Newly released surveillance video shows the moment an Ontario man disguised in a burka tried and failed to assassinate a Hells Angels member in a packed food court at the Vancouver International Airport in April 2015.
In the video, Knowah Ferguson, the 18-year-old would-be hitman, is seen approaching a table where his target, Damion Ryan, a Hells Angels member dressed in white, is sitting.
Ferguson lifts one of the two handguns he was carrying in his purse to the back of Ryan’s head and pulls the trigger, but nothing fires, and Ryan can be seen trying to swat the gun away before fleeing on foot.
Few of the bystanders appear to have noticed the attack, which unfolded in seconds.
Ferguson, who was carrying a Glock and a .45-caliber handgun, told his accomplice, who has not been identified in court records, that he tried to get the second gun out of his purse after the first gun jammed.
The pair later torched their getaway car -- and the burka -- before returning to a Vancouver motel to await their next assignment.
They were arrested a few months later, in June, in a stolen truck with a cache of firearms.
Ferguson pleaded guilty to attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder and was sentenced to 11 years in prison last month on the two charges.
According to court records, Ferguson, who had no previous criminal record, was motivated to carry out the hit by a promised $200,000 payout.
Though he maintained that “the overall plan…was instigated and designed by (others)” and that his role was simply to “execute,” the judge derided him for being an “active and eager participant who was ready to take a life.”
With a report from CTV Vancouver’s David Molko
