Editor’s note — Some readers have expressed opposition to this story, not wishing to read about a mass murderer’s background. We respect their position. We don’t ever want to glorify, but we must contextualize to begin to find the answers we all desperately want — who, why and how. Providing personal history is crucial to this.
That said, we are now shifting our coverage focus to the victims and their families. Going forward, we only use the murderer’s name and photo when it serves a greater public good, and when we do, we will endeavour to explain it.
We are taking a similar approach with photos of his crime scenes. Those will only appear when they provide valuable context for our readers.
Before Sunday morning, the name Gabriel Wortman was best known to family, friends, former classmates and clients at his Dartmouth denture clinic.
By midday, he was the top news story across the country.
Details are still emerging about Wortman’s terrifying spree that began with shootings and property fires in the Cobequid Bay community of Portapique late Saturday night and ended with him dying in a final confrontation with police at the Enfield Big Stop just before noon Sunday.
The image of a desperate man on the run, driving a mock-up RCMP vehicle and wearing a uniform resembling that of an RCMP officer, while committing a series of violent crimes between Colchester County and the outskirts of Halifax has left those who knew him stunned at the news.
As soon as Nova Scotia RCMP released his name and posted his photo as a warning to those in the community, details of his life began to emerge.
It was soon revealed this was the same Gabe Wortman as the denturist who ran the Atlantic Denture Clinic in downtown Dartmouth, with a second clinic in north-end Halifax. Those who went to school with him in New Brunswick took to social media with memories and expressions of shock and disbelief.
@NS_scooke Wortman was a great friend and amazing person in High School. Always smiling. Always kind. This is nothing but shocking!
— Lisa Brush (@LisaBrush) April 19, 2020
His entry in the 1986 Riverview High School Yearbook was posted, describing him doing wheelies on his Honda XR 500R dirtbike and going skiing with friends, with his dislikes of “cold weather and English class.”
In one chilling note, in light of Sunday’s events, it hints at his interest in a possible career in law enforcement, saying “Gabe’s future may include being an RCMP officer.”
Former high school friend Scott Balser posted on Facebook that Wortman was a very nice guy who liked to help others.
“We never know what others go through in life that makes them make certain decisions," Balser wrote. "I am by no means defending his actions this weekend.
“It’s a very sad and tragic situation and my heart goes out to all the families involved. I’ve tried to live my life by this principle, ‘but for the grace of God, go I.’ We never know how we are going to react to a situation until we are in it.”
Going even further back, junior high school friend Pierre Little on Twitter recalled an early fascination with air-powered guns and target practice.
“We used to shoot his machine gun air pellet or BB gun, I can’t remember which, behind his house in Bridgedale,” Little said. “Quite a rare airgun for the eighties. He also was into bottlecaps with saltpeter stinkbombs.”
New Brunswick comedian and TV host Candy Palmater considered Wortman one of her best friends when they attended the University of New Brunswick in Fredericton together in the late 1980s.
The pair met up while they were residents at UNB’s co-ed McLeod House, where they bonded over shared tastes in music — Pink Floyd’s The Delicate Sound of Thunder was a favourite album at the time — and motorcycles, since Palmater’s family ran a Harley-Davidson dealership in northern New Brunswick.
“I knew right from the beginning that this guy needed a friend, so I befriended him,” Palmater said. “Most of my friends didn’t like him, but I didn’t care. He met my parents and members of my family, and we were inseparable for that whole year.
“I always felt like he wasn’t quite comfortable in his own skin, but I thought as he matured, he would grow into himself.”
"Gabriel always had a sadness about him, but I was so shocked to hear that he’d hurt other people."
- university friend Candy Palmater
Palmater said she and Wortman exchanged letters after university, but after the early 1990s, their paths wouldn’t cross again.
She said she wasn’t surprised by a CTV News story she saw in 2014 describing how he’d provided free dentures to a cancer survivor who couldn’t afford them on her medical plan, but noted that watching the story she sensed the spark she remembered from their university days seemed to be missing.
“Gabriel always had a sadness about him, but I was so shocked to hear that he’d hurt other people,” she said. “I don’t know what his later adult life was like, but I can tell you that at university, people weren’t nice to him.
“He was a little bit different, like I’m a little bit different, but he was beautiful and he had a really deep heart, but he was the brunt of everybody’s jokes.”
A former client at his clinic, who asked that her name not be used, recalled that Wortman and his common-law partner who worked with him were jovial and easy-going together when she received new dentures from him in September.
"I’m stunned here, to tell you the truth. It’s often the last person you’d think of, but they always say that after something like this."
- former client at Wortman's denture clinic
“He was nuts; I mean that in a good way,” she said. “We were carrying on back and forth like we knew each other our whole lives.
“They seemed to get along fine, bantering with each other like you would with your good friends. They seemed like very nice people together, very happy people.”
The woman said it was the friendly atmosphere at the clinic that made her visit so memorable, and the joking between them that eased the burden of what could have been an uncomfortable procedure.
“She said, ‘He gets all the thanks and all the hugs, and I do all the work.’ So I asked her if she wanted a hug, and I gave her a hug,” the former client said.
“I’m stunned here, to tell you the truth. It’s often the last person you’d think of, but they always say that after something like this.”
51-year-old Gabriel Wortman is the suspect in our active shooter investigation in #Portapique. There are several victims. He is considered armed & dangerous. If you see him, call 911. DO NOT approach. He’s described as a white man, bald, 6’2-6’3 with green eyes. pic.twitter.com/Y2nJNULlkn
— RCMP, Nova Scotia (@RCMPNS) April 19, 2020
Another former client going by the name of Blaize Jones shared a different memory on Facebook, in a comment on a post repeating the RCMP information that Wortman was driving a car made up to look like an official police vehicle and wearing a uniform.
“I do remember him saying he buys old police vehicles from the auction and fixes them up; he had two,” posted Jones.
“When I went to meet him at his Halifax location to pick up my new dentures, his wife was driving one. I pray he’s caught and no one else gets hurt. including him.”
As we now know, the situation did not unfold that way.
Even as she was talking about her old college friend — not even knowing at that point whether to refer to him in the past or present tense — Palmater said she couldn’t make Sunday’s events make sense in her own mind.
“I’ve known people in my life, where if I’d woken up to this news this morning and it was about them, I’d say, ‘Well, I’m not that surprised.’
“But he was not one of those people, I would never, ever have thought that about him. My heart’s breaking for the people he’s hurt. ... I can’t marry that with the Gabriel I knew.”
