Members of the Filipino-Canadian community express frustration in online groups
Vancouver, BC
By Charmaine Y. Rodriguez
The accused in the killing 11 people in a vehicle-ramming attack at the Lapu-Lapu Day festival in Vancouver last April 2025 has pleaded not guilty to all 42 charges.
Damienne Darby of the British Columbia (B.C.) Prosecution Service said Adam Kai-Ji Lo has pleaded not guilty to 11 counts of second-degree murder and 31 counts of attempted murder for the vehicle ramming attack, a CityNews Vancouver report said.
The deadly attack claimed the lives of Jenifer Darbellay (50), Kira Ganapol Salim (34), Vicky Bjarnason (55), Glitza Daniela Samper (30), Glitza Maria Caicedo-Samper (60), Daniel Samper Toro (65), Jendhel Sico (27), Richard Le (47), Katie Le (5), Linh Hoang (30), and Nerissa Pagkanlungan (46).
The event shook the Filipino-Canadian community in Vancouver and Canada as a whole and made history as one of the deadliest attacks in the country.
Online, some social media users expressed disappointment over the development.
“Ipadala mo sa Pilipinas yan (send him to the Philippines),” one Instagram user wrote expressing taking justice into their own hands instead.
Darby said Lo entered the pleas in a court appearance last Nov. 2 by video conference.
The accused has elected against facing a jury in favour of a judge-only trial set to start in B.C. Supreme Court on April 19, 2027.
Lo’s case was moved to B.C. Supreme Court earlier this year after previously being handled in provincial court, where a judge ruled he was fit to stand trial after hearing from two forensic psychiatrists.
Lo has been diagnosed with schizophrenia, had a history of police interactions related to mental health, and was living in the community under the supervision of Vancouver Coastal Health, according to a report by fipa.bc.ca.
Among those who filed the lawsuit against Lo was John Lind, whose lawsuit says he sustained multiple rib fractures, a punctured spleen and lung and kidney laceration.
The lawsuit seeks damages for Lind and others harmed by the vehicle-ramming attack where Lo had driven an SUV through a crowd at the street festival hosted by Vancouver’s Filipino community.
The proceedings are subject to publication bans, vancouvertelevision.ca report said.
The exact reasons for the fitness ruling, and details of what Lo told the doctors, cannot be published because of the bans.
A media consortium that includes The Canadian Press has challenged the publication ban, but a provincial court judge said last September that a ruling on that application has been delayed.
The attack set off changes and recommendations to improve public safety rules for festivals and community events.
The Lapu-Lapu Day festival returned in April this year at a different location at Vancouver’s Italian Cultural Centre, and focused on reflection and remembrance of the victims of the attack.