Man arrested carrying meat cleaver on the Hill
When a bullet struck the upper corner of the windshield of a gold Dodge Charger on Wednesday, the panicked but unharmed man inside the car called police, setting off the city’s 38th shooting investigation of the year.
Patrol officers equipped with assault rifles and the heavily armed tactical squad responded to the Debra Dynes community housing complex near Debra Ave. and Meadowlands Dr. just after 12:30 p.m., searching for what police believed was an armed suspect.
Tactical officers entered one of the homes in the complex and exited some 13 minutes later after searching the home. The shot-up Charger, parked across the street at a strip mall, was towed by police for further examination by investigators.
Police believed the shooting was both drug- and gang-related and that the uninjured victim, who is known to police, was targeted. He was co-operating with their investigation, but police said the suspect was on the lam.
Wednesday’s shooting puts the city 11 away from reaching the level of gun play Ottawa saw in 2014 — 49 shootings over 52 weeks — that at the time caused widespread concern from police brass and city council. Both have been largely quiet on the growing number of shootings this year at a time when a draft police budget for 2016 has yet to be approved.
Combating guns and gangs is one of police Chief Charles Bordeleau’s identified priorities. After dealing with 49 recorded shootings and an exhausted anti-gang unit of eight investigators, Bordeleau temporarily bolstered the squad’s numbers. The unit is supposed to investigate every firearms-related offence and shooting in the city while also doing proactive work, along with the direct action response team, to keep track of known gang members in the city.
Officers say the unit’s ability to infiltrate known suspects, conduct surveillance, write warrants and rid suspects of their guns is severely impacted by the number of shooting investigations, which are now routine in Ottawa. Without the proactive work, the guns stay on the street and the shootings continue, police say.
Officers believe they are now in the nearly the same position as they were when shootings spiked in 2014. Since Nov. 9, police have investigated seven shootings, one of them the fatal and as-yet unsolved gunning down of 41-year-old Dady Junior Jean while he stood on his driveway in Vanier.