Brenda Lucki, the first female RCMP Commissioner, announced today that she will retire March 17, one month short of her fifth anniversary on the job. Despite intense political criticism on several fronts in the past couple of years, she said the federal police force had made “some great progress” in meeting the expectations of Canadians, communities and policing partners. [node:read-more:link]
Convicted after abducting and confining a 3-year-old boy in Sparwood 12 years ago, the sex offender is free again, despite violating his parole board supervision conditions. In November 2022, Randal Hopley had been seen sitting near children attending story time in a local library, however, the judge has now ruled she did not believe he currently poses a risk to the public. [node:read-more:link]
Convicted after abducting and confining a 3-year-old boy in Sparwood 12 years ago, the sex offender is free again, despite violating his parole board supervision conditions. In November 2022, Randal Hopley had been seen sitting near children attending story time in a local library, however, the judge has now ruled she did not believe he currently poses a risk to the public. [node:read-more:link]
U.S. intelligence officials believe that the Chinese balloon shot down by the U.S., and now in the hands of the FBI, is part of an extensive military surveillance program which has conducted at least two dozen missions over at least five continents in recent years. Roughly half have been into U.S. airspace, including the downed “weather” balloon which also entered Canadian airspace after being detected by NORAD. The debris now is being analyzed by FBI engineers in an attempt to learn what kind of intelligence it could have collected as well as how future incursions can be tracked. [node:read-more:link]
RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki told a parliamentary committee February 6 that officers were deployed as a disruption at three Chinese “police stations” in Toronto and one in Vancouver. “We did a disruption by going in uniform, with marked police cars, to speak with the people involved,” she said. Meanwhile, the RCMP is continuing its investigation into what has been condemned as a global initiative by China against expatriates. [node:read-more:link]
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has pardoned “tens of thousands” of prisoners, including many linked to anti-government protests in recent months, on the eve of the anniversary of the 1979 Islamic revolution. Persons charged with offences such as espionage, murder or destruction of state property, some of whom face the death penalty, are not being pardoned. [node:read-more:link]
The U.S. Coast Guard’s rescue of a Canadian at the mouth of the Columbia River in Oregon took a strange twist on the weekend. A massive wave had rolled the trawler yacht which he was aboard, which turned out to be stolen. He was not only arrested in connection with another incident in Oregon but also is wanted in B.C. on a variety of other outstanding charges [node:read-more:link]
The federal government is facing resistance to a request that the RCMP stop using sponge rounds and CS gas for crown control. Brian Sauvé, a former RCMP officer and now President of the National Police Federation, says “removing less lethal options from our members’ available options raises real concerns for public and police officer safety.” [node:read-more:link]
Swedish Justice Minister Gunnar Strömmer says proposed legislation would restrict activities linked to militant Kurdish groups in the hopes of persuading Turkey’s objections to his country’s bid for NATO membership. “It's a broader criminalisation, targeting a large number of activities within a terrorist organisation that are not concretely connected to a particular terrorist crime,” he said. [node:read-more:link]
Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness said February 1 that his government is willing to send troops and police to Haiti as part of a proposed multinational security force. The UN special envoy for Haiti said a week ago that she hoped the Security Council would deal “positively” with the request from Haiti’s government which has been dealing with widespread gang violence. [node:read-more:link]
Two RCMP officers in Prince George, B.C., are charged with manslaughter in the 2017 death of an indigenous man in their custody, prosecutors announced February 1. Three others are charged with attempting to obstruct justice. Four of the officers remain on active duty while the other is on administrative leave for unrelated reasons. [node:read-more:link]
Citing similar cases in British Columbia, an Ontario Superior Court judge has denied a municipality’s application to clear out an encampment of homeless people. The Region of Waterloo had asked the court to find that some 50 people in a Kitchener were violating trespass laws but Judge Michael Valente ruled that there is a constitutional right for a person to shelter themselves if accessible indoor spaces aren’t available. [node:read-more:link]
A Taliban splinter group is being blamed for a January 30 suicide-bomb attack that killed at least 100 persons and wounded scores of others in Pakistan near its northwestern border with Afghanistan. The mosque in Peshawar is within a high-security zone which includes regional security headquarters. [node:read-more:link]
Effective January 31, British Columbia begins a three-year experiment in decriminalizing small amounts of cocaine, methamphetamine and MDMA possessed by persons 18 and older. The federal government granted an exemption from the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act last May and while it is not expected to stop users from being killed by tainted drugs it is considered a step forward. [node:read-more:link]
A bomb believed to have been planted by the Taliban killed at least 59 people and wounded 157 others praying in a mosque near police headquarters in Peshawar, Pakistan, today. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said the attackers “have nothing to do with Islam” and that “the entire nation is standing united against the menace of terrorism.” [node:read-more:link]
