No evidence of racial bias in QEII fatal shooting as 2nd person charged: RCMP

A second person has been charged in connection with the fatal shooting of Birinder Singh on Highway 2 south of Edmonton. Amanda Anderson has the latest.

Investigators have charged a second person in the fatal shooting of 22-year-old Birinder Singh on the QEII and now say his death was neither a hate crime nor a case of road rage.

“Any shooting in the public is alarming, but I can tell you with certainty, our investigation has shown that this is absolutely not racially motivated whatsoever,” Alberta RCMP Major Crimes Sgt. John Brown told reporters at a Wednesday press conference.

“It has nothing to do with any type of racial bias … Although our suspect was a white male, the second suspect is not.”

Deon Libsekal, a 23-year-old who was already in custody for unrelated matters, faces charges of second-degree murder and accessory after the fact in connection with Singh’s death. He was arrested in Edmonton at the end of March.

Less than a week prior, Mounties had also arrested 18-year-old Jimmy Gassner. RCMP say they believe they’ve now charged all suspects in Singh’s death, and that both men were known to police.

Mounties confirmed Tuesday that a pickup truck pulled up beside Singh’s car near Leduc on March 14. The occupants of the truck threw up a peace sign at the friends, who returned the gesture.

Two gunshots were then fired, at least one of which hit Singh. Police currently believe Gassner was the passenger and shooter while Libsekal was driving the truck.

The group of friends were able to pull their car to the side of the road before Singh succumbed to his injuries. The pickup truck sped off, according to witnesses.

Singh and his friends were international students from India. His surviving friends previously said they believed they were the victims of a hate crime. The World Sikh Organization subsequently called for RCMP to investigate the shooting as though it were racially motivated.

To maintain the investigation’s integrity, Mounties say they had confirmed a motive but would not disclose it. They did rule out racial bias, racial hatred, robbery, road rage or gang initiation.

Second-degree murder charges were laid instead of first-degree ones to reflect the lack of planning behind the shooting, Mounties said.

“In our investigation we could show that there was absolutely no plan,” Brown said. “This probably occurred and became an incident within two minutes.”

Both Gassner and Libsekal may have been involved in gang-related activities that were unrelated to this shooting, he added.

Mounties couldn’t say whether drugs and alcohol were involved and did not rule out mistaken identity or a random act of violence.

“We can’t promise this is never going to happen again. That being said, this is something that is a very, very rare instance. It doesn’t happen often. And I think that people can still feel safe driving on the road and not worry about something like this happening to them,” said Alberta RCMP Cpl. Mathew Howell.

Investigators also thanked the public for a number of tips they said helped lead to the arrests.

Both Gassner and Libsekal remain in custody and the latter is due in court Thursday.