Vincent Weiguang Li
A man is beheaded and partially eaten while onboard a Greyhound bus. He was headed home to Manitoba from working a carnival in Alberta. His killer stabbed him repeatedly, with no emotion, almost robotically..
Sounds kind of like a horror film, right? Unfortunately, this is a true story.
Vincent Weiguang Li, a Chinese immigrant to Canada, was a forklift operator in Winnipeg. He had a wife, Anna, who worked as a waitress. Vince left that job and moved to Edmonton, where he worked at the Wal-Mart. His wife later moved to Edmonton as well.
Around June 30, 2008, Vincent was fired from Wal-Mart after an “altercation” with another employee. Small loss, as he had two other jobs, one at a fast-food restaurant and one with a newspaper delivery service. In the weeks following his dismissal from Wal-Mart, Vincent requested some time off from the delivery service, so he could go to a job interview..
And here is where our story really begins… On July 28, 2008, Mr. Li boarded a Greyhound bus bound for Winnipeg. The next day, around midnight, he gets off of the bus with three pieces of luggage and spends the night on a bench near a supermarket. One individual who walked past him said that he “was sitting bolt upright, with his eyes wide-open.” Sometime during the morning of July 30, Vince sold his brand-spankin-new laptop computer to some 15 year old kid for a whopping $60!
Sounds kind of odd, right? Maybe a little strange? Maybe something that would cause some concern? Perhaps someone would alert local law enforcement about the unusual stranger on the bench? Guess not, because just before 6pm, Vincent was getting back onto a Greyhound bus, containing one Tim McLean and 35 other passengers. Mr. Li found a seat in the front of the bus and sat down to enjoy the ride.
Sometime before 8:30pm, old Vince decided to change seats after a schedule rest stop. His new row-mate was Tim McLean, exhausted after his job at the carnival in Alberta. McLean, being tired as he was, didn’t really acknowledge the man sitting next to him, and naturally decided to fall asleep.
Suddenly, all hell breaks loose. Vince whips out a big knife and starts stabbing the sleeping McLean in the chest and neck, repeatedly! His movements are robotic, calm, methodical. Passengers panic, Tim tries to fight off his attacker, passengers flee the bus, Tim can’t fight for too much longer. He succumbs to his injuries and Vince calmly hacks off his head.
Somebody finally has the bright idea of calling the Mounties. They soon arrive to find Vince being contained on the bus by the driver, one of the passengers, and a truck driver who had heavy tools as weapons. The entire time this is going on, Vincent was stabbing the now-dead victim and carrying around his head like a trophy. Police officers witnessed him eating parts of the victim’s body. Vincent taunts the police and declares “I have to stay on this bus forever!”
You can hear a tape of the police radio calls as they watched Vincent mutilate Tim McLean’s body by viewing the following video:
At roughly 1:30AM, Mr. Li tries to escape by breaking one of the bus windows. The RCMP then tase him, twice, and put him, handcuffed, in the back of a cruiser. They find Mr. McLean’s ear, tongue and nose in Mr. Li’s pocket and various other parts of the body in plastic baggies on the bus. The eyes and part of the heart are never found, and probably were eaten by Vince.
What was Vincent Weiguang Li’s excuse for this heinous murder of another human being? What could possibly work to rationalize stabbing a sleeping 22 year old man over 40 times?
Well, it seems that Vince was schizophrenic. He and the psychiatrist assigned to evaluate him claimed that God kindly pointed out to Li that Tim McLean was a bastion of all that is evil and just had to be executed. Well, who is Vince to say no to God? But just killing him would not suffice. After all Tim was “evil incarnate” and would probably just come back to life. Here’s a bright idea: dismember the body and that will make it more difficult for the body to rise from the dead, so to speak! Pure genius!
That defense worked for the judge presiding. He was found “Not Criminally Responsible, By Reason of Insanity” by Justice John Scurfield. However, he couldn’t let Vince roam free right away, so he sentenced him to spend an indefinite amount of time in a mental institution. This means that if the good doctors deem Vince not a risk to himself or others, he could walk the streets of Canada once more. Hopefully he never gets that chance.
