A minor hockey team from Sherbrooke experienced a disturbing situation to say the least, Saturday evening, in the hotel where they were staying, in Saint-Nicolas, one of the sectors of the city of Lévis, while they were participating in a U13 tournament in Sainte-Marie-de-Beauce.
Several shots were fired at a man in his 20s in what was believed at the time to be an organized crime event.
The police investigation is heading more towards mistaken identity, we learned on Monday. According to the police department, the event is linked to the conflict raging in the criminal environment, reports The Sun.
The man suffered multiple gunshot wounds, police confirm.
A shooting in the parking lot of the Comfort Inn hotel which occurred very close to the rooms of the Sherbrooke team. Another hockey team and a volleyball team also occupied the establishment during the events.
The head coach of the Sherbrooke team — who prefers to remain anonymous for his team — was still in shock Monday afternoon.
“It can’t be described. There was a shooting outside the hotel. Parents and children are still in shock. I try to protect everyone, I don’t want it to bring up trauma.”
“It happened 10 feet in front of the bedrooms. We were one floor higher and some parents were on the first level, at the parking lot level. We heard the sound of gunshots, everyone heard these noises in the hotel. We thought it was someone angry in a room, but when we found out what it was, we got scared. It stays in your head,” he said, still visibly shaken.
The situation quickly became confusing for everyone at the hotel.
“Despite our misfortunes, there was a mother of one of the athletes on the volleyball team who is a crisis social worker. She helped the children. She spent about two hours talking with the young people to calm them down. The young people, and some parents, are still in shock from all this,” reiterates the head coach.
“Since Saturday, we have tried to manage the situation as best we can, but it is not easy. It’s a trauma. Some children don’t sleep well, they startle, they wake up in the middle of the night. It also affects parents. We think that this kind of event happens in big cities, in city centers, but not in Saint-Nicolas.”
Help for the team?
The team quickly contacted Hockey Sherbrooke on Sunday to obtain help in managing this exceptional situation.
“There has never been a precedent like this. Hockey Sherbrooke is looking at how they could help us, parents and children. We are waiting for answers,” said the head coach.
The latter still does not know if the team’s season will continue.
“You have to consider everything. We will wait to speak to Hockey Sherbrooke, to see how we will proceed next. Let’s say that many young people are seriously affected. I myself am very affected; I’m OK, I can function, but mentally, for my team, I’m thinking about what’s next.”
“We have nothing, no services, to support young people. No one has ever seen this, it doesn’t happen every day. We only see this on television. And even then, we know that it is fiction, that it is not reality. When it happens for real, it’s another world.”
— The head coach
Hockey Sherbrooke has already offered to postpone the team’s practices and matches in the short term.
A meeting of the organization’s general management is also scheduled for Tuesday.
“We are very sensitive to the situation, it makes us think. I have been working in minor hockey for around 50 years, and I have never been confronted with this type of event. We will do everything to support them and find the necessary resources,” specifies Jean-Guy Rancourt, hockey director at Hockey Sherbrooke.
