Three teenagers are in hospital and police are looking for suspects after stabbings on the Calgary Stampede grounds late Tuesday.
Calgary police say just after 11 p.m., officers responded to reports of an assault near the Euroslide on the Calgary Stampede midway.
Police say a fight broke out between group of 8 to 10 people.
When officers arrived they found an 18-year-old man with stab wounds. He was taken to hospital in serious but stable condition.
A short time later, officers responded to two more reports of people with similar injuries, a 15-year-old in the area of 17 Avenue SE and Macleod Trail, and another 18-year-old man near Erlton Street SW and 27 Avenue SW.
Police determined they were also involved in the fight. The pair were both taken to hospital with serious injuries.
CPS are calling the incident an “isolated” targeted attack and say the victims and suspects were known to each other.
“The motive behind the attack remains under investigation,” says CPS acting Insp. Scott Campbell.
The suspect, or suspects, have yet to be identified.
Investigators say they are in the process of reviewing security footage of the area and say some of the cameras on the grounds captured part of the incident.
Campbell says how the suspects were able to get an edged weapon through metal detectors and stampede security is also part of the investigation.
“They do have measures in place to try to mitigate anything getting on, but certainly there’s always a possibility that things will slip through or come in a different way,” says Campbell, adding that there were around 193,000 people who came through the gates on Tuesday.
A Don Toliver concert that was expected to draw thousands of young people to the Coca-Cola Stage ended about 15 minutes before the incident took place, but Campbell said there is no indication the stabbing had anything to do with the show.
“Our bag searches and metal detectors are in place and last night we remained at our highest level of security searches throughout the evening,” says the Stampede’s director of public safety Kerrie Blizard. “Despite the volume of people that were arriving we did not decrease our security searches last night.”
Police say there were likely a number of witnesses that saw the incident happen, and some may have recorded it on their cellphones.
Anyone who witnessed the incident or who has video footage from the area at the time is asked to contact police at 403-266-1234 or tip anonymously through CrimeStoppers.