Note: The McLean family is still trying to change the laws in Canada. Currently, the insane perpetrator’s rights are put ahead of the victim. Tim’s Law would put the victim’s right in the spotlight. If anyone wants to read more about this law, go to timslaw.ca
This story was written and submitted NavyCop. I’d like you all to join me in welcoming her to the staff at PYSIH. Look to me from this excellent first effort that NavyCop is going to be a valuable addition to our little blog
Does Vincent Weiguang Li Belong In Hell?
- Yes (84%, 346 Votes)
- No (16%, 64 Votes)
Total Voters: 410
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61 Comments »
This is an unusual case of CRAZY. Keep him away from humans and animals. No sense in keeping this one in jail or in a mental facility. He is a danger to anything that crosses his path.
Perhaps Bermuda or Palau will take him. “No sense in keeping this one in jail or in a mental facility.” He needs a beach cottage in place where he can kill and eat people who don’t count.
and what people would that be? What an ignorant statement you just made!
Mamabear, ever heard of sarcasm?
This is just about the strangest thing that I have ever heard of. I was a little shocked that no one attempted to tackle the crazy man so that Tim had a chance to get away. It seems like everyone was out for themselves in this situation.
There’s usually just a lot of women, kids and old people on Greyhound busses.
I live in Winnipeg, which is where the greyhound was headed, and we talked about this in my classes. Li didn’t just behead him with a small knife, it was a beast of a thing. I believe that Tim McLean was dead before he was beheaded and the fact of the matter was that had someone gone forward they may have died as well. Everyone likes to think that if they had been on that bus they would have stopped Li, but the reality is that he was a psycho with a huge knife who would have gone swinging. As awful as it is that Tim McLean died as horrifically as he did, it’s amazing that Li didn’t target anyone else.
Around the time my now X-wife was hosing me over I took her to New York, looking for some time to see if things could be patched. I should have taken her to Montreal….
I too am a little disturbed by the fact that no one tried to stop the guy. Like, yes , he has a big hunting knife, but while his back was turned someone could have smashed him over the head or something? Instead, the poor, young victim in question was not only murdered, but also defiled in the most gruesome ways imaginable.
I live in Canada. This was absolutely HUGE when it first happened (almost a year ago now). There has been some talk on Canadian news stations that this main might go free. I don’t see how that makes sense AT ALL. “Hmm, most horrific homicidal maniac we’ve seen in years? Ah, he’s just crazy, let’s not hold him to that!”
I remember when this happened. I was pretty interested in it at the time (OK, I admit it. I was fascinated by the gory details *LOL*). I couldn’t understand why anyone on that bus didn’t try to help Tim McLean either, but in interviews a couple of the passengers said it seemed like everyone was frozen with shock for a few moments, and by the time they snapped out of it, it was obvious McLean was dead. In fact, Vincent had started working on cutting his head off, and when a passenger made a move towards him, Li threatened him with his knife and a pair of scissors. Personally I don’t know what anyone could have done with a crazy man armed with a knife in a confined space like a bus.
He won’t go free. Well..with a Conservative government in power, he won’t. If Canada elects the left-leaning Liberals, dunno what will happen. Probably treat him as a disadvantaged person, a minority at that, and blame his “episode” on discrimination from a white male dominated society. If, heaven forbid, the socialist NDP ever manage to get into power, they would probably make cannibalism legal on the grounds that it would be racist to make it illegal, and intolerant of other cultures to boot.
Last I heard, it was doctors who decided whether mental patients are safe to be released into society rather than politicians.
OT, I wonder what would have happened to him had he pulled this off in his native China…
He would have ended up an involuntary organ donor.. Don’t they do that in china? Donate the organs of condemned prisoners??
I dont think there’s any fixing a person like this..
If he did that in China, he’s going to be in prison and have a bullet in his head.
