Ottawa police officer dies by suicide at headquarters office

An Ottawa police officer shot and killed himself inside police headquarters on Elgin Street on Friday.

The officer, whose name has not yet been released, was found inside the robbery unit office on Friday evening.

The death occurred five years minus a day after another Ottawa officer, Staff Sgt. Kal Ghadban, a 22-year veteran, also took his own life at police headquarters.

Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit probed the death of the 43-year-old husband and father of three and concluded there were no reasonable grounds to charge any Ottawa Police Service officer with a criminal offence in connection with it.

Friday’s suicide at the Elgin Street police headquarters also came at the start of a weekend in which officers from across Canada will gather on Parliament Hill to honour their fallen comrades.

In 1998, the federal government proclaimed the last Sunday of September Police and Peace Officers’ National Memorial Day, and in 2003 it mandated that flags on federal buildings, including the Peace Tower, would be flown at half-mast on that day.

The names of almost 900 peace officers are engraved on the Canadian Police and Peace Officers Memorial on Parliament Hill.

Toronto police are investigating the death of one of their officers, Const. Vadym Martsenyuk, in his home on Thursday.

Ontario’s chief coroner, Dr. Dirk Huyer, announced earlier this year that he was launching a review of police suicides in the province after eight active officers and one recently retired officer died by suicide in 2019.

Huyer noted that no more than five officers had taken their own lives in any one of the previous five years.