The twin brothers who were killed while carrying out a heist at a bank in Canada last year in July had been planning their attack for many years, with the aim to kill as many police officers as possible.
Convicts Mathew and Isaac Auchterlonie, 22, were killed by the cops after they attempted to rob the Bank of Montreal branch in the municipality of Saanich, British Columbia.
An investigation by the Vancouver Island integrated major crime unit found that the brothers had strong anti-government and anti-police views and were even ready to sacrifice their lives during the heist.
“It was determined the suspects’ primary objective was to shoot and kill police officers in what they saw as a stand against government regulations, especially in relation to firearms ownership,” Cpl Alex Bérubé of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police said during a news conference at the Saanich police department, reports AP news agency.
The officer said that the brothers had been hatching some sort of “act of extreme violence” since 2019 and initially wanted the shootout to happen in mid-2023.
But their desire to move out of the house they shared with their mother led them to move up their plan.
“The suspects concluded that they could not move their arsenal of weapons to a new location without attracting attention, and thus electing the bank location at random,” Bérubé was quoted as saying.
On Tuesday morning, after the twins left the bank, members of the Greater Victoria emergency response team, who were in the vicinity in an unrelated matter, spotted them and decided to help other officers catch the culprit.
During the gunfight, six officers were injured. An earlier report said police fired as many as 100 rounds at the suspects, killing them both.
(With inputs from agencies)
