RCMP Watch

Pete Fisher, Cobourg, ON (Sun Media)  - After a long bureaucratic battle that sparked a growing furor, changes have been made so slain Const. Chris Garrett can be considered for the Cross of Valour.
The governor general’s office said it has officially received word that the Canadian Bravery Decorations Regulations have been amended and Garrett’s application [...]

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Toronto, ON (Canadian Press) - A Conservative MP says the federal government is clearing the way for a slain Ontario police officer to receive Canada’s highest bravery medal.
Northumberland-Quinte West MP Rick Norlock says Prime Minister Stephen Harper is taking steps to amend the Canadian Bravery Decorations Regulations.
That will allow slain Cobourg police Const. Chris Garrett [...]

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Jonathon Gatehouse and Charlie Gillis (Macleans.ca)  -Dangerous work. No backup. Nasty bosses. Vicious infighting. The RCMP is in ruins.
It was billed as a major drug bust, significant enough to put a crimp into southern Ontario’s cocaine trade. A seven-month undercover sting that culminated in the July 2005 seizure of two kilos of coke, $144,000 in [...]

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Chris Selley (Macleans)
March 2, 2005: Constables Leo Johnston, Anthony Gordon, Brock Myrol and Peter Schiemann are dispatched to assist a bailiff in repossessing a truck from Jim Roszko on his property in Rochfort Bridge, Alta. Roszko flees, but the officers discover stolen property and a marijuana grow-op, and remain to investigate. Having made his way [...]

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Robert Marshall (Winnipeg Sun) - He was just a kid. So how can the RCMP brass sleep at night?
Const. Douglas Scott is the newest and freshest face of law enforcement tragedy. Just out of his teens and half of a two-man detachment in the far north where problems of suicide, despair and a cultural disconnect [...]

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Tonda MacCharles, Ottawa (Toronto Star) - RCMP officers gathering in Brockville today to mourn the death of Const. Douglas Scott might be hoping a backup staffing policy change under discussion at headquarters will prevent such tragedies in the future.
But even if adopted, it’s clear the “multi-member response policy,” which would require lone officers on duty [...]

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(CBC News) - The RCMP say it’s not possible for two officers to respond to every call received in the North, even if there was enough money to pay for them.
Sgt. Larry O’Brien of the Yellowknife RCMP says as baby boomers retire, there just aren’t enough veteran personnel to go around.
He told CBC News he [...]

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(Winnipeg Free Press) It’s a situation that’s becoming all too common — lone Mounties in dire trouble being rescued by ordinary folks as they try to deal with unruly criminals.
Case No. 1: A week ago Saturday, three motorists on the Trans-Canada Highway near Virden had to help a male RCMP officer arrest a combative 37-year-old [...]

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Kelly Egan ( Ottawa Citizen) - The Royal Canadian Mounted Police keeps an honour roll of those who died in service. It is a permanent fraternity, now with 220 members, never to grow smaller.
The last officer to die violently, Const. Douglas Scott, 20, has links to the Ottawa area, and so did the first, in [...]

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Regina, Saskatchewan (Regina Leader-Post) -Regina’s RCMP Depot Division stands by its training program despite the deaths of two on-duty Mounties in a month.
“This program prepares all our graduates, whether they go to Lumsden, Saskatchewan, or Surrey, British Columbia, to take their skills and work as police officers in this country — they’re fully ready for [...]

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