Aidan Lumley grew up in Sudbury, swimming in Ramsey Lake and being active in the Sudbury Yacht Club.
He and his mother, Elaine Lumley, left Sudbury when he was seven, in the early 90s, but returned every summer and March break to spend time with his grandparents.
He was active in church, was a provincial team swimmer, and was always willing to lend a hand, said Elaine Lumley.
Aidan Lumley was shot dead in the streets of Montreal on Nov. 27, 2005. And his mother says she still wonders why someone hasn’t come forward as a key witness — a person the police need to hopefully solve the case.
“Some people have come forward. But the thing is, unless you actually see someone pull the trigger,” nothing can be done, Lumley said.
“This is how our legal system works. You can see someone on the street with a gun, but if you look away for a split second, and the gun goes off, you can’t say he’s the one who did it.”
Lumley was in Sudbury earlier this month to visit family. While she was here, she took the opportunity to contact local media to help get the message out about bringing her son’s killer to justice.
She said she is hoping for witnesses to come forward to help solve the case of her son’s death. She plans on running a newspaper ad in Montreal to spur anyone who was in the area that day to come forward.
“If you witnessed something four years ago, and you were a young student ... you’re in a different place (now) than you were four years ago. You’re a young professional now. Maybe you have a family of your own. If you’ve pushed such an image (like the shooting) out of your mind, it’s eventually going to come back to haunt you. You may have been afraid back then."
A tragic evening
On the night her son was shot, Elaine Lumley did not sleep well. At the time, she couldn’t figure out why.
“I woke up around six in the morning. I just woke up, I went into the living room and I just sat there until 10 a.m., and it was almost like I was in a trance.”
There was a knock at the door. It was a police officer.
The officer asked if Robert lived there, her son, Aidan Lumley’s, middle name.
Elaine Lumley said, “no.”
She started to cry.
“Do you have a son?” the officer asked.
“Yes.”
“Was he born Jan. 6, 1985?” the officer asked.
“Yeah.”
“I better come in,” the officer said.
The officer told Elaine Lumley her son had been shot and killed in Montreal.
“We’ve never seen a gun,” she told the officer. “That’s not my son. He would never be around a gun.”
She dropped to her knees, in the hallway.
The officer picked her up and brought her inside to sit down.
It happened four years ago, as of Nov. 27, but Elaine Lumley said she remembers every detail.
Aidan Lumley was shot through the back, in the heart, and died shortly after in hospital, according to his mother. He was shot dead in the streets of Montreal, at the age of 20.
Aidan Lumley was a third-year university student at Trent University, studying physics.
A week before his death, he made the Ontario swim team.
The weekend of Nov. 27, he decided with a group of friends, to go to Montreal for the weekend to celebrate one of his friend’s birthdays.
“Saturday night they went out for dinner. There was about 15 of them and they ended up at this tiny, little club down on Bleury Street, called the Vinyl Lounge,” Elaine Lumley said.
His mother has heard pieces of what happened once Aidan Lumley arrived at the club. Police have “figured it all out,” she said, and have passed the information along to her.
“They don’t tell me how they get their information, and they tell me what they can. They believe that they know who did it and they believe that they have the whole story, but they don’t have enough to charge him for Aidan’s murder.
The gun has never turned up.”
Elaine Lumley retells what she has heard: one of her son’s friends was talking to a girl, and was subsequently approached by a male she was with.
He went over and said, “Don’t talk to my girlfriend.”
“Apparently that was it, there wasn’t any kind of confrontation inside the bar,” she said.
Elaine Lumley has come to know that the “boyfriend” made a phone call to a male friend. And that man, from what Lumley knows, is the killer.
“He called the killer, to bring reinforcements,” she said.
Lumley said the street of the shooting, Bleury Street, is a small place.
“I think it was just bad luck and being in the wrong place at the wrong time... Aidan and one of his friends were just walking across the street (to a friend’s car) and they were grabbed from behind. His friend got away and, as Aidan was grabbed, the killer went up behind him and shot him in the back.”
In 10 steps, her son’s life was erased. The 10 steps it took to get from the club towards the car, were his last.
“One minute I’m saving up for Aidan’s university and the next minute I have to plan a funeral. He was an amazing student, he was funny and he was the life of the party,” his mother said. “He was a normal 20-year-old, just having a good time.”
Elaine Lumley says she “lives in hope that (the person responsible) will be charged in Aidan’s murder.”
Elaine said she finds it difficult coming to Sudbury after her son died “because Sudbury reminds me of when he was little. He grew up here.”
Her son is buried in Sudbury, beside his grandfather, Rev. Robert Lumley.
