Officials said the victim was Ripudaman Singh Malik, who along with co-defendant Ajaib Singh Bagri were found not guilty in March 2005 of murder and conspiracy in the twin bombings of Air India that killed 331 people on June 23, 1985. Police initially did not release the identity of the deceased, but confirmed it after Malik’s son, Jaspreet Malik, mentioned his father’s killing in a statement on social media. “The media will always refer to him as someone to blame for the Air India bombing,” the son wrote on Facebook. “The media and the RCMP never seemed to accept the court’s decision and I pray that today’s tragedy is not related.” A witness who works at a car wash in Surrey said he heard gunshots Thursday morning and ran outside to find Malik unconscious in his car. In a statement, the Integrated Homicide Investigation Team said: “We are aware of Mr Malik’s background, although at this time we are still working to determine a motive. We can confirm that the shooting appears to be targeted and there is not believed to be any further risk to the public.” Sgt. Timothy Pierotti said that because the shooting happened in a residential area, police were confident that witnesses could help solve the crime. Police said shortly after the attack that a vehicle believed to have been used in the shooting was found engulfed in flames a few blocks away. At Malik’s trial, the Supreme Court of British Columbia heard that a suitcase bomb was loaded onto a plane at Vancouver Airport and then flown to Toronto on Air India Flight 182. The aircraft crashed into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Ireland, killing 329 passengers and crew. About an hour later, a bomb intended for another Air India plane exploded prematurely at Tokyo’s Narita Airport, killing two baggage handlers. Inderjit Singh Reyat, the only man convicted of the bombings, testified for the prosecution at the trial of Malik and Bagri and was later convicted of perjury. Deepak Khandelwal of Oakville, Ontario, said the shooting “just brings back all the horrible memories we’ve had to live through for the last 37 years.” He was 17 when his sisters, 21-year-old Chandra and 19-year-old Manju, were killed on Flight 182. “It’s like a nightmare that never stops giving,” he said.
