Nova Scotia’s Serious Incident Response Team is investigating after two RCMP members fired an unknown number of bullets at someone outside the Onslow Belmont Fire Brigade Hall on the morning of April 19, 2020.
CBC reports the two unidentified RCMP constables thought they were shooting at the Nova Scotia killer who, by that time, was known to be wearing an RCMP uniform and driving a replica RCMP cruiser.
Their hail of gunfire left the wall of the fire hall riddled with bullet holes.
Pat Curran, Interim Director of SIRT, says an investigation into the gunfire is underway, but offers no additional details.
Timeline
At 10:21am, RCMP Nova Scotia posted the following message on its Twitter feed:
Gabriel Wortman is currently in the #CentralOnslow #Debert area in a vehicle that may resemble what appears to be an RCMP vehicle & may be wearing what appears to be an RCMP uniform. Please stay inside and avoid the area. #RCMPNS
— RCMP, Nova Scotia (@RCMPNS) April 19, 2020
Approximately 9 minutes later, two RCMP constables arrived at the Onslow Belmont Fire Brigade Hall, located roughly 25 kms east of Portapique, and opened fire on someone wearing a safety vest.
RCMP bullets flew for about ten seconds, then the two police officers hid behind a garbage bin, according to one witness.
Then the two RCMP members jumped back into their police cruiser and sped away.
They didn’t bother to check and see if they injured or killed anyone before fleeing the scene.
That’s very disturbing behaviour, even in the midst of a manhunt for a mass murderer, considering SIRT’s Pat Curran says the murder suspect was believed to be somewhere else at the time these two RCMP members started shooting at someone.
Fortunately, the unidentified innocent person was not injured. I can only imagine how terrified they were when the two uniformed cops emptied the magazines of their RCMP-issue pistols into the wall of the volunteer fire hall.
Onslow Belmont Fire Brigade Statement
Source: TheChronicleHeral.ca
The hall was used to provide a place where residents could come take a break, register and get hotel and Red Cross information.
The hall was used to provide a place where residents could come take a break, register and get hotel and Red Cross information,” the brigade says in a Facebook posting, which has since been removed.
We can confirm that around 10:30 a.m. there was gunfire at our hall and the gunfire caused considerable damage to our property, including taking one of our trucks out of service.
Our video surveillance does not capture the shooters but does show two people who appear to be RCMP officers enter our property, one to the front and one to the rear.
One of these people enters our hall at the front but no one who is sheltered inside the hall spoke with the people/person resembling the RCMP officer so we (cannot) confirm why they were there.
No one identified themselves as an RCMP officer. They left our property shortly after the gunfire. We have since been contacted by SIRT (the Serious Incident Response Team) and are co-operating with their ongoing investigation.
Fortunately no one was physically injured.
This is a very disturbing find. Why has this not been talked about by the main stream media?
It has, but it never received much coverage given the massive manhunt underway and the 16 crime scenes he left in his wake. Two cops being idiots didn’t gain much traction in the wake of 22 innocent dead people. Understandably so.
Unless you’re the innocent guy gunned down by these 2 goof officers
The MSM are Enemies of The Canadian People and We get the privilege of paying for [their] LIES
The RCMP do not serve Canadians [they] serve the Crown
This keeps looking worse for the RCMP particularly and the Police Services in general. The RCMP are supposed to be Canada’s elite cops – the highest standard for recruitment, the best training, washing out those who don’t make the grade. It’s getting harder to believe that every time something like this happens. To top it off, if they can’t control access to RCMP and police uniforms, how the hell can they be expected to control access to firearms? How can anyone believe they shouldn’t return fire when this sort of thing happens? No sane person is going to turn in their guns with events like this happening. We settled for licensing and registration. We need to keep licensing and get rid of registration. If the powers that be insist on micro managing us, in the end they will get nothing, and it will be their fault, not ours.
All the money wasted on tracking and controlling licensed firearms owners and their guns could be much better spent of real firearms training for Canadians. I taught my wife and two daughters to shoot – they learned the basics with ..22 rifles and handguns, but got bored shooting at twenty-five yards. When they were comfortable and safe with the basics I moved them up to an .223 AR-15 and let them shoot at 100-200 yards. They liked the .223 because if felt like they were shooting a “real” rifle but without the unpleasant kick they got from my 30-06. The joy they shared competing with that AR-15 was absolutely heartwarming, to say the least. One daughter even joined me as a firearms professional, supervising on – set firearms use. Without her experience of shooting an assortment of firearms, especially the .223, she might not have had the confidence to supervise some of the macho movie stars and redneck extras we had to deal with. The .223 round and rifle are a very important part of our Canadian Firearms Heritage.
