Four officers of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) were killed while investigating an illegal marijuana farm, in what is the worst single case of police deaths in Canada in 120 years.
RCMP spokesman Corporal Wayne Oakes said the four officers were at a Quonset hut on a farm near the village of Rochfort Bridge in northwestern Alberta on Thursday when they were shot by a suspect, who was also found in the shed. A government source told The Canadian Press news agency that the suspect later killed himself after shooting the officers.
"It's my sad duty to inform you that four members of the RCMP were killed today in the line of duty -- four brave, young members," said Bill Sweeney, commanding officer of the RCMP in Alberta.
"The loss of four police officers is unprecedented in recent history," Sweeney said. "I'm told you have to go back to about 1885 in the RCMP history during the Northwest Rebellion to have a loss of this magnitude."
Public Safety Minister Anne McLellan held a news conference to say she would consider tougher penalties for growers in the proposed marijuana decriminalization bill. Parliament is preparing to debate a resolution that asserts that legalizing pot would weaken the activities of drug dealers and organized crime.
Prime Minister Paul Martin called it an act of "brutality" and offered his condolences to the families of the slain officers.
Sweeney said he couldn't give details on what happened until all the facts were gathered.
There had been confusion all day about the fate of the officers after the first reports that shots were fired at a farm near Rochfort Bridge, a village of about 60 people.
Cenaiko had first told reporters that four officers were not responding to their radios after having gone to investigate suspected illegal activities on the farm. Sergeant Rick Oncescu of the Calgary RCMP said two SWAT teams were called into the area and Mounties from surrounding jurisdictions also responded.
Major Scott Lundy, a spokesman for Edmonton Garrison, said the military received a request just after 12:30pm from the RCMP for assistance. He said two armored personnel carriers, an ambulance and about 20 military personnel were dispatched from the military base.
Drug lord Jose Adolfo Macias Villamar, alias “Fito,” was Ecuador’s most-wanted fugitive before his arrest on Wednesday, more than a year after he escaped prison from where he commanded the country’s leading criminal gang. The former taxi driver turned crime boss became the prime target of law enforcement early last year after escaping from a prison in the southwestern port of Guayaquil. Ecuadoran President Daniel Noboa’s government released “wanted” posters with images of his face and offered US$1 million for information leading to his capture. In a country plagued by crime, members of Fito’s gang, Los Choneros, have responded with violence, using car
OVERHAUL: The move would likely mark the end to Voice of America, which was founded in 1942 to counter Nazi propaganda and operated in nearly 50 languages The parent agency of Voice of America (VOA) on Friday said it had issued termination notices to more than 639 more staff, completing an 85 percent decrease in personnel since March and effectively spelling the end of a broadcasting network founded to counter Nazi propaganda. US Agency for Global Media (USAGM) senior advisor Kari Lake said the staff reduction meant 1,400 positions had been eliminated as part of US President Donald Trump’s agenda to cut staffing at the agency to a statutory minimum. “Reduction in Force Termination Notices were sent to 639 employees at USAGM and Voice of America, part of a
Canada and the EU on Monday signed a defense and security pact as the transatlantic partners seek to better confront Russia, with worries over Washington’s reliability under US President Donald Trump. The deal was announced after a summit in Brussels between Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Antonio Costa. “While NATO remains the cornerstone of our collective defense, this partnership will allow us to strengthen our preparedness ... to invest more and to invest smarter,” Costa told a news conference. “It opens new opportunities for companies on both sides of the
The team behind the long-awaited Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile yesterday published their first images, revealing breathtaking views of star-forming regions as well as distant galaxies. More than two decades in the making, the giant US-funded telescope sits perched at the summit of Cerro Pachon in central Chile, where dark skies and dry air provide ideal conditions for observing the cosmos. One of the debut images is a composite of 678 exposures taken over just seven hours, capturing the Trifid Nebula and the Lagoon Nebula — both several thousand light-years from Earth — glowing in vivid pinks against orange-red backdrops. The new image
RSS