The owner of the building set on fire on the night of Monday to Tuesday in Mascouche is stunned by the age of the suspects, who allegedly threw Molotov cocktails onto his property.
“Minors doing this is definitely surprising,” said owner John Aira Moali.
Two of the four minor suspects arrested by the police smelled of gasoline and fire when they were found, hiding in a nearby yard, reports Mascouche Police Service Captain Maxime St-Georges.
The other two had been found a few minutes earlier.
The person who called 911 around 11 p.m. Monday night told officers that four people ran away before the flames started. That’s what put officers on the trail of the suspects, the captain said.
“A few months ago it was a pizzeria a few blocks away, today it’s us…” laments the worried owner of the burned-out building.
The owner’s business is holding up
John Aira Moali is also a director of the tropical wood import company based at the same address, JM Tropical Wood. He is also the main shareholder of the company that owns the business.
On site, signs indicate that she also does landscaping and construction.
Despite the flames, he is not worried about his business since “no equipment was damaged.” “We will do our work as usual, we have to,” he resigns himself.
“It’s especially unfortunate for my tenants who lived there,” Moali said. “They speak Spanish, so there’s a language barrier, so I’m trying to help them find housing. I don’t know where they’re going to go and they didn’t have insurance.”
According to the police, the tenants were foreign workers who, by chance, were due to move out the day after the incident.
Another piece of good news for tenants is that there was much less damage on the side of the building where their rooms were located, allowing them to “recover their furniture and all their personal belongings.”
Photo Agence QMI, Pascal Girard
There were “about eight of them who came out of the house and gathered on the sidewalk” following the event, according to a neighbor who wished to remain anonymous.
Mr. Moali says the workers in question were not hired by his landscaping company.
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