RCMP Officer, Communications Officer Supports Allegation of Political Interference

OTTAWA – The two people who made accusations of political meddling in a Nova Scotia shooting investigation hold their memories.

Chief Superintendent Darren Campbell and former RCMP director of strategic communications Lia Scanlan were among the witnesses called to testify in the House of Commons public safety committee on Tuesday.

The committee is reviewing conflicting reports about whether RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki was under pressure from the federal government to ensure that the mounted police released details about the weapons used in the 13-hour shooting spree, which left 23 dead. including the gunman.

Several Nova Scotia RCMP officials say Lucki scolded them nine days after the murders.

Campbell’s handwritten notes from a meeting on April 28, 2020, say Lucki told them that he promised then-public safety minister Bill Blair that information about the firearms would be released at a conference. press that day, and that it was related to upcoming gun legislation.

Lucki has said that she did not interfere in the investigation, but was frustrated with the Nova Scotia division for its communication with the public because the media reported facts before the RCMP published them.

“I called the meeting to express my frustration and disappointment,” he told the committee in July.

Campbell told members of the committee Tuesday that Lucki “made me feel like I was stupid” and like I didn’t understand the importance of disclosing information.

The RCMP has come under intense scrutiny over its communication with the public and families of victims during and after the spate of killings. An ongoing public inquiry in Nova Scotia has been commissioned to examine that issue, among others related to the shootings and the police response.

Campbell said he couldn’t reveal the makes and models of the weapons because “it would negatively impact the ongoing investigation.”

“There were investigative objectives, which included the investigation of anyone else who might have assisted (gunman) Gabriel Wortman in any way,” Campbell said.

At the time, the RCMP was working with the FBI and other agencies to discover how Wortman was able to smuggle weapons from the United States.

Scanlan said he felt Lucki didn’t care about the risk to the investigation.

No one, in Canada or the US, has ever been charged with helping Wortman obtain or smuggle those firearms.

The committee has also turned its attention to whether Lucki should have turned over that inventory of weapons to federal government officials by the end of April.

Documents released through the public inquiry show that she shared that inventory with Blair’s office on April 23 and explained that it should not be shared beyond the minister and prime minister.

But Campbell said he didn’t think it was appropriate for her to do so.

“As I understand it, the direction was quite clear that (information about the weapons) could not be shared outside of the RCMP,” he said.

That address, according to Campbell and the chief superintendent. Chris Leather, who also testified before the committee in July, came from Nova Scotia’s police watchdog, the Serious Incident Response Team, known as SIRT.

SIRT was investigating the police murder of the gunman. Campbell and Leather say they were told by the director of SIRT that the weapons inventory could only be disclosed internally because of that investigation.

But Pat Curran, who was director of SIRT in April 2020, told The Canadian Press in an email that the gunman’s weapons were not part of the watchdog investigation and that he gave no instructions to the RCMP.

“I did not consider controlling the disclosure of weapon information to be a SIRT issue. Disclosure or non-disclosure of that information was unrelated to the matters SIRT was investigating,” Curran said.

In their testimony, Blair and Lucki strongly denied that the federal government exerted any pressure on the RCMP commissioner. Meanwhile, Nova Scotia RCMP officials, including former Assistant Commissioner Lee Bergerman, have been adamant that Lucki was under pressure and that she voiced it at the April 28 meeting.

This report from The Canadian Press was first published on August 16, 2022.