Greyhound Canada beheading suspect utters death wish in Manitoba court

Vince Weiguang Li, the forty year old Chinese-Canadian who has been charged with the beheading of 22 year old Tim McClean on a Greyhound Canada bus, has indicated that he wishes to die, according to media reports. Li refused to communicate with prosecutors or with his government-assigned legal counsel earlier today, and he also remained silent during an initial court hearing this morning in Portage La Prairie (Manitoba). Several reporters heard Li say “please kill me” when the presiding judge asked him if he wished to have a lawyer. The judge has ordered that Li undergo a psychiatric evaluation prior to his next court appearance, which is expected to take place on September 8^th, 2008.

Li arrived to Canada in 2004 as an immigrant from China, along with his wife Anna. His acquaintances, including a church pastor, told journalists that there were signs that Li could be capable of such horrific violence. The shocking incident took place last week along the Trans-Canada highway, near Portage La Prairie, when Li repeatedly stabbed and then beheaded McClean with a butcher’s knife. A group of passengers who tried to intervene found Li holding McClean’s severed head in one hand and the bloodied knife in the other. CNN also reported that Li proceeded to hack at the corpse and a police officer claimed that he even saw Li engage in what appeared to be cannibalism. Li now faces second degree murder charges.

www.greyhound.ca