VPD officers cleared of wrongdoing

Probe into 2009 fatal shooting of man finds police not guilty of any criminal act

Vancouver police officers involved in a 2009 domestic-dispute call that saw a knife-wielding Vancouver man shot dead in front of his 13-year-old daughter have been cleared of any wrongdoing.

On Sept. 18, 2009, Eugene Anthony Knight, 46, was shot by two officers after a third officer shot him with a Taser that proved “ineffective,” Sgt. Peter Thiessen, Integrated Homicide Investigation Team spokesman, told The Province at the time.

Vancouver police asked for an external probe, and after a lengthy investigation, IHIT found the fatal shooting was not a criminal act, Thiessen said on Thursday.

Knight’s wife, also 46, had called 911, screaming that a knife-wielding man was threatening to kill her, police said. Three officers broke through Knight’s door in the 2500-block Birch Street within four minutes of the call. They ordered Knight to drop the knife, Thiessen

“There was no criminality or Police Act [issues] in this tragic event.” — Rollie Woods, Office of the Police Complaint Commission

said, at the time.

Neighbours interviewed at the time said that violent screams and up to six shots shattered the calm of the quiet, tree-lined South Granville block.

Jaime Whittmack, 30, who lives in an adjacent building, said before shots were heard there was “screaming and I heard someone saying, ‘Put down the knife!’”

As a matter of process, the case was forwarded to the Office of the Police Complaint Commission (OPCC) for an independent review.

Rollie Woods of the OPCC said his office oversaw a Police Act investigation into the shooting, conducted by Port Moody police.

That investigation also found no wrongdoing.

“There was no criminality or Police Act [issues] in this tragic event,” Woods said.

A Coroner’s inquest has been scheduled.

In September 2009 Thiessen said Knight’s wife was not physically harmed in the knife-wielding incident and was transported to the Vancouver police detachment, along with her daughter. The wife was co-operating with police and counselling was being provided to both, police said.