Anger, grief in Quebec after ‘attack’ on daycare centre

The driver who Canadian police believe deliberately crashed his bus into a daycare centre, killing two children, is being evaluated by psychiatrists, officials said as mourners laid flowers and lit candles at the site.
Pierre Ny St-Amand, 51, faces nine counts including premeditated murder and attempted murder.
He has been “transferred from hospital for psychiatric examination”, Quebec’s provincial public security minister, Francois Bonnardel, told reporters.
In the city of Laval, a suburb of Montreal, incomprehension and anger dominated a day after St-Amand rammed his bus into the daycare centre as some parents were dropping off their children.
Mourners – among them Quebec officials, Laval residents and people who had travelled from other cities – came to lay flowers or stuffed toys and to light candles in front of the daycare centre as well as a nearby church.
“It’s a terrible tragedy, I’ve been speechless since yesterday,” said Yannick Lebeau, who came with his wife from their home 20km (12 miles) away to pay tribute.
His wife Annick Belisle, a teacher for 20 years, was in tears at his side.
She called the deaths “senseless”.
The daycare centre suffered serious damage, with part of its facade broken and covered with plywood.
Debris was still scattered over the ground yesterday.
Some of the children were trapped under the bus before being freed.
One child died on the scene and another in an ambulance, authorities said, while a further six children were rushed to hospital but have since been deemed out of danger.
St-Amand appeared briefly at a hearing on Wednesday, hours after the tragedy, where he refused to speak but nodded to answer the judge’s questions, smiling broadly and repeatedly trying to sit up from the bed to which he was handcuffed.
Witnesses who tried to subdue him at the scene said he was acting erratically, including removing all his clothes.
He is scheduled to appear in court again on February 17.
Authorities have revealed that St-Amand has worked for the Laval municipality’s public transit system for about 10 years and does not have a criminal record.
Flags on some public buildings, including the Quebec provincial legislature, have been lowered to half-staff, and small shrines have been created near the scene of the tragedy.
At one point, a Laval police cruiser parked on the crime scene perimeter was piled high with stuffed toys, flowers and sympathy messages.
More lie by a nearby fence and outside a local church where people stopped last evening to leave plush animals and candles as well to console each other.
Authorities did not confirm the children’s ages, but according to the Canadian Broadcasting Corp, about 80 kids under the age of five attend that daycare facility.