The Canadian Femicide Observatory for Justice and Accountability is releasing an extensive report today – the 30th anniversary of the Montreal Massacre.
Fourteen women who were pursuing engineering careers at l’Ecole Polytechnique were gunned down by Marc Lepine, a young man with a troubled past who often complained about women working in “non-traditional” jobs and claimed the murders were an attack on feminism.
Jenny Wright is an expert panelist on the observatory and outlined some of the startling findings on women who have been killed in Canada.
Nine out of every ten women murdered left behind at least one child, speaking to the profound inter-generational impact on families and communities.
Wright says there’s also been an increase in women murdered in rural communities. She says about 24 per cent of femicides were in rural, remote or northern communities, troubling because there are fewer resources in those areas for women to get help.