Canadian shooter Michael Zehaf-Bibeau was estranged from his parents, Bulgasem Zehaf and Susan Bibeau, for at least five years before he went on a shooting spree last Thursday at Canada’s National War Memorial and Parliament.

Zehaf-Bibeau’s killed Cpl. Nathan Cirillo at the National War Memorial. After killing Cirillo, Zehaf-Bibeau made his way to Canada’s Parliament where he was killed by Sergeant-at-Arms Kevin Vickers.

The CBC reported that Zehaf-Bibeau was a drifter who had frequent run-ins with law enforcement and often stayed in homeless shelters.

During one of his stays in a homeless shelter, Zehaf-Bibeau came in contact with Farid Bano Ali. Bano Ali is the chairwoman of British Columbia Muslim Association women’s chapter.

She told the CBC that Zehaf-Bibeau told her that he didn’t have any communications with his parents.

The CBC quoted Bano Ali as saying, “I asked him a lot of issues, and he said, ‘Oh, my parents. I come from a family, they don’t like me, they don’t want me, and so I’m hanging around here.’”

Zehaf-Bibeau’s parents sent out a statement in which they apologized for his actions. In the statement, his mother also confirmed that she hadn’t had contact with Zehaf-Bibeau for quite some time and that it had been “-over five years” since she’d seen him.