Dorothy Piner stops at a memorial for Karolina Huebner-Makurat on July 9. Piner lives just a block away from where Huebner-Makurat was fatally shot in Toronto’s Leslieville neighbourhood.Sammy Kogan/The Globe and Mail
The husband of a woman killed by a stray bullet as she walked to pick up lunch in a Toronto neighbourhood has now been left to help their two daughters cope with what friends say is unimaginable grief.
Family and friends have established a fundraising campaign for the girls after Karolina Huebner-Makurat, 44, succumbed to her injuries after being shot last Friday just after noon.
Police said Sunday they are searching for three men. In a statement, the Toronto police said the three are believed to have been involved in a physical altercation and two of them fired handguns at each other.
Ms. Huebner-Makurat’s two daughters, aged 7 and 4, now face an “uncertain future” without the mother who “was a constant source of love, strength, and support for her girls,” said an online post for a GoFundMe fundraiser.
“Caroline loved life and was instant friends with everyone she met. Her great sense of humour always lightened up all situations. She was a kind soul, always eager to lend a helping hand. She was a shining light in the lives of her two beautiful daughters,” the post said.
Her husband, Adrian Makurat, posted a Facebook message Friday evening asking for privacy.
“Tragic day. Life is short. Hug your love ones every moment you get the chance.”
City councillor Paula Fletcher, whose Toronto-Danforth ward includes Leslieville, where the shooting occurred, said the incident “shocked her to the very core”.
“It is unbelievable and unacceptable,” Ms. Fletcher said in an interview with the Globe. “This brazen act of violence where this beautiful mother and wife was killed is horrific and this is not the city that we want to live in.”
Ms. Fletcher added that the rise in casual acts of violence in Toronto are leaving people “terribly unsettled in the city.”
“For whatever reason there has been a huge spike in ambient violence since the onset of COVID – and we don’t know why.”
Police said the force received a call for a shooting in the Queen Street and Carlaw Avenue area at 12:33 p.m. Friday. The force posted images of three males suspects on Sunday, one more than they had announced on Saturday.
The police are asking for the public’s help in identifying the individuals, who fled the area on foot and are thought to be “armed and dangerous.”
The first suspect is described as 25 to 30 years old, tall, with a medium build, cornrows and may have injuries to his head. He was wearing a white T-shirt with a black stripe from sleeve to sleeve, blue jeans and white shoes.
Police say the second suspect is 18 to 25 years old, average height, slim build, with long hair in a ponytail. He was wearing a black baseball hat, a black North Face hoodie, dark coloured jeans and white shoes.
A third suspect is also between 18 to 25 years old, tall, with a thin build. He was wearing a grey hoodie, dark pants and dark shoes.
This is the city’s 32nd homicide this year, adding to a series of random and violent attacks in Canada’s largest city.
In early February, former CBC radio producer Michael Finlay, 73, died one week after he was randomly assaulted while out walking in Toronto’s east end on Danforth Avenue. Toronto Police later arrested Robin Robert Cropearedwolf, 43, for manslaughter in connection Mr. Finlay’s death.
On Jan. 20, an 89-year-old woman was killed at about noon while walking near the subway station at King and Yonge streets. Police said she was pushed to the ground by a 37-year-old man, who is now facing manslaughter charges.
With reports from Colin Freeze.
Clare O’Hara