City police rarely fire their weapons
Just over a week after the sound of a Saskatoon police officer’s pistol shattered the calm of a quiet cul-de-sac in River Heights, a high-ranking member of the department said they point their weapons only on “very infrequent” occasions — and it’s even more rare for one to pull the trigger.
“In all of 2016, other than animal destructions, which accounted for six, there were only two additional incidents where a firearm was discharged by a member of the service,” Supt. Mitch Yuzdepski said, noting the figures are further reduced because some “discharges” occur in training incidents. “It’s rare.”
According to a report to the board of police commissioners last month, Saskatoon police officers used their .40-calibre Glock pistols and .223-calibre Colt C8 carbines more in 2016 than in 2015, when they reported a total of eight incidents involving gunfire, of which five involved an animal. Officers reported pointing but not firing their weapons 15 times last year and nine in 2015.
In 2014, by comparison, police reported 14 shooting incidents, of which all but two were “animal destructions.”
Yuzdepski said at least one of the two non-animal-related incidents in 2014 involved an officer inadvertently firing a firearm into a “safety station” used for safe loading and unloading.
The department’s most recent shooting incident occurred last week, when an officer fired two rounds at the stolen truck 22-yearold Austin Eaglechief was driving, after it slammed into a police cruiser and pushed it more than 100 feet. Eaglechief was not struck by gunfire but died minutes later in a highspeed collision. It remains unclear whether bullets struck the truck.
Eaglechief’s mother has questioned the officer’s decision to shoot at the truck, suggesting it was unsafe and triggered her son’s anxiety, sparking the chase that ended his life. Yuzdepski, who spoke in general terms because the events surrounding Eaglechief’s death remain under investigation, said while each incident is different, the threat determines the response.
“In general terms, the officer has to perceive a threat to themselves, to their partner, to a member of the public, typically, before they’re going to take their firearm out.”
Regardless of whether an officer points a firearm or shoots at a suspect, every use of force by police is investigated internally, and those findings are then reviewed externally, Yuzdepksi said. Police Chief Clive Weighill confirmed last week that an outside police agency is looking into the incident involving Eaglechief.
Officers are sometimes disciplined after incidents involving firearms. In 2011, for example, a Saskatoon police constable received “advice to future conduct” after it was found that while his life was endangered when a traffic stop on 19th Street resulted in him being dragged 250 metres by a car, it was not threatened at the time he shot at the fleeing vehicle.
In general, “People will secondguess decisions by officers or suspects or anyone all the time,” Yuzdepski said. “But until there’s an investigation that is completed and all the facts are in place, I don’t think it’s fair to anyone to rush to any kinds of judgments.”