Man Jailed For Life Over ‘Monstrous’ Killing Of Family

A man who killed six people, including a mother and four children, has been sentenced to life in prison.

Febrio De-Zoysa, a 20-year-old student, was living with the family in March 2024 when he fatally stabbed Darshani Ekanayake, 35, and her four children: Inuka, seven; Ashwini, four; Ranaya, three; and two-month old baby Kelly.

A family friend, 40-year-old Gamini Amarakoon, was also killed, while the father Dhanushka Wickramasinghe was wounded.

Delivering the verdict on Thursday, Justice Kevin Phillips condemned De-Zoysa’s “stupefying, monstrous” actions. “You are the stuff of nightmares… You have caused so much loss and grief,” he said.

The Sri Lankan student was living in the basement of the Wickramasinghe family’s rented townhouse at the time of the mass stabbing, which Ottawa’s mayor later called “one of the most shocking incidents of violence in our city’s history”.

In court on Thursday, De-Zoysa repeated what he had said during earlier investigations: that the family had been “good and kind” to him, but that he was “unwell” at the time.

Defence lawyer Ewan Lyttle acknowledged that De-Zoysa committed “unthinkable” crimes, while noting that he was wrestling with mental illness when the incident occurred.

De-Zoysa sat still and showed no emotion for most of the hearing, Canadian media reported.

When Justice Phillips asked if he had anything more to say, he apologised.

“I will spend the rest of my life acknowledging the truth of what I did,” he said.

The victims, apart from the baby who was born in Canada, were Sri Lankans who had arrived in Ottawa over the previous few years.

www.bbcnews.co.uk/world