CTV and others reported on the 20th (local time) that eight teenage girls killed a homeless man with a weapon in downtown Toronto, Canada.
The Toronto Police Department said in an interview that day that a homeless man (59) was stabbed to death by a weapon wielded by teenage girls on the street in the city center at around 12:30 am the previous day.
Eight of them, three 13-year-olds and two 14-year-olds, and two 16-year-olds, were charged with second-degree murder.
Police said they met through social media and gathered around 10:30 pm on the 18th in the center near the site.
At the time, the criminals approached the homeless man who was talking to another person and had an argument with him, then took out a weapon he had in advance and attacked him.
It is said that the crime took place within 3 minutes.
The seriously injured homeless man was taken to the hospital by an ambulance called by passers-by at the scene, but died soon after.
Police officials said they had no clue as to whether the girls and the homeless knew each other, and they did not know why or how the altercation occurred.
However, the official said that the investigation is underway as the case may be 'swarming', which refers to a type of crime in which several people work together to find and attack an innocent victim without any special motive.
He added that the perpetrators did not appear to be gang members and that three of them had previous contact with the police.
They were caught and arrested by the police who were quickly dispatched near the crime scene and were reported to have possessed weapons other than the weapons used in the crime.
Before the crime, the police explained that they had a similar altercation with other passers-by, and this was also identified as a form of swarming.
(Photo = CBC website, Yonhap News)