STANELY CUP FINALS : Celebration Marred by Looting, Violence

The celebration of Montreal’s Stanley Cup victory Wednesday night turned into looting along downtown’s main avenue, St. Catherine Street.

A reporter for the Montreal Gazette said he witnessed looting in dozens of stores whose windows had been smashed in an area close to the Forum that stretched 10 to 15 blocks.

“I saw one man standing in front of his souvenir shop with a shard of glass in one hand and holding his broken nose in the other hand,” said Aaron Dersel, a reporter for the Gazette. “He said he’d been beaten by four men and he would use the shard of glass to protect his store.

“In one case, there were 30 riot police in front of a store that had been broken into and they had arrested 20 young men who were sitting cross-legged on the sidewalk.”

Dozens of police cars had their doors ripped off, emergency lights smashed and windows punched in. Groups of 10 to 20 people set small fires and ripped apart wooden trash barrels to use as tools.

Montreal had beefed up its police presence downtown in anticipation of violence because of similar activity after the Canadiens’ last Cup victory in 1986.