Wow. NavyCop, this is quite a story. All I can think about is the fact that this must have taken a considerable amount of time to decapitate this person. I just hope this person is locked away for the rest of his life.
What a crappy way to die. I feel for Tim and his family. Geez.
poptart1,
Tim was mercifully dead before the decapitation. But yeah, sucky way to die. Being stabbed by the guy who got fired from Wal-Mart. I didn’t know that was possible! Wal-Mart firing someone? Unheard of!
Sorry, I’m a jaded individual. Gotta crack jokes…
Yours,
NavyCop
Bunch of hosers…
Mr. Li should have been shot on site….
I live in Winnipeg and followed this story. I think the end result just says to people that as long as your crazy, its ok to kill someone cause you will just get put up in a nice chushy hospital and eventually be released. Finding Vince Li not responsible by reason of insanity is like saying he was also a victim in all this because he was mentally I’ll. The RCMP should have shot the bastard on site. Instead the Canadian people will live in fear upon his release cause we all know he will eventually be let go.
Just hold onto the hope that he is really insane and tries to eat somebody else in the mental institution… :)
As the resident loon, I know I’m the one always lecturing people about the “crazy” defense, but this is the first case I’ve seen in a long time that just screams “TOTAL WHACKJOB”. In light of that fact, I would advise that anyone approaching a lunatic who has calmly, in a Greyhound bus full of passengers, stabbed someone to death and is busily cutting off the victims head while chowing down on the victim’s lopped-off nose, should know that the only things that might stop this psychotic fruitcake are lethal weapons or a dart gun loaded with enough Thorazine to drop a bull elk.
You ARE NOT going to talk him out of stopping. You ARE going to present yourself as the very next victim for decapitation and cannibalism by Mr. Li. Especially if you’re smiling nervously and looking pleasant. Crazy people love that shit.
And yes, the opinon of this nutball is that certain deranged people who demonstrate this type of behavior should be permanently locked up, without option of parole or release, because as a fruitcake myself I can tell you that major mental illnesses are NEVER CURED, they are only TEMPORARILY CONTROLLED for the life of the patient who is subject to ABJECT RELAPSE at any time.
This is not like a heart condition requiring a pacemaker or a bypass which is difficult and dangerous but not impossible to accomplish. This is an abject, permanent failure of all mental systems except those controlling involuntary functions. Fixing this person is not a kidney transplant; fixing this person is raising Lazarus from the dead.
As a fellow fruitcake I endorse this comment. The vast majority of crazy people don’t do anything like this, but those that do need to be locked up for life.
I watched the video, OMG! That is horrifying. It is like something out of a movie – but it was real. The guy describing what happened, I can’t imagine being in his shoes, I tried. Bizarre to say the least.
Then again people do these things, don’t they? Usually it is in private, just the killer and the victim, but this one did it right in front of a bunch of people.
He is and always be an extreme danger to society. Hopefully the doctors will never deem him sane enough to get out.
fucking gooks why do we even let these flatface punks come over here to get the chance to rob rape and murder our proud and pure blooded race we need to deport these fucking gooks back to where they came from or exterminate them completely canada needs to handle problems like the south does LYNCH THE FLATFACE BASTARD
ZIEN HEIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
LOL – When I saw this comment, I knew there was something familiar about about that “Zien Heit” thing. So I searched TJ’s IP and guess who TJ really is? It’s ThE j0kEr guys. But wait, it gets better. It seems ThE j0kEr has some sort of inner conflict going on in his head, not onlyhas he posted under no less than FIVE different names. They are:
ThE j0kEr
ashcan
a real skinhead
TJ
E-Rock
He’s even used a couple of these sock puppet characters to scold other versions of himself. For example, a ‘real skinhead’ called out ‘ThE j0kEr’ and chided him for not being a real aryan:
In another exchange with himself, Ashcan actually took the position of someone who despises racism, and gave himself as ‘ThE j0kEr’ a hard time for his racist views:
Wow j0kEr, don’t be so hard on yourself….
