Onslow shooting probe released
Investigation recommends mounties who fired on fire hall shouldn’t be charged
Charges aren’t warranted against the Mounties who shot up the Onslow Belmont Fire Hall during Nova Scotia’s April 2020 mass shootings, according to Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit.
It reviewed information from the public inquiry into Gabriel Wortman’s shooting spree that left 22 people dead, including a pregnant woman and an RCMP constable. During the frantic manhunt for Wortman, shots fired by two RCMP officers at the fire hall on April 19, 2020, left those inside fearing for their lives.
“The Nova Scotia Serious Incident Response Team had asked Ontario’s SIU to review whether any new information considered by the Mass Casualty Commission that had not been considered in the SIRT’S investigation of the shooting, would impact the previous SIRT decision that no charges were warranted,” the Ontario watchdog said Friday in a news release.
The report probes new evidence in the case, but ultimately doesn’t find enough to charge RCMP constables Terry Brown and Dave Melanson for the shooting that left three men inside the fire hall fearing for their lives for almost an hour.
“The new material evidence falls short of justifying criminal charges against either of (them),” it says.
Deputy Chief Darrell Currie, 59, still believes the Mounties who shot at the fire hall that day should be charged.
“Obviously I’m disappointed,” Currie said Friday after reading through the SIU report twice.
“They’ve taken the RCMP for their word, and that’s been the problem all along ... I personally don’t believe their statements.”
‘JUST FRUSTRATING’
Currie, a volunteer firefighter, suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder due to the mistaken fire hall shootings.
“I’m still not back to work,” said the Bell technician.
“I go to psychologist appointments monthly now, take medication and that sort of wonderful stuff for PTSD, and then this obviously is just frustrating.
It adds to the frustration and the problems. And it doesn’t help that this is the week before the anniversary.”
The RCMP shootings in question took place on the second day of Wortman’s 13-hour killing rampage on April 18 and 19, 2020, that saw the Dartmouth denturist dress up like a Mountie, get into his mock patrol car and murder neighbours near his cottage in Portapique, escape and take a nap in Debert, then continue to kill people he knew as well as random strangers in the Wentworth area, Debert and Shubenacadie.
The fire hall had been transformed into a comfort centre on the morning of April 19, 2020, for people being evacuated from the seaside village of Portapique, some 30 kilometres to the west.
The Mass Casualty Commission heard that Brown and Melanson approached the fire hall at about 10:17 that morning in an unmarked Nissan Altima.
Brown had interviewed Lisa Banfield, the mass killer’s common law wife, earlier that morning and learned Wortman was driving a replica RCMP cruiser and was wearing an orange safety vest.
Approaching the fire hall, the two officers saw David Westlake, the emergency management co-ordinator for Colchester County, wearing a reflective safety vest and standing beside a marked RCMP cruiser in the fire hall parking lot.
Mistaking Westlake for the killer, the officers stopped in the middle of Highway 2 and got out of the Nissan with their Rcmp-issued carbines raised.
The two officers reported seeing Westlake duck behind the RCMP vehicle, driven by Const. Dave Gagnon, who was sitting in the vehicle after backing into the fire hall parking lot earlier to provide security for the comfort centre.
Brown then fired four rounds from his carbine toward the firehall and Melanson fired once.
‘SHOTS FIRED’
Westlake bolted into the fire hall and yelled “shots fired.”
The Ontario outfit compared evidence given about the firehall shooting at the public inquiry with the investigation conducted by SIRT, Nova Scotia’s police watchdog.
Several details appeared to be new, including that Westlake “explicitly denied ducking,” according to the new report.
But that denial is at odds with his earlier notes, it says, which detail how two officers in a gray car yelled “get down & I ducked & ran into main entry shots then ring out.”
Westlake was also mistaken about his position in relation to an RCMP cruiser on the scene.
“He places himself at the rear of the cruiser on the passenger side,” says the new report.
“In fact, the video footage establishes that he was by the driver’s door of the cruiser when he began his flight towards the fire hall doorway.”
Another new detail to emerge in the comparison was that Gagnon did not hear any commands and he thought his window was down.
The new report also pointed out that Jerome Breau, a civilian witness, reported driving by the officers with his window down not hearing them issue police commands before shooting.
“The new material evidence (from Gagnon and Breau) that they did not hear commands (from Brown and Melanson) before the shooting does not establish that no commands were given. It could very well be they simply did not hear any such commands given the distances involved and the dynamic nature of the events as they unfolded,” said the report authored by Joseph Martino, director of Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit.
“…In view of the countervailing evidence on these points proffered by the (two officers who fired their weapons) there is no reason to believe that the more incriminating scenario is more persuasive than the other.”
‘POLITICALLY MOTIVATED’
Brian Sauvé, who heads the National Police Federation, was keen on the results of the SIU probe.
“We are pleased to once again see our members cleared of any wrongdoing in respect to shots fired by two RCMP officers at the Onslow Fire Hall on April 19, 2020, to protect their community,” Sauvé said in a written statement.
“This questionable and politically motivated decision to re-open this investigation for a third time was unnecessary and reactive, and only achieves the risk of additional public scrutiny and trauma for members who professionally and bravely responded to the mass casualty event.”
A Mountie dog handler recognized Wortman and shot him dead on April 19, 2020, as he was attempting to gas up a car at the Enfield Big Stop that he’d stolen from his final murder victim.
The SIU report is available online at https://siu.on.ca/en/directors_report_ details.php?drid=3796.