RCMP Commissioner Brenda Luckey speaks during a press conference in Ottawa on October 21, 2020. Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press
Something extremely important is missing: an explanation from RCMP Commissioner Brenda Luckey. He can’t wait much longer.
The claim that the Liberal government pressured the RCMP to release information about the investigation into the April 18-19, 2020 shootings in Nova Scotia in order to advance its gun control agenda is now reduced to two increasingly incompatible versions of events – with Commissioner Lucky in between.
We need the commissioner to come out quickly.
She issued prepared statements denying political pressure. But now she must tell the country what she told RCMP officers at a conference call on April 28, 2020 — and whether she told them she was under political pressure to release more information about the investigation.
A second document emerged this week from a second RCMP official who said they heard Commissioner Luckey express her desire to see investigators release information about the weapons used in the shootings because she was under political pressure over the pending government gun legislation. It’s hard to imagine two people mishearing the same shocking thing.
Yet there was a clear denial on Wednesday from Emergency Preparedness Minister Bill Blair, who at the time of the shootings was public safety minister in charge of the RCMP.
He said neither he nor anyone else in the government had asked Commissioner Luckey to provide additional information. And he said he never linked the government’s gun control program to the investigation or released details in his conversation with the commissioner.
There is only one person in the middle of it all: the top officer in the national police. However, the contradictions in the description of the events have become more acute, Mr. Member of the Commission Lucky’s version remained unclear. She is expected to appear before a parliamentary hearing on the matter at the end of July. But the public has a right to expect a frank account of what happened. Immediately.
The question is not whether Mr. Blair, nor Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, nor any other political operative in the Liberal government asked the RCMP commissioner for answers about the 2020 shootings.
It was a shocking mass shooting at the first peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the RCMP’s response raised more than a few questions — which is why the inquiry, the Mass Casualty Commission, is looking into it now. The manner in which the information was released by the force, including Commissioner Luckey, also raised questions. Mr. Trudeau and his ministers were right to ask what was going on.
But there is a red line – instructing or pressuring police on how to conduct operations – that cannot be crossed. And it is doubly worse if the border is crossed for crude political purposes.
RCMP Superintendent Darren Campbell’s notes from the 2020 conference call said Commissioner Luckey chided officers for not providing details about the weapons used in the mass shooting — a revelation that Supt. Campbell believed he would obstruct the investigation. According to those notes, Commissioner Luckey said she promised the Prime Minister and Mr Blair that information about the weapons used in the shootings would be released as it related to pending government gun legislation.
This week, the Mass Casualty Commission released a letter to Commissioner Luckey written by Leah Scanlan, former director of strategic communications for the RCMP in Halifax, written a year after the events. Ms Scanlan said that in the conference call Commissioner Luckey spoke about the pressures she was facing, the talks she had had with Mr Blair and the Government’s plan to introduce gun legislation. Ms Scanlan wrote that she felt “disgust” when she realized that these political considerations had been the “catalyst” for the conference call.
So? Was Commissioner Luckey talking about political pressure when he complained that investigators were not releasing details about the weapons used in the incident? Did she mention the government’s political agenda and upcoming gun legislation?
She really hasn’t told us. She came out with statements that she had not faced political pressure. But she didn’t tell the whole story on that conference call.
On Tuesday, Commissioner Luckey issued another statement admitting she had handled that conference call poorly, again denying political interference and failing to explain what happened.
This cannot go on. She is the senior officer in the national police. This is a serious charge. And the commissioner cannot maintain public trust if he keeps us guessing.
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