Since last week's stabbing incident at the Quartier Cavendish Cineplex Odeon Theatre, I have received many calls from frightened constituents. A couple were reportedly watching a movie when the wife asked a man behind her to stop smoking cannabis. He allegedly lunged towards her with a knife. The husband stepped in front and was stabbed in the leg.
Five men were stopped by police in the parking lot, but released.
"Our Sergeant on the scene interviewed them and they were not at all connected to the incident," Commander Luis Oliveira told me. "There was no evidence to bring any of them in."
The Commander said none of the men smelled from cannabis either. "We have all of the information on each one of them in the event we need to communicate with them," he said.
According to the Commander this was an isolated incident and people do not need to panic. In the meantime officers from Police Station 9 have been doing foot patrols in the Quartier all week and they will continue to do so. The socio community agents are meeting with the cinema management to establish proper procedures for what to do when people light up, get into fights, etc. As our City Manager Tanya Abramovitch righly told members of council today, "We at the city have the reflex to call Public Security and/or the police, but they do not. Had such a procedure been in place, this likely would not have escalated in the way it did. The fact that what they were smoking was cannabis is not really relevant. They could have been smoking a cigarette and the same thing would have happened. "
I, like many people, often go to this theatre. It is absolutely necessary for one staff member to routinely go in and out of each room to see if anyone is acting inappropriately and to take the proper action. How many times have any of us turned around in a movie theatre and, for instance, asked someone to be quiet. As the Commander told me, the perpetrator "was clearly someone high on dope,"
It’s because of our low crime rate that people are freaking out about this isolated incident. That and the fact that it was poorly communicated to the public until the article in The Suburban came out. The Police Commander’s comment of “clearly someone high on dope” is ridiculous. We CSLers often joke that the police force at Station 9 have the easiest post on the island. I’m glad to live in our safe city and am grateful to CSL Public Security, VCops, and the Police for helping to keep it that way.
CSL residents are very fortunate to live in a “relatively” crime free community. Do not fool yourselves in believing there is no crime, there are issues, but not as many as in other areas of the island of Montreal. Knowing this Commander, the residents can be certain that they have a police officer in place with a lot of experience and an understanding of the particularities of this area. Have faith. Possibly fact-check the “clearly someone high on dope” for clarification on the comment.