Ethan Bespflug, 17, lost his life after being stabbed on a bus this week in Surrey, B.C., on his way home from a friend’s house. His mother was waiting to pick him up at a bus stop and was following the GPS tracker on his phone when she saw the tracker depart from his route and head to a hospital.
“Ethan was a son and a brother who was senselessly murdered when he was supposed to be safe,” she said. “Our fears of sending our children out into the world are becoming more and more prevalent in our daily lives.”
Bespflug was the oldest of five, and his family had recently moved to Abbotsford from Surrey, southeast of Vancouver, partly because of concerns about crime, Van Der Gracht told The Canadian Press.
Van Der Gracht said the boy had texted a friend shortly before he was killed, saying two other young people had boarded the bus and he wanted to get off at the next stop to avoid them. They allegedly stabbed him as he tried to get off.
Following the Tracker to the Hospital
Bespflug would often take the bus to Surrey and his mother would pick him up and drive him home. When she saw his GPS tracker heading to the Royal Columbian Hospital in New Westminster on the night of April 11, she rushed there, too.“I just wanted my life to end. I think I would have traded mine,” she said. “I don’t understand why it had to be him. Why him?”
It is the second bus stabbing this month in Surrey. The first was on April 1 and was not fatal. The victim’s throat was slashed, but the victim is now recovering at home. A man has been charged with terrorism offences in that case. The RCMP said the April 1 and April 11 events are not connected.
Premier David Eby said Thursday that police are increasing transit patrols. He said Bespflug’s death is every parent’s nightmare.