Actually, this Ashcan/j0kEr character is an interesting guy, if you take into consideration the fact that the same guy who posted this:
Also wrote this:
Holy shit! Is this the best the master race has to offer? What a dick!
Ha Ha Ha. What a dumbass.
Whoa.. that kids got a problem..
One more thing.. I didn’t know there were people who posted on the net who were unaware that their IP address can be tracked, and that their actions online can be logged?? ..
hmmm.. Perhaps someone has learned a lesson? Probably not..
OT: I wondered what happened in this case.. I will say one thing, a crime like this perpetrated by someone from a different race usually brings out the racists.. Back when Chi Vang (I think that’s how his name was spelled) killed those hunters in wisconsin, people were sporting bumper stickers that said “save a deer, shoot a hmong”.. I tell you, that was a painful incident without all of the added bullcrap of an agenda of hatred.. I was angry at the man myself, but it made me sad to see people preaching that kind of message..
Would all the Racists’ Advocates please not comment? This wasn’t a racist killing.
I am Asian, Korean to be exact, and I am very appalled by this.
See? Murder transcends ALL races… As I have said somewhere else, all crimes against other humans are hate crimes, nothing to do with the color of your skin or which country you hail from.
All crimes are a hate crime if you think about it. Rape, terrorism, and genocide done out of hatred.
isn’t the perp always protected in favour of the victim? i know it is here in Holland.
Well, that is how it is in Canada. Here in the US the police roam free with tasers and ASP batons and guns, oh joy and rapture! Shame about that innocent until proven guilty part… (JUST KIDDING FOR THE BLEEDING HEARTS OUT THERE!!! Don’t take me so seriously, I’m an arrogant prick and I always think I’m right. There, I insulted myself so you don’t have to. Feel free to do so if you like, because I’ll just ignore you. Not up to my level of play…therefore, not worthy of my attention.) >:)
you’re our kind of people alright
-editor
DualDenz,
Unfortunately that’s how it is in some places. In the US, the perp and the vic are given equal rights (well, almost. The victim can walk free, if still alive, and the perp is locked up in most cases.)
Happily for all, here in the U.S., we still kill people for their crimes. (Well, in some states.) Yes, if you kill someone in America, we kill you back. It’s only fair, don’t you think?
Best comment so far. Thanks, ma’am.
There was actually a joke told by Ron White about that went like this, “if you kill somebody in Texas, we kill you back” hahahahhah I thought that was some funny shit right there, I don’t care who you are. hahahha.
In Texas, they have installed a “fast lane” for killers. Texas executes plenty of people. California should install two “fast lanes” for death penalty prisoners. The less time we have to feed them the better.
TBS, have you seen the TV show “Dallas DNA” on the Discovery Channel? Texas may have a “fast lane” for executions, but they also have a very high rate of wrongful convictions (at least in Dallas). In the 40 cases that were reviewed since 2001, 19 were found to be innocent thanks to DNA testing. With statistics like that, I’m fairly certain that there have been quite a few innocent men put to death. Not something most Texans would be very proud of.
We aren’t proud of the mistakes we Texans have made but we are proud of the fact that we execute the people on Death Row who deserve to be there. I wish it wouldn’t take so long sometimes, but hey, I guess that helps when somebody really IS innocent and not just saying that like everyone in jail says it.
insanity is not an excuse for behaving like the wendigo.
