Triple shooting victims in East Selkirk, Man., are 2 men, woman
'There is a lot of work to do, a lot of questions that need to be answered,' RCMP says
The victims of a triple shooting in East Selkirk, Man., are two men and a woman, say police, who remained tight-lipped about details.
"There is a lot of work to do, a lot of questions that need to be answered in order for the family to come to terms as to what happened," said RCMP spokesperson Sgt. Paul Manaigre.
CBC has learned two of the dead were James Gregoire and Nicole Rach-Gregoire. The two were married.
As well, CBC News has confirmed the third person was Bill Wozney of Winnipeg. He was a physiotherapist with Selkirk-based Physiotherapy on the Red, where Rach-Gregoire worked as the office manager.
When asked whether the three victims lived at the home or if anyone else was in the house at the time, Manaigre said, "the investigation is ongoing [and] at this point I can only confirm that shots were fired, firearms were used."
Asked how long he expects the RCMP to be at the scene, Manaigre said, "as long as it takes."
Although he wouldn't say whether it was a murder-suicide, Manaigre said there are no other suspects.
Geordie Rach, Rach-Gregoire's son, told CBC News he has little information about what happened.
"We barely know what's going on ourselves; the RCMP haven't told us anything," he said.
When asked if he wanted to say anything about his mother or her husband, Rach replied, "No, just kind of keeping it to our family, keeping it to ourselves."
Neighbours shocked
Police received multiple calls from neighbours just after 7 p.m. CT Monday about shots fired in the area, 40 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg.
The bodies were found outside of the house, which sits on a waterfront acreage at 15 Cooks Cove.
Neighbours told CBC News on Tuesday that the incident is upsetting and shocking. One woman was in tears.
It's a very small community, so most people knows the victims, said a neighbour who only wanted his first name, Rick, used.
"They were a popular family, a good family," he said. "Everybody's devastated, I'm sure. They're a young couple and they had a lot on the go."
Rick said he has lived in the area for 31 years and nothing has ever happened like this before.
"It's just a sad day. A sad day, for sure," he said. "It's such a devastating situation, so many questions to be answered."
I guess you just don't know. It can happen anywhere.- Kevin Franco
Another neighbour, Kevin Franco, heard three shots. The first two were about two seconds apart, followed by the last one five seconds later, he said.
"It sounded like it was my neighbour playing a joke on me with the lid of his tin garbage can, banging it to get my attention or something," he said.
When he learned what happened, he said he was stunned because the neighbourhood is a quiet one where everyone waves to one another.
"Very friendly, very friendly. Very out of the ordinary this sort of thing, that's for sure," he said.
There's only a half-dozen homes on Cooks Cove, each with large properties. The road dead-ends at Cooks Creek, so most people travelling it know one another, Franco said.
"You get to see the vehicles all the time and everybody's outside so everybody's waving," he said. "I guess you just don't know. It can happen anywhere.
"It's shocking."
Officers from the RCMP's serious crime unit and forensic identification unit were on the scene late into the night and the property remained taped off Tuesday morning.
With files from Caroline Barghout