Etobicoke student shooting deaths: inquiry set to open

The shooting deaths of two Toronto high school students last year will be the subject a formal school board inquiry.

The Toronto Catholic District School Board will conduct three public meetings to gather input, scheduled Feb. 24, March 4 and March 25.

• Etobicoke fatal shooting: Victims were high school students

Zaid Youssef, 17, and Michael Menjivar, 15, were shot around midday on Oct. 6, 2014 behind an apartment building in North Etobicoke in the area of Dixon Road and Islington Avenue.

Witnesses said the shooting took place after a fight broke out in the parking lot of Don Bosco Catholic Secondary School and continued at nearby Fairhaven Park.

Yousseff was a student at Don Bosco while the younger teen attended North York's James Cardinal McGuigan Catholic High School on Finch Avenue West, 12 kilometres northeast of the park.

A little over a week after the incident, police arrested and charged a 17-year-old boy with attempted murder and various weapons offences in connection with the shooting deaths.

The school board announced the inquiry on Tuesday, saying it wants to determine what policies and procedures can help "in preventing, as well as responding to, similar situations in the future."

"Our main goal is to hear from those who were directly impacted by this very serious and tragic incident," said Paul Crawford, the former board superintendent who was named chair of the independent inquiry panel.

"If we can come up with additional intervention strategies and insights that assist with further support of vulnerable youth in our community that will be one big positive outcome for all of us," Crawford said.

The panel is supposed to file a report with recommendations to the board of trustees by April.