I have to stop and think, if I am on a bus, and midnight, I would guess the majority of people would be sleeping…and by the time they woke up to the screaming, and shook the cobwebs off their brains and realized someone was being stabbed, I would believe they would be in a stake of shock like…”seriously, they is a man being stabbed on a bus?” I mean…at a club, or in a bar, you kind of expect a fight may break out…but on a bus, in the middle of your sleep, these two people were not arguing, not yelling at each other, if I heard no talking between the two I would think they are both sleeping. To me its as if this murder would be as shocking as a bus crash while your asleep. One minute your fine, the next you have no fricking clue whats happening, and as a human being your first thought is “am I ok?” and “how can I stay safe” In a bus crash no one jumps to the wheel to steer the bus and lead everyone to safety if they are asleep. How do you even begin to wrap your head around whats happening? you hear yelling, and 2 guys fighting….then you see a knife and some blood? you going to rush in? or you going to back up AWAY from the machete wielding psycho? especially for seniors and mothers with kids, or other 20 year old kids on the bus. I know I would like to say Id jump in, but I would be the 1st one off the bus! If they were stopped on a hiway stretch, I can see why the mounties took so long to reach them, if it had happened in a town, the response time would have been shorter, maybe he wouldnt have been beheaded.
This website story is the first I have heard of Tim being eaten and mutilated! How sick. And yes..they had published in the winnipeg paper, that they could not state weather Vince would be let go siting “privacy laws” so I will follow this story on here, because people like me, the ‘general public’ would like to know if this sick twisted fuck will be moving into my neighborhood, so I can firebomb his demented ass.
I didn’t vote for him to go to hell because I think he’s already in hell. I wonder what he’ll feel like when he’s stabilized on anti-psychotic medication and realizes that he hacked a man to death and ate him?
I think Li should spend the rest of his life in a forensic psychiatric facility without the chance of ever being deemed “safe.” The majority of paranoid schizophrenics do not take their medications on a consistent basis without some sort of supervision and
prodding–stabilizing this guy and then releasing him back onto the street is tantamount to giving him another butcher knife and telling him to “go have fun.”
Damn, I hope I never have to ride a Greyhound bus again…
I am very sorry what anyone had to go through when Vince Li went berserk. This bastard should be executed.
I just have to say that this reminds me of the recent Virginia Tech grad school killing. The killer was also an immigrant from China. What the hell is it with the Chinese and decapitation?
As an aside, I have a neighbor who is a Chinese immigrant. She is a TOTAL whack-job, herself. I am starting to wonder what the hell is in the water over there.
Back to clinicals, this does not surprise me coming from a paranoid schizophrenic. Although it’s an extreme example of the violence they are capable of, it’s well-known in the field that paranoid schizos are more exponentially more pre-disposed to violence than any of the other subclasses of schizophrenia COMBINED. It’s the nature of the illness (the paranoia). It’s also why they are the hardest to treat.
Regarding the (grad school) Tech killer, the locals (LE) have been quite hush-hush about that case, but I’ve got it on good authority that he’s also been diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic. It’s unfortunate that it has to come to situations like these before people can be properly diagnosed. I am sure there were many people who questioned both of these people’s mental states, but it takes an act like this to have anything be done about it.
BTW, I am not in any way implying that ALL Chinese are nuts (for anyone who was at-the-ready to chide me for it). I’m just stating that there is, perhaps, something culturally ingrained (in the Chinese) whereupon human life might not be as valued as it is in other cultures. Could be the patriarchial tradition of son-favorance, offspring limitation, etc. etc. I’ll not speculate more than that, since I clearly do not know the culture as well as I’d like to.
However, in-field, I HAVE seen (what appears to me, as well as several colleagues, to be) a disproportionate amount of Chinese immigrants with, AT BEST, “psycho-emotive adjustment issues” which lend themselves to violent behavior. In other words, of the Chinese suspects who end up “on the radar” due to violent behavior, a disproportionate amount of them are more recent immigrants and appear to be suffering from either personality disorders or organix disorders. We could get into the whole “Impact of using Westernized diagnostic criteria” argument, but if you’re in the field you understand how this argument is flawed. Anyhow, I’m just saying…
It’s okay, you can imply that… Nobody will fault you for it. After all, it’s your opinion and you can voice it… I’m just sick of people calling all dual race crimes racially motivated.
Completely agree! We are, after all, a “melting pot” nation (and southern Canada is obviously seeing more racial variation these days as well). In perp’ing a violent crime (esp. a spontaneous one), the chances of those around you being racially different are…um…pretty damned high.
