The non-fatal police shooting of a man in Thompson’s Eastwood neighbourhood last October was justified and there is no basis for criminal charges to be laid against the RCMP officer involved, Manitoba’s police watchdog announced Aug. 9.
The Independent Investigation Unit of Manitoba probe into the shooting found that all evidence supported the conclusion that the man who was shot was armed with a knife and that the officer fired the single shot in order to preserve his and others’ safety.
The shooting occurred around 2:45 p.m. last Oct. 25 near the intersection of Princeton Drive and Cornell Place and was captured on video by two residents of Forest View Suites, also known as Princeton Towers, though the identity of the person who filmed one of the videos of the shooting was never determined.
No other police officers were in the area at the time the man was shot in the stomach, but the IIU spoke to nine civilian witnesses, several of whom said in their statements that they saw a knife in the hand of the man who was shot.
The officer who fired the shot was in the area on an unrelated matter when he was notified of an intoxicated male holding a knife. The IIU found that the officer backed away from the armed man in a zigzag pattern to ensure distance between them and repeatedly instructed the man to drop the knife before shooting him once in the stomach and announcing via his police radio that shots had been fired.
In his voluntary statement to IIU investigators, the officer involved in the shooting said, “The male had been given every opportunity to drop the knife and get on the ground and stop doing what he was doing, but for reasons unknown to me, he failed to do so, his continued behaviour only elevated the risks to the general public and myself and a line had to be drawn to stop his behaviour and take control of the situation.”
The first officer to arrive on the scene after the shooting, who was the only other police officer that the IIU interviewed, said she found a filleting knife on the ground near the shooting victim that matched descriptions given by civilian witnesses and that the officer who fired his gun appeared to be in shock and was saying, “He had a knife, he was like six feet away, he was coming, he kept going towards me, I told him to drop the knife, drop the knife, but he wouldn’t and I had to shoot him.”
The man who was shot was interviewed by IIU officers while in Thompson General Hospital on Oct. 27 and told them he was blacked out after consuming alcohol and didn’t remember this incident. A few days later, on Nov 1, in an interview with Thompson RCMP, the man said he was not sure if he was holding a knife or where it may have come from.
“I seen the video, I did not have a knife in my hand … I wanted to talk to the officer, he had no reason to shoot me,” the man told police.
Under the Criminal Code of Canada, police officers have the right to use force, including that which may cause serious injury or death, on a person they are trying to arrest if they are acting in self-defence because of a reasonable belief that they may in danger of being harmed.
A use of force expert told the IIU that the officer’s actions were consistent with what a well-trained Canadian police officer would do in a similar situation.
IIU civilian director Zane Tessler said in his conclusion that, “all the evidence gathered from all sources provides a reliable and sufficient support for the sole conclusion that the decision by [the officer] to shoot [the man] was necessary to prevent the injury or death to himself or anyone in the vicinity” and that there were no grounds to justify any charges against the officer.
