Convicted B.C. serial killer Robert Pickton has been hospitalized and is in critical condition after he was assaulted in prison on Sunday, Radio-Canada is reporting.
The Correctional Services of Canada (CSC) said in a statement Monday that an inmate at the maximum-security Port-Cartier Institution in Quebec was the victim of a major assault.
Quebec provincial police, the Sûreté du Québec, are investigating.
The CSC said the injured inmate was taken out of the prison and moved to a hospital for treatment.
Two sources, including one police source, confirmed with Radio-Canada that the unnamed, assaulted inmate is Robert Pickton. The sources say Pickton is between life and death.
Authorities identified the assailant, who is another inmate, and “appropriate actions have been taken,” the CSC said in the statement.
Port-Cartier, Que., is located around 700 kilometres northeast of Montreal.
In 2007, Pickton was convicted of six counts of second-degree murder in the deaths of women who disappeared from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside.
They were Sereena Abotsway, Mona Wilson, Andrea Joesbury, Marnie Frey, Georgina Papin and Brenda Wolfe.
The remains or DNA of 34 women, many of whom were Indigenous, were found on Pickton’s pig farm in Port Coquitlam, about 25 kilometres east of downtown Vancouver.
Pickton was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of full parole for 25 years.
In an interview with Radio-Canda’s Tout un matin Tuesday, federal Public Security Minister Dominic LeBlanc said an internal investigation will be carried out at the Port-Cartier prison to shed light on the circumstances of the attack.
He did not confirm the identity of the inmate who was assaulted, citing reasons related to the protection of privacy and security in prisons.