2 men randomly attacked by hammer-wielding man in downtown Winnipeg

A 28-year-old man is charged with aggravated assault and possession of a weapon after police say he randomly attacked two strangers with a hammer in downtown Winnipeg on Saturday afternoon.

In a news release sent late Sunday morning, the Winnipeg Police Service said officers were alerted to an assault happening near the Millennium Library around 3:10 p.m.

Winnipeg Police Service spokesperson Const. Rob Carver said officers walking near Portage Avenue and Donald Street were flagged down by a person who said someone was being assaulted a block over.

They found a man in his 60s with severe head injuries who had been attacked by a man with a hammer at a bus shelter at Donald Street and Graham Avenue. He was taken to hospital in critical condition.

Carver said the weapon was a kind of hammer often used for household demolition projects.

"My understanding it was like a small sledgehammer, almost a mallet-type hammer," he said. "They're fairly common. Not common as a weapon. I would say we don't see that very often, thankfully."

Carver said the officers called more police units to the scene immediately. They then found a man in his 50s in the Millennium Library Park who had also been attacked by a hammer-wielding man and also had severe head injuries. He was taken to hospital in unstable condition, the release said.

'He was in plain sight'

Police said they determined the same suspect was likely responsible for both unprovoked attacks and that neither victim knew the attacker.

Carver said officers from several units spread out across the downtown area in cars and on foot, looking for a suspect who they still didn't have a clear description of.

"He was in plain sight, but he'd been evading us for a long time. Officers were catching glimpses of what they thought was a suspect. I talked to one officer who said that they were exhausted after a couple of hours of on foot running around downtown looking for this guy," Carver said.

"We had officers who were looking initially for a suspect and stopped a guy. It turned out to be the wrong guy."

Carver said police eventually found the man after security guards from a building downtown pointed them in the right direction.

They arrested the man without incident around 5:10 p.m. at Graham Avenue and Edmonton Street, he said.

"He was, from the reports I read, relatively cooperative. I mean, officers confront a guy who could have easily killed a couple of people — they would have had their weapons out, their guns out. But he complied. When other officers arrived, he was on the ground being handcuffed," Carver said.

"He didn't give us much in the way of background information as to why this would have happened, but he wasn't combative. Very odd."

No indication of drugs, alcohol

Carver said police still aren't sure what motivated the attacks, and there is no clear indication drugs or alcohol were involved.

"I stopped long ago trying to put some sort of normal context on abnormal events, and I think a lot of cops do the same. None of it makes sense, and often there is no explanation," he said. 

"You kind of shrug your shoulders and go, 'What? Why on Earth could this, how could this have happened?' But I think a lot of tragic events end up with the same sort of conclusion. We look for answers where sometimes there just aren't any."

The man is charged with one count of mischief under $5,000 and two counts each of aggravated assault and possession of a weapon.

He was detained in custody.

Both victims are now in stable condition, but are still recovering from serious head injuries and not ready to talk about the attacks — leaving investigators with unanswered questions.

"I know yesterday, [they] were not in any way, shape or form to be interviewed," said Carver. "So I don't think we have a complete picture yet. In speaking to the officers, the injuries were quite traumatic."