And, it’s not a good idea to sleep on a bus either.
It was news from rural Manitoba that went around the world. As is well known by now, 40-year-old Vincent Weiguang Li has been charged with second degree murder in the death of 22-year-old Tim McLean Jr. aboard a Greyhound bus heading towards Winnipeg.
Li suddenly took out a knife, and stabbed McLean dozens of times before beheading him and showing the severed head to the passengers who were then all outside of the bus. There was no provocation for the attack and the only contact between the two, other than sitting next to each other, was when they and other passengers were outside the bus at a previous stop smoking cigarettes.
According to witnesses, Mr. McLean was sleeping while playing music through headphones, with his head resting against the window. He did this while a stranger was in the seat next to him. Had Mr. McLean been awake at the time that Li pulled the knife he would at least have a fighting chance. The driver and passengers who have been criticized in some circles for escaping the bus rather than come to the young victim’s aid, may have reacted differently to a fight rather than the attack that was probably fatal before anyone realized exactly what was going on.
Tim McLean cannot be faulted for being asleep any more than airlines can be faulted for not searching passengers for nail files or cigarette lighters on September 10, 2001. In the wake of what happened on the Winnipeg bound bus, many people are now calling for airport type security for buses. It’s never going to happen. The expense of such security measures would be prohibitive for those who travel long distances by bus many times because they cannot afford to fly. And buses, unlike aircraft make frequent stops where passengers get on and off. It seems infeasible to have the driver set up a metal detector in the parking lot of Joe’s Good Eats after a 20 minute stop. Anyone who wants to get a weapon onboard a bus will find it easier than to take a knife or a gun on an aircraft. And although this horrific murder took place on a long distance route from Edmonton to Winnipeg, it could have just as easily have happened on a city bus, streetcar or subway car. If it is impractical to impose airport type security on Greyhound and similar carriers it would be impossible to impose stringent measures on municipal public transit.
The reality is that we live in a violent society despite all the bragging that crime rates are going down. During the past weekend in Toronto, there were three murders including that of a 7-year-old girl who was allegedly beaten to death by her guardian. It’s of little consequence to the friends and families of those victims as well as those of Mr. McLean that crime rates are going down. While acts of sudden horrific and unprovoked violence like that that cut down Tim McLean are extremely rare, they can happen anywhere at any time.
Police are constantly warning people to be aware of their surroundings. Those surrounding should include buses and other forms of transportation where people are in close contact with strangers and where there is virtually no chance of escape if something happens. It is true that not sleeping on long trips such as the 20 hour journey that McLean had embarked upon is pretty well impossible. But what is strange is the amount of people who sleep on public transit while sitting against the window, hemmed in by a total stranger who is probably non violent but then maybe not. And for some surprising reason, more people seem to be sleeping on city buses and subways in the morning where presumably most of them are off to work, than they are in the evening when returning home. Not sleeping in confined public spaces, hemmed in as Mr. McLean was, should be the “new normal”.
It has been over 40 years since Petula Clark sang about not sleeping in the subway. Now it’s about time that people listened to that advice.
