Nova Scotia Mass Shooter’s Spouse Worried He Was Looking for Her When Killings Began

Nova Scotia Mass Shooter’s Spouse Worried He Was Looking for Her When Killings Began
A couple pays their respects to the victims of the shooting at a makeshift memorial in Portapique, N.S., on April 22, 2020. (The Canadian Press)
The Canadian Press
2/20/2021
Updated:
2/20/2021

HALIFAX—The spouse of the gunman who killed 22 people in Nova Scotia told police that she has had guilty feelings and wonders whether others died because she ran away from her partner when his rampage began last April.

Lisa Banfield told police that she questions whether Gabriel Wortman went to locations she might have run to in order to get help and then killed people as he went along.

The information is contained in a statement she provided to RCMP Staff Sgt. Greg Vardy on April 28, which was used as part of a police application for a search warrant.

Previously released court documents related how Banfield had escaped after being assaulted by Wortman on the night of April 18.

After her escape, Wortman began a killing rampage that only ended the next day after a police officer shot him dead at a gas station in Enfield, N.S.

Banfield told police that in the days prior to the killings Wortman was “caught up with COVID−19,” was talking about death and said that he knew he was going to die.