Two officers involved in the fatal shooting of an armed man who had just shot to death his estranged wife’s boyfriend have been cleared of criminal wrongdoing by B.C.’s police watchdog.
The shooting happened on the morning of Sept. 18, 2015 in the 3800 block of Frances Street in Burnaby.
The man, high on a cocktail of drugs and alcohol, arrived at his estranged wife’s house just before 7 a.m. with a loaded, bayonet-mounted rifle and two boxes of extra bullets, according to a report released Tuesday by the Independent Investigations Office.
His wife – who had stopped living with the man a year earlier – lived on the ground floor of the house with her boyfriend, her son, his girlfriend and their two infants.
The woman said she had texted her estranged husband the day before and told him she was filing for divorce, according to the IIO report.
On the morning of the shooting, he broke open the door of the house carrying the rifle and yelled at everyone to get into the living room, according to witnesses interviewed by the IIO.
At one point, the woman’s boyfriend confronted the rifle-wielding man and was fatally shot in the neck, according to the IIO report.
In a recording of her 911 call, the woman is heard yelling “Oh my God. He's just shooting. Oh my god” after a gunshot sound.
By the time police arrived, however, everyone had fled the house except the woman’s boyfriend, the shooter and a tenant who was sleeping upstairs.
After unsuccessful attempts to make contact with the shooter, the Lower Mainland Emergency Response Team (ERT) entered the house from the back and encountered him facing them at the end of a hallway, according to the IIO report.
“At that time the affected person was holding a rifle with an attached bayonet which was pointed towards the subject officers,” states the report. “The subject officers shot at him and he was hit with two bullets in the chest. Almost simultaneously the affected person looked down the barrel of his rifle and shot himself in the head.”
A blood-splatter analysis and autopsy supported police accounts the man had shot himself, according to the IIO.
“The pathologist stated that it was not possible to say which, if any, of the gunshots were more significant than others in relation to the cause of death,” states their report.
The man’s estranged wife said he had talked about suicide over the years of their relationship, and, a week before the shooting, had told her he had tried to hang himself.
The IIO concluded the ERT’s entry into the home was justified given the urgency to rescue woman’s boyfriend and the other tenant still in the house.
The watchdog also concluded the “use of force that is intended or is likely to cause death” was justified by the two officers who shot the man, given that he moved his rifle to point in their direction rather than complying with their commands not to move.
“Based on all of the evidence collected during the course of this IIO investigation and the law as it applies, I do not consider that any police officer may have committed an offence under any enactment and therefore the matter will not be referred to Crown Counsel for consideration of charges,” said IIO acting chief civilian director Bert Phipps in the report.
Both officers who shot the man declined to be interviewed by or provide any report to the IIO, as is their right under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
