Synchronicity: Montrealer witnesses public suicide of man who killed his dad 3 years earlier

Ronald Olszewski in collage

   Synchronicity is a fancy term for "spooky coincidence" and Coolopolis has been anxious to use it since we learned it two weeks ago.
   One of Montreal's all-time synchronistictastic moments started when junkie loser Ronald Olszewski, 36, killed a gentle old jeweler in a robbery at 2087 Guy Street on 4 July 1992.
   The victim Sol Benmergui, 62, died from gunshot at his place on Guy just north of Demaisonneuve.
   Sol, who owned and operated the Sol d'Or jewellery shop for 28 years - 25 of them a few doors down - had told his wife the day before day prior that he was worried about getting robbed.
   Indeed his wife Lolli suggested he not open his store that day but he went in nonetheless because he wanted to replace a burnt-out lightbulb.
   Benmergui, after being shot, stumbled into a neighbouring store, into the arms of a neighbouring merchant.
   He died in hospital hours later.
   Benmergui was born in Morocco and left a wife and five kids. Although he loved the craft, he had instructed them not to go into the same business, as he considered it too dangerous.

Sol Benmergui

   Police knew that Olszewski was the killer but no witnesses would testify against him.
   The affair came full circle three summers later on 31 August 1995 when one of Benmergui's sons, Yehouda, found himself just a couple of blocks away, walking up Cote des Neiges past Sherbrooke at about 1 p.m. on a Wednesday.
   It's a five minute walk, or 350 metres away from where his father was killed.
   Benmergui was shocked to see an armed man run into the street surrounded by police.
   The man had just robbed the Zafira Jewelry store at 3488 Cote des Neiges but police had him surrounded.
   The man stopped running, dropped to a knee and shot himself dead right in front of Benmergui.
   Turns out that the man was the very same Ronald Olszewski who had killed Benmergui's father three ears earlier.
   Olszewski had returned to Montreal after serving 18 months in prison on a heroin dealing rap and then went to Alberta where he was sought by police after robbing more jewelry stores
   Another brother, Alex Benmergui, said that the family wasn't doing cartwheels about the public suicide performed by the man who killed their father.
   "It shouldn't have happened this way. No one deserves to die that way."