Incident in Dover leaves man shot, officer hurt
The Alberta Serious Incident Response Team (ASIRT) has been called in following an officer-involved shooting in Dover on Thursday night.
An officer was injured and a man was shot after police located a stolen vehicle they’d been observing for a time as it pulled into a back alley, near the 3800 block of 30 Ave. S.E. around 7 p.m., police said in a statement.
Later Thursday night Calgary Police Service Chief Roger Chaffin said officers in a police cruiser pulled into the back alley and got out to approach the vehicle, resulting in an altercation between the officers and the individual inside.
The altercation ended with one officer being dragged and injured by the stolen vehicle, and another officer opening fire, striking the driver.
“Four thousand stolen vehicles this year already. Too often I think our members are put in harm’s way,” Chaffin said.
“Just today alone we saw three such events where we saw loaded firearms and drugs in vehicles.
“I’m concerned about the overall crime trending and what we are coming up against on a nightly basis,” he said. Chaffin said there seems to increasingly be “no regard for life or property” in such situations.
A neighbour whose backyard faces the alley told Postmedia his wife heard three gunshots around the time of the incident.
Both the officer and the unidentified male suspect are in stable condition. Chaffin said the man was known to police prior to this incident.
A local resident, Adonis Kalif, said he has lived in the area for more than three years, and has never seen anything like this happen in his backyard.
“That’s why I stopped, I wanted to know exactly what happened,” he said. Kalif added it’s generally a safe neighbourhood, but this incident will make him think twice about allowing his teenage children out after a certain time.