Weapons, cash seized in Kamloops blitz
Knives, axes, hatchets, brass knuckles used to intimidate and assault, anti-gang task force says
After two men were shot dead at different hotels in Kamloops in violence police have linked to organized crime, B.C.’s anti-gang task force seized a number of knives and other weapons with blades during a four-day blitz in the Interior city.
Police, in a promised crackdown after the murders, pulled over 78 vehicles and checked 132 people connected to street-level drug-dealing, the Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit-B.C. said in a news release.
Police seized 21 knives, 12 axes and hatchets, three machetes, a box of .22-calibre bullets and a magazine for a .22-calibre gun, four sets of brass knuckles, a lock-picking kit and a can of pepper spray.
The pepper spray was labelled “goof away” and included hand-printed directions to “aim at goof and spray until you can rob, beat and ... divert.” One of the hatchets was engraved with “The GOOF Killer.”
The CFSEU-BC sent what it calls its uniform gang enforcement team to “try to mitigate, disrupt and suppress any further violence,” according to the release.
The weapons can be “used to intimidate or assault others, or to protect illegal commodities and proceeds of crime,” said the task force. “Taking these potential weapons off the street and out of the hands of those involved in the drug trade was vital to the uniform gang-enforcement team violence suppression efforts while in Kamloops.”
The team, based in Metro Vancouver, occasionally goes out to other communities to support local police and it worked with Kamloops RCMP’s crime unit on the crackdown.
Police also seized $40,000 in cash “believed to be directly tied to the drug trade,” and small quantities of suspected cocaine, crystal meth and fentanyl.
The two men shot dead early on Jan. 23 at two hotels were Cody Mathieu, 31, of Kamloops and Rex Gill, 41, of Penticton.