Half of the current 18,000 members of the RCMP have less than 5 years of service, and – despite recruits being slightly older than previously(avg age 30) – they are drawn from University types now and not ex-military or those with real rural, “blue collar” life experience. Many have never fired a weapon before training at Depot, and since they are also required to have a clean driver’s licence have no experience with how to handle a car beyond normal, cautious driving. They also must have such a squeaky clean personal history that they have no concept of how criminals think and therefore how to catch them – when they themselves commit crimes on the job or off, it is usually of the most deviant type similar to priests and school teachers who sexually abuse children.
I’m happy to hear you are on top of this! I was beginning to think no one cared or even noticed.
Thanks Ted. Yes, I’ve been following every news item I can find on this story, but there really isn’t much.
Unless more witnesses come forward and speak publicly, we won’t learn any details beyond what we already know.
When Nova Scotia SiRT completes their investigation and publishes their findings we will have a better idea, but likely still not the complete story.
It will be interesting to see what NS SiRT’s report says, whenever it’s finally released.
I agree. I’ve been waiting patiently for their report but am not holding my breath. I imagine a situatation where they say it was nothing and completely belittle it to the point it just goes away. JT got his exscuse to take the guns and now they want us to just focus on the victims and the fear. Don’t ask questions out of repect to the families. Just buy our horse shit narrative. Like you said, it should be fun to watch them squirm and hear what they come up with.
How many shots were fired,you stated they emptied their revolvers..How do you know this? Yes,I know and handle weapons.
Hi Marg,
Nobody knows the price number of shots were fired. That won’t come out until SiRT publishes their report.
My “emptied their magazines” rhetorical comment is based on counting holes in the wall of the fire hall using available photos – hardly a scientific method, I grant you. The point was was attempting to make was they fired a lot of bullets but never bothered to see if they killed anyone before running away.
I have been posting a open question to the RCMP on Facebook asking, who were they shooting at? why did they not identify themselves or the target? how is it that days and now weeks after they still claim not to be sure who was shooting or at what? Why have we not heard from the guy they were shooting at? They have discovered and released more info about the shooter than appears in most biographies but this is still a mystery. How long does it take to spin a ficti9nal story and pay off a woman in Nova Scotia? RCMP that can show up, open fire on innocent people, take off and not explain anything is way more serious than one mass shooting. Mass shootings dont set precedence, what they did, snd the fact that they are not being held immediately to a higher standard than civilians, set precedence. And not a good one. These officers are allowed to carry restricted weapons at all times and use them at their discretion. They should by any logic or even illogic be held to a higher standard and have toral transparency.
Excellent post.
Trauma is a response to psychological injury.
I’m sure the innocent person wouldn’t say they were uninjured.
Where is the accountability there from RCMP?
Great point, Jen. I’ll update so it reads “physically uninjured”.
Thank you for your honesty Christopher….
#TheMoreYouKnow
#TogetherWeWILL
AlisonMyrden.com
Were they real RCMP ?? The single shooter seemed to do a lot of evil by himself ?? Shooting , travelling , burning houses and cars……………..??????
Were these two A-holes part of the rampage ???
I find it hard to believe two “real” cops would actually do this.
Widely reported as two official RCMP members. Nova Scotia SiRT will (eventually) deliver a report on what happened. I doubt that’s forthcoming any time soon though.
My bet is the report will say something along the lines of “we have investigated and cleared ourselves of any wrongdoing” as usual.
I hope not, Andrey. No rational investigation can conclude two cops firing dozens of rounds into a fire hall is anything but criminal when they run away instead of checking to see if they killed anybody. It’s dereliction of duty.
Wow! Taxpayers could have been injured and that’s a very serious incident indeed since all those agencies already lack funding!!! Not to mention its potential impact to Canadian health system and weakening economy.
Now jokes aside, I doubt there will be any repercussions, not corresponding to the seriousness of the incident at least.