As It Happens

Family of slain Toronto student "shocked" at fatal stabbing inside school

The family of 19-year-old Hamid Aminzada are in shock and disbelief after he was stabbed and killed in a Toronto high school Tuesday, according to a family friend. "The police don't tell us anything at all, Nabil Sayed tells Carol. Aminzada, a student who recently emigrated from Afghanistan with his family, was stabbed while trying to break up a hallway...

The family of 19-year-old Hamid Aminzada are in shock and disbelief after he was stabbed and killed in a Toronto high school Tuesday, according to a family friend. "The police don't tell us anything at all, Nabil Sayed tells Carol. Aminzada, a student who recently emigrated from Afghanistan with his family, was stabbed while trying to break up a hallway fight at North Albion Collegiate Institute.


He later died in hospital. Another teenager turned himself into police and charged with second-degree murder.  

"He was a very good kid," says Sayed, of Hamid Aminzad. " He was never involved in fights. He was always listening to his father and his mother, his brother and sister."

"The family was very happy. Yesterday they had been very happy." Mr Sayed says the teen's father came to Canada two years ago in order to send his kids to school and so they could grow up in a safe country.   

"Everybody is talking about the same matter," says Sayed. "How it happened in Canada, inside the school? Somebody is going to stab and kill you? This is like impossible."

Speaking at a news conference today, a Toronto school board official said that the attack would be reviewed to determine if the school could have done anything differently, but ruled out the use of metal detectors.