Government, RCMP could face lawsuits: lawyer
Police have faced criticism over lack of emergency alert
HALIFAX — Both the Nova Scotia government and RCMP failed to properly alert Nova Scotians of a gunman’s deadly rampage last weekend and as a consequence will likely face lawsuits in the millions of dollars, says a Halifax personal injury lawyer.
“I find it incomprehensible that when people are being murdered and houses are being torched there’s no emergency public notice going out telling people that there is a murderer on the loose and to take care, stay inside and lock your doors,” said Ray Wagner.
Numerous questions remain about how it was possible for a 51-year-old denture fitter to carry out unprecedented carnage over a 12-hour span, and why a potentially life-saving emergency alert system wasn’t used while the tragedy unfolded.
Nova Scotia Premier Stephen Mcneil has attempted to deflect blame to the RCMP. Mcneil said that around midnight last Saturday the province was first notified of the initial destruction left behind by the gunman in Portapique, and by the following morning Emergency Measures Office (EMO) staff were in a position to issue the alert, but didn't get the go-ahead to do so from the RCMP.
On Wednesday, a day after the premier’s comments, Chief Supt. Chris Leather said the RCMP was drafting an emergency alert when the gunman was shot and killed in Enfield on Sunday.
Wagner slammed the RCMP for choosing Twitter as their primary communication tool with the public while the tragedy unfolded. Wagner, who doesn’t use
Twitter, said a limited number of people use the social media platform. The urgent danger posed by the situation called for a far wider alert and a higher standard of care, he said.
While critical of the RCMP, Wagner also took aim at the province’s EMO. He questioned the province’s decision to not send out a public alert during the gunman's rampage, while just over a week before a text alert was issued advising people to stay inside over Easter weekend.
“Why does EMO sit around in a crisis and not take action themselves without the RCMP?" he said. “EMO can certainly give the RCMP notice that that’s what they intend to do.”
He said any legal action against the province and RCMP will come down to who’s ultimately responsible for issuing the alert. That will be determined by whether both parties had adequate policies or protocols in place to respond competently to the emergency and whether they followed them.
“First off, you establish what the duties are in any kind of negligence case. Is there a duty to warn? Certainly, in this day and age, of course there’s a duty to warn the public of impending danger.”
EMO did not respond to questions about the issue by deadline.
There’s a wide range of damages to be considered in this case, Wagner said. Victims' family members — parents, grandparents and spouses — can claim for what’s called loss of care, companionship and guidance, and there are other options where a spouse of a victims can sue for lost income and support.
“There’s also what we call valuable service, so say you were a 70-year-old woman looking after your 74-yearold paraplegic husband who’s now deceased, there are a lot of services that would have been provided to that husband that are no longer available.”
Separately, there are costs associated with trauma suffered by survivors, which has to be reconciled, he said.
Collectively, damages will be in the millions of dollars, he said.
Wagner said the preferred way to take legal action against both parties is through a class action suit rather than individual claims. Besides being a more efficient and streamlined process, it would drill down to important truths, he said.
“Because everyone wants to know what happened, and the reason they want to know what happened is not because they’re nosey. They want to know and have the comfort that something is being done about it and that this is not going to happen again.”