The man accused of stabbing two Abbotsford Senior Secondary school students – one fatally – was a typical high school student in Red Deer, Alberta – though he had a short fuse, say friends.
Gabriel Klein was someone who responded badly to fellow students when he didn’t think things were going his way – even punching one boy, said Sandra Kay-Leigh Schmidt, who was in several classes with Klein at Lindsay Thurber Comprehensive High School.
“Some days he seemed perfectly okay, and other days he would scream at you,” Schmidt told CTV News.
Two incidents stood out in her recollection of the young man, who now faces charges of aggravated assault and second degree murder in connection with an attack in Abbotsford that left a 14-year-old girl wounded and a 13-year-old girl dead.
The first, in 2012, was in a welding class. Students were joking and Klein took offense and lashed out at another boy who hadn’t been involved, Schmidt remembered.
“He got aggravated and angry. He yelled at him and punched him in the head,” Schmidt said. The boy was not seriously injured.
The second incident was in a math class, where a student had his feet underneath Klein’s desk.
“That was not okay to Gabe,” recalled Schmidt. “I remember he stood up and started screaming. Screaming that he was going to do something to him.”
The math teacher intervened and Klein didn’t come back to the class after that, Schmidt said. She said she’s not sure if he graduated, or how Klein ended up staying in shelters near Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside where locals say he was a regular buyer of crystal meth.
It appears Klein was en route back to Alberta and staying in a homeless shelter when something happened. He went into a local liquor store, and then was arrested in Abbotsford Senior Secondary.
The wounded girl’s identity can’t be reported because of a publication ban, but the community is coming together to remember Letisha Reimer.
“Just a chance to acknowledge this is a tragedy that’s happened within the community of Abbotsford with our teenagers and we want to give them a space to process and grieve,” said Tyson Kiliem, Central Heights Church Pastor.
Another acquaintance of Klein’s at Lindsay Thurber Comprehensive High School said he didn’t think Klein was out of the ordinary.
Tanner McDougall says Klein was just another kid trying to fit in like everyone else, and part of that was trying the mild psychoactive drug salvia. A video surfaced of Klein trying the drug, and laughing with several friends who can be seen off-camera.
“It was a high school thing. Everyone was all about trying it,” McDougall said. “He was a generic, normal, nothing out of the ordinary, no red flags sort of kid.”
Abbotsford Senior Secondary School will remain closed until Monday.
