MONTREAL - Investigators say a young girl was in a state of shock after her father attacked his ex-girlfriend and a 20-year-old man who eventually died after a violent melee that was linked to a love triangle.

Police say the girl's father, Martin Bedard, later committed suicide by stabbing himself to death.

A Laval police spokeswoman said Monday that Bedard's 12-year-old daughter told an investigator she heard horrifying screams during the weekend attack.

"She heard a woman screaming and yelling at Bedard to stop," Nathalie Lorrain said in an interview.

Earlier, authorities said the girl had witnessed the attack.

Julie Chenel, the woman involved in the triangle, was released from hospital Monday after being questioned by detectives.

The 33-year-old Chenel, who used to go out with Bedard, was beaten with a baseball bat at her apartment in Laval, north of Montreal.

Bedard, 43, who lived downstairs in the same building, confronted Chenel and Tim Flowers, her new boyfriend, on Sunday morning.

Laval police Const. Frank Di Genova says there was a heated verbal exchange between the two men and that Bedard pulled a knife and stabbed Flowers in the chest.

Bedard returned to his basement apartment and stabbed himself several times in the upper chest.

Di Genova says Bedard then stumbled outside and collapsed near the main entrance to the apartment building next to the younger man.

When she was interviewed by detectives, Chenel confirmed what police suspected -- that the two deaths were a murder-suicide.

Laval police said Bedard's daughter from a previous marriage had to be taken to hospital suffering from violent nervous shock.

Di Genova said in an interview the couple broke up in March after being together for several years, but that there were no signs of any problems.

"Everything was fine. .we have no previous history of conjugal violence or threats at the address," he said.

"Something was triggered in the gentleman's head the day it happened."

The city's ambulance service said both men's hearts had stopped by the time paramedics arrived at the building.

Spokesman Guy Saint-Pierre said the two men were revived and taken to hospital where they later died.

Di Genova said Chenel can only remember up to the point when she got hit on the head with the baseball bat.

"After that, she doesn't remember a thing."

Flowers' mother arrived in the Montreal area from eastern Quebec on Monday to claim her son's body.

In a tearful interview with CTV, April Main said her son was too young to die.

"He was only 20, he was a baby," she said.

"He was raised in Gaspe, he comes here to work, he goes out on one date and he's killed."

Main said she will take her son home to be buried in Gaspe.