A former North Vancouver gang member, who once organized a drive-by shooting of a Lynn Valley home while he was in jail, has been killed in what police describe as a targeted shooting in Kamloops.
Konaam Shirzad, 34, has been identified as the victim of a fatal shooting outside his home in a Kamloops neighbourhood around 7:20 p.m. on Sept. 21.
Another 28-year-old man was taken to hospital with gunshot wounds.
Kamloops RCMP said they believe the shooting was targeted.
Shirzad was known as a founding member of the Red Scorpions gang. Originally from North Vancouver, Shirzad had a significant criminal history.
In 2005, Shirzad was sentenced to 30 months in jail after orchestrating a hit on a man who had testified in court about Shirzad beating a man with a set of brass knuckles at Argyle Secondary. After he was jailed for that assault, Shirzad called up another Red Scorpions member from prison and told him to “take care” of the witness who testified against him.
Shortly after, shots were fired through the front door of a house on Fromme Road in Lynn Valley, embedding bullets in the kitchen and bathroom walls. The couple who lived in the house had just gone to bed, possibly saving their lives.
It was later revealed in court during a wiretapped conversation between Shirzad and the gunman that the wrong house had been targeted. The witness actually lived two doors away.
In 1999, when Shirzad was 16, he tried to murder his former best friend by stabbing him twice in the back with a large butcher knife outside North Vancouver’s Park & Tilford movie theatre. Shirzad was found guilty of attempted murder after being raised to adult court.
RCMP monitored Shirzad’s activities after he was released from jail and found he had close associations with several people who had violent criminal histories.
In 2010, Shirzad was sent to jail again after West Vancouver police found him with a loaded Ruger handgun in his car, in defiance of a lifetime firearms ban. He told a judge then that he had left his life of crime.
Shirzad later moved to Kamloops where he owned a gym. Police raided the gym in January of this year.
On Thursday, RCMP released surveillance video photos of the two suspects taken shortly before Shirzad was gunned down. They are appealing for information from possible witnesses.
