The killing of 85-year-old Chang Yong Cho who died in his home in Burnaby, B.C., is the latest in dozens of cases where people have died or been injured by stray bullets in Canada in the last 30 years. They include multiple high-profile deaths of children and adults killed in public spaces as well as their homes. In 2018, 15-year-old Alfred Wong was in the back seat of a vehicle with his family as they drove home from dinner in Vancouver when he was hit by a bullet as they drove past a shootout between gang rivals on the busy Broadway thoroughfare. Kane Carter was sentenced in July to two life terms for second-degree murder, for killing Wong and an alleged gangster who died in the same shootout. Wong and Cho are among at least nine people across Canada hit by stray bullets in the past 10 years, and more than 30 since the 1990s, including at least 16 who died. Police investigating Cho’s death said on Tuesday that he was killed in his home by a bullet fired around 1:30 a.m. on Aug. 30, about a block away. Investigators have appealed to a group of youth believed to be involved to “do the right thing” and come forward. Other victims in stray-bullet shootings have included eight-year-old JahVai Roy, who died after being hit by a bullet in bed in Toronto in August last year, 21-year-old Indian student Harsimrat Randhawa, who died in April 2025 after being shot while waiting for a bus in Hamilton, Ont., and Dante Andreatta Marroquin, 12, killed in Toronto in 2020 when two men sprayed dozens of rounds from a moving vehicle. Five-year-old Ethan Yellowbird died in 2011 after being struck by a bullet while he slept on the Samson Cree reserve south of Edmonton, while in 2007, 11-year-old Ephraim Brown was attending a birthday party outside a Toronto housing complex when he was struck in the neck by a bullet and died. Laurie Tinga survived after being shot in the head in 2005 by a stray bullet while watching TV in her home in Port Moody, B.C., in what police called a gang shootout. This report by Ashley Joannou, The Canadian Press, was first published Sept. 9, 2026
