The father of the 18-year-old transgender killer who slaughtered eight people (nine of you count his suicide) in Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia, on February 10 spoke out for the first time about the senseless killing. Justin Van Rootselaar, the biological dad of the mass murderer, distanced himself from his son and said he had little to do with his upbringing.
Notably, he also used male pronouns when talking about his offspring, and called him his “son,” because that is the truth. Some in the media and in Canadian law enforcement have been struggling to admit that reality.
His name is Jesse Van Rootselaar, and he gunned down his mother and 11-year-old brother before targeting children at the Tumbler Ridge Secondary School. He was wearing a dress during the massacre and publicly identified as transgender.
The father said he was a dad in name only:
“I was estranged from Jesse Strang and was not part of his life,” he told the CBC in a statement, using the last name of the shooter’s mom, Jennifer Strang, who was among the eight shot dead Tuesday.
“His mother declined my involvement from the beginning, and I was not given the opportunity to be a part of raising him. Jesse did not use the [Van Rootselaar] family name at any point in his life,” he continued. [He went by Jesse Strang.]
He also spoke of the heartbreak families must be going through in the aftermath:
“While that distance is the reality of our relationship, it does not lessen the heartbreak I feel for the pain that has been caused to innocent people and to the town we call home,” the father added.
[…]
“This is a time for compassion, for holding one another close, and for supporting the families who are grieving such unimaginable loss,” Justin Van Rootselaar said.
"As we respect your grief, we respectfully ask that you also respect ours. There will be no further statements.”
MORE: Canadian Mass Shooter Identified As Transgender, Authorities Rush to Not 'Misgender'
Can't Make It Up: Hillary Clinton Opens Girls' Rights Panel by Interviewing... Transgender Lawmaker
As our sister site Townhall noted, the media and Canadian law enforcement tried to lecture people about Jesse’s gender identity and went to idiotic lengths to make sure his designation was “honored” — even though he is dead and a sadistic killer.
Make sure you call him a “gunperson,” not a gunman:
This network makes MSNBC look tame. https://t.co/oEe32GC35J
— Bonchie (@bonchieredstate) February 11, 2026
Jesse had a history of mental illness, and police were frequent visitors to the home. The media should be more focused on why this guy wasn’t behind bars or getting help in an institution — not what pronouns he preferred.
"Van Rootselaar wasn’t a woman. He was an eighteen-year-old man—a gun-obsessed, middle-school dropout whose many mental-health afflictions happened to include gender dysphoria. The mass murderer called himself a woman. But that doesn’t mean he was, or that the rest of us have to… pic.twitter.com/HJg0oAYGKI
— Quillette (@Quillette) February 16, 2026
But that doesn’t mean he was, or that the rest of us have to live in the imaginary universe he (literally) built for himself.
Editor’s Note: Progressive policies have hurt America immeasurably.
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