Nova Scotians call for inquest
Victims’ relatives want answers on issues such as RCMP response
HALIFAX—Nova Scotians struggling with the devastating aftermath of a mass shooting are looking for a commitment from the province’s leaders to set up a public inquiry to help answer a long list of unanswered questions.
Nick Beaton, the husband of a continuing care assistant who was killed on her way to work during this month’s massacre, said Monday an inquiry is needed to examine a number of issues, including the way the RCMP communicates with the public during a mass shooting.
Beaton said that had there been an emergency alert issued after the shooter left the Portapique area — where 13 people were killed — he believes his wife Kristen would still be alive.
“There definitely needs to be an inquiry, no mistakes about it,” he said in an interview, adding that a lack of clear information about the weekend’s events has led him to start his own investigation.
“How do we know? We don’t know anything because they’re not telling us anything.”
Beaton said he feels the RCMP’s upper management failed to communicate the extent of the threat by detailing it in a series of tweets, rather than an emergency alert that would have appeared on smartphones and television screens.
But the issue of the emergency alert is just one of many arising from the rampage that resulted in 22 deaths in five communities over the weekend, Beaton said.
Police have said the attacker, Gabriel Wortman, had access to a handgun and long guns he didn’t have a licence for, including some weapons obtained in the United States, but they haven’t released details of how Wortman gained access to them.
It’s also unclear how the denturist managed to slip through a police perimeter around Portapique.
RCMP have also yet to say how he came to own at least four replica police vehicles, including the one with a light-bar and accurate paint job he drove on the days of the killings.
Meanwhile, an online campaign has begun seeking to change the name of a Nova Scotia high school to honour the RCMP officer killed during last week's shooting rampage that claimed 22 lives in the province.
A petition is calling for Prince Andrew High School in Dartmouth to be renamed for Const. Heidi Stevenson.
The 48-year-old Stevenson was killed in a confrontation with the gunman, who was driving a mock police car and wearing an RCMP uniform.