A person from Washington State, who is alleged to have been in contact for years with the Tumbler Ridge shooter, has been charged in connection with the fatal mass shooting. The suspect is 30-year-old James Cody Bryant, from western Washington State, who is charged with conspiracy to murder persons in a foreign country, acting United States Attorney Neil Floyd said. Floyd said the charge can carry a sentence of life in prison. Bryant was arrested in Bellingham, Wash., on Tuesday and remains in custody, Floyd said. Bryant’s next court appearance is scheduled for Tuesday at 2 p.m. The charge against Bryant has not yet been proven in court. Officials had first spoken to Bryant two days after the Feb. 10 mass shooting in the northeastern B.C. community. Officials added that it took this long to get to a charge, as officials had to get subpoenas and warrants to get copies of the “thousands” of communications between Bryant and the shooter, 18-year-old Jesse Van Rootselaar. Floyd said Bryant had allegedly been in “repeated contact with the shooter, offering advice, sending money, and even agreed to livestream the horrific event.” Floyd referred to the shooter as “JVR.” He said Bryant had the information and ability to alert law enforcement, and even discussed that possibility with the shooter, but chose not to. “Instead, (Bryant) encouraged and offered assistance to a murderer.” Eight people were killed, including six children, in the Feb. 10 shooting in Tumbler Ridge. Van Rootselaar died of a “self-inflicted wound,” police have said. Two people, Van Rootselaar’s mom and brother, were killed at their family home. The other six, five students and an educator, were killed at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School. Floyd alleges that Van Rootselaar had challenges starting the vehicle after shooting and killing her mother and brother at the home. It was allegedly Bryant who “provided advice and offered assistance on how to get the car started so that JVR could proceed to the school and kill children.” Mike Herrington, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Seattle field office, said Bryant and Van Rootselaar allegedly met on the now-defunct Omegle video chatroom about three years prior to the shooting. He said the two developed a friendship over the period of six months before they began to focus on discussions of violence. “I read a lot of court documents, including some that discuss incredibly heinous acts of violence,” Herrington said. “But this complaint was particularly difficult to read, in part because of the casual tone these two individuals used when discussing the mass taking of innocent lives that was being planned. Further alleged, instead of de-escalating or reporting to law enforcement, Bryant continued to enable the shooter over the months they discussed these plans.” Herrington said Bryant also allegedly agreed to record a livestream of the mass shooting and “broadcast in a way that would maximize notoriety for the shooter.” That livestream was allegedly online for about 20 seconds before it was shut down. “Without Bryant’s misplaced loyalty and willingness to operate the live stream, we don’t ultimately know if the shooter would have gone through with the crime,” Herrington said. B.C. RCMP’s Lower Mainland Assistant Commissioner Elija Rain said Tuesday’s charge announcement “reflects the months of investigative effort, cooperation, and coordination between” the agencies. He added that he recognizes the charge brings a range of emotions for victim families, survivors, and members of Tumbler Ridge. “For some, it provides a measure of reassurance that progress continues to be made. For others, it may reopen painful memories and difficult questions,” he said. “We remain mindful that no investigative milestone can undo the harm caused that day, but we hope it reflects our ongoing commitment to seeking answers and pursuing all available evidence.” Rain said it’s been 238 days since the tragic event, acknowledging that in the days after the mass shooting there were updates and “then we became more limited in the information we can share publicly.” He said the choice not to disclose these details wasn’t because police hadn’t determined answers, but was instead to “ protect the integrity of the work being done in both Canada and the United States.” Rain added that law enforcement has reviewed more than 90 interview statements from students, educators, and first responders. As well, digital and physical evidence has been “collected, prioritized, and processed.” The high school – the scene of the second shooting – has since been torn down, with a promise from the provincial and federal governments to build a new school at a new site. Staff and students are currently in a temporary, modular school. Ongoing lawsuits in California court The news comes a little more than two weeks after the B.C. government filed a lawsuit in California against OpenAI in the Tumbler Ridge mass shooting. The lawsuit stems from OpenAI’s failure to notify law enforcement of threats on its platform before the mass shooting and for designing an “unsafe product.” Van Rootselaar had two ChatGPT accounts that were flagged by OpenAI for internal review, but law enforcement wasn’t notified of that until after the shooting. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman did apologize in the days after and the company has vowed to make reforms. The company is also seeking to have the lawsuits heard in B.C. courts. Days after that lawsuit was announced, American magazine Mother Jones revealed disturbing new details of Van Rootselaar’s ChatGPT account use in the months leading up to the tragic school shooting. The AI chatbot reportedly produced “hypothetical” mass-shooting scenarios for Van Rootselaar, described what types of guns can have the most devastating impact in school shootings, answered queries on what time of day other high-profile shootings have occurred, and even explained how best to evade its own safety protocols. In addition to B.C.’s lawsuit, families of victims and victims have filed 37 other lawsuits in California against OpenAI. – With files from Mark Page
Person from Washington State arrested in connection with Tumbler Ridge shooting
