Vancouver Chinatown stabbing suspect says God ordered him to ‘hurt somebody’

The British Columbia man who stabbed three people at Vancouver’s Light Up Chinatown festival on Sept. 10, 2023, told the court this week he did so because he believed God directed him, as he entered not guilty pleas to three counts of aggravated assault. The attack unfolded during a high-profile community event that draws families, local businesses and cultural performers to celebrate the neighborhood.

Taking the stand on Tuesday, 66-year-old Blair Donnelly testified that he left the B.C. Forensic Psychiatric Hospital on an unescorted day pass intending to go to a coffee shop but instead purchased a chisel and traveled by transit to Chinatown. He said he felt divinely compelled to change his plans and told the court, “I was prompted by God to hurt somebody,” adding that the “Holy Spirit was leading me.”

The court heard that Donnelly attacked a married couple in their 60s and a woman in her 20s, stabbing the two women in the back and slashing the man in the arm. All three victims survived but suffered serious injuries. Donnelly had previously been found not criminally responsible in the 2006 stabbing death of his 16-year-old daughter and in a 2017 attack on another psychiatric patient.

His lawyer, Glen Orris, told the court Donnelly admits to carrying out the stabbings but argued that his mental state at the time should determine whether he can be held criminally responsible. When pressed by a prosecutor about whether he had misinterpreted what he believed God had placed on his heart on the day of the attack. “As I look back, I agree with you,” Donnelly said, later describing himself as mentally and morally sick at the time. The trial is continuing in B.C. Supreme Court with psychiatric evidence expected to be central to the case.