Finally, someone else who makes sense. Kudos for having a fully functional brain between your ears, sir! You should change your name to SuperJoe! If only others would figure out that we are all the same color under our skins. We all bleed red, right?
I’d like to see this one sent to some kind of lab. Obviously under no circumstances can he be kept anywhere but in a pine box or a maximum-security ward.
But scientifically, I wanna dissect this guy. If simple schizophrenia can cause this, then you don’t even have to be evil. Let’s say that you see a guy sitting on a park bench molesting a child. You’re gonna kick his ass if you can. I’d go so far as to say that you have a moral obligation to attack him no matter what the law says.
Turns out you were hallucinating and the kid was totally imaginary, but you killed the guy. What now? I’ve seen a guy walking down the sidewalk, immersed in a knock-down drag-out brawl with people who weren’t there.
If that sort of thing can actually happen to people, where they apply perfectly normal reasoning to situations that aren’t actually going on, we need to figure out how the hell that works and cure it.
If we could “cure” it, we could fix three-quarters of the homeless people living under bridges. It’s pretty hard to hold a job while conversing with all those imaginary friends.
Hey, that’s not nice, TBS…..Some of my best friends are imaginary… >:)
I am actually surprised that this sort of thing has (to my knowledge) never happened before. With all the post-911 security measures introduced in the flight industry*, it amazes me that other modes of transportation are still operating under the “honour system.” Baggage and persons are not checked prior to boarding, and as far as I know, the drivers are not trained in any way to deal with hostile situations, nor are they armed with any sort of protective devices.
It makes me feel a little bit nauseous when I think of the many hours I myself have spent, passed out cold in a travel coma, while riding on a bus. If nothing else, I hope that this tragedy convinces travellers to be more mindful of their surroundings at all times. Oftentimes, the “safest” places can be the most dangerous. Just look at all the innocent children who have died in their own homes, at the hands of the very people who are supposed to love and protect them.
With respect to Li’s “sentencing,” this is just another example of the Canadian Justice system being totally and completely f*cked. Do the crime, do the time — unless you’re Canadian!
* measures which, from what I can tell, do more to inconvenience travellers than to prevent terrorism
skitzo’s are put in mental institutions in America too.. no reason to blame Canada teehee
I agree. Why hasn’t the government done more for more than just the airlines when it comes to transportation security? It goes to show that something of a horrendous caliber has to happen before some serious re-vamping happens to the security of public transportation. :( Just one more reason why I would rather drive FOREVER across state borders to get places.
It terrifies me that there is any chance of this “thing” being released someday…are they freakin’ serious?? If you’re criminally insane and prone to not taking your meds, then for God sakes, you should not be able to walk amongst the rest of us…there are plenty of people in jail or hospitals that will never see the light of day (and have probably done less) so why in the hell would he EVER be set free??
I’ll see if I can’t find an update for you, Capergirl. Hate to see this idjit in my neck of the woods…
In California we treat people sentenced for sex offenses to prison 1st and then they go directly to the mental institution where they remian forever. Anyone committing crimes like Vince Weiguang Li go straight to mental institions & stay until they learn the right things to say and then are released to all expenses paid, gold-plated government support which includes housing, health-care, food, social activities, and in their old age, long term nursing home care.
California’s legal system needs a total overhaul. Anyone like Vince Li should remain locked up permanently, not be allowed to roam free to kill again.
California has a legal system?!?! Jeez, I’ve lived here all my life and I never knew that. I thought we had more of a legal roulette wheel. Silly me!
Forever isn’t very long. At least, not when I count all of the “Molester Dots” in my neighborhood on the registry. Yet another reason I’m glad I don’t have kids.
Lol, becks. I submitted a just for fun story, hopefully it gets put up soon ;) You’ll know who it’s about right away, but it’s funny
My new story is on the forum. Not hell worthy, lol