Susan Bibeau’s letter to Postmedia News

Worth reading in its entirety but some highlights:

Most will call my son a terrorist, I don’t believe he was part of an organization or acted on behalf of some grand ideology or for a political motive. I believe he acted in despair. I am not sure of the meaning of being radicalized. I doubt he watched much islamic propaganda, I doubt he wanted to go fight in Syria. I know he believed the US government responsible for killing thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians, that he did say that.

I believe his actions did create terror. He did mention having met once one of the persons mentioned in the media, person that I believe went to Syria to fight, he also said that person would have left Canada with the passport of someone else. He had met him in the mosque. He mentioned having asked the Imam of the Mosque if he knew of this persons’ activities and the Imam would have said no.

My son was not on the list of persons under supervision by CSIS, that further supports my belief of the last desperate act of a person not well in his mind, a person wanting to be killed. I will add that I am not unbiased in this so I may be wrong, I have not been following much of the information on the news, so there may be a lot I don’t know.

For me mental illness, is at the centre of this tragedy. At some point in his life, my son had a serious addiction to drugs, I don’t know if he overcame it, but doing so much of it could have left permanent marks and led to his current mental state. His conversations were often strange.

Was he crazy? I never could have imagined that he would do something like this, but he was not well either. He refused any of my help, he preferred staying in the homeless shelter rather than coming to my house.

I will always be left with the question if I could have said something else, insisted more to help…. The emptiness and pain are overwhelming.

In closing, I wish to apologize to everyone, I am deeply sorry and deeply saddened by the events. Violence never solves anything, however it seems ever present, so easily the response.

Susan Bibeau’s letter to Postmedia News.