Alberta RCMP officers cleared in fatal shooting

Alberta’s police watchdog says two RCMP officers were justified when they shot and killed a man who was on a rampage with a stolen frontend loader and tried to use the massive machine to crush a police car with an officer inside against a tree.

“Operating this front-end loader in the manner he did resulted in it becoming a weaponized 35,000-pound blunt instrument that was much more difficult for officers to stop or contain than any other standard vehicle,” Susan Hughson, executive director of the Alberta Serious Incident Response Team, said Monday.

“The man also attempted to lower the bucket of the frontend loader down onto the roof of the vehicle but was unable to do so because the bucket got wedged ... in the tree.”

The unidentified 37-yearold man who died Dec. 25, 2015, in Red Deer, Alta., was wanted on suspicion of sex assault and attempted murder.

The watchdog’s report says the officers stopped firing after the loader began rolling into a nearby field and turning in circles. Officers in a four-by-four drove beside it and saw the suspect slumped motionless on the floor of the cab.

They hoped to get medical help for the man and fired at the loader’s tires to stop it, but the rubber was too thick and the bullets bounced off.

The loader eventually straightened out, drove towards trees and then stopped.

An autopsy found the man died of multiple gunshot wounds to his torso, Hughson said. It also found he had methamphetamine and amphetamine in his blood.