NFA Fifth Letter to RCMP Public Complaints Commissioner
December 17, 2013
Airdrie, Alberta
Mr. Ian McPhail, Q.C., Interim Chair
National Intake Office
P.O. Box 88689,
Surrey, BC VEW 0X1
Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP
Dear Mr. McPhail:
RE: HIGH RIVER – LONG-GUN REGISTRY RECORDS USED IN FIREARMS SEIZURES!
Reference is being made to our four previous letters sent to you outlining the many issues and concerns that need to be examined during your investigation of the RCMP’s break-in and unwarranted search of more than 1,900 homes in High River and the seizure of hundreds of firearms and hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammunition.
I want to thank you for sending your investigator, Robert Falla, to Calgary to interview me last week. It was very reassuring to know the depth of your investigation even though I understand the limitations the Commission has under your legislative mandate and terms of reference. Please let us know if we can be of any more help with your investigation of these fundamental human rights and Charter violations in the weeks and months ahead.
In our letter dated August 27, 2013, we provided expert analysis of the audio portion of a RCMP propaganda video of their search of a High River home during the flood. Our audio-visual expert stated the person heard in the radio transmission clearly says he’s “located all the firearms.” These four words would indicate that the RCMP not only knew there were firearms in the house but also the exact number of firearms in the house. We alerted you to this evidence given that the long-gun registry was supposed to be destroyed in 2012. Now it is possible the RCMP radio transmission may have been referring to only restricted or prohibited firearms which still need to be registered; however, while this is a possibility it is not all that likely.
Today, I am providing supporting evidence that the RCMP were using long-gun registry records in their search for firearms in the High River homes. The White’s told me this story on September 13, 2013. Yesterday, Don and Jane White of High River gave me permission to release this information to you. When Don White went to the High River RCMP Detachment to pick up his 11 trigger-locked long guns, the RCMP officer told him that that two of his long-guns weren’t registered. Don White responded, “That’s right, the two new shotguns we just bought!” The only possible way the RCMP Constable knew that two of his long-guns weren’t registered is if he had access to a copy of the old long-gun registry listing of their guns – a listing that was supposed to be destroyed last November in accordance with an Act of Parliament.
In our last letter, we exposed a number of lies the RCMP told the media and public during the events as they unfolded in High River. But all the RCMP lies noted in that letter were told on or after June 28th. On PAGE 93 of the RCMP’s response to ATI Act file: A-2103-04354 there is a CBNewsNet transcript for June 24 at 1:02 PM that states: “200 RCMP officers along with locksmiths as well as military personnel now going door to door checking on homes and checking to see if anyone stranded.” The reference to “locksmiths” is not the whole truth because we also have an RCMP officer’s notes proving that on that same day, June 24, 2013 the RCMP were also kicking in doors and seizing firearms – NOT simply going door-to-door searching for survivors and finding guns that were in “plain view”! We understand your investigators have all the notes taken by RCMP officers during the seven or eight days they searched High River homes. It should be an easy task to prepare a time line showing the dates and times when people were rescued by the RCMP and the dates and times when firearms were seized.
Finally, on page 92 of the response to our RCMP ATIP file A-2013-04354, it shows that in addition to the 223 RCMP officers deployed in High River during the flood, there were 310 Canadian Forces personnel in High River, many of whom were witnesses to the unwarranted search and seizure operations in High River. During my e-mail communications with National Defence in October, we were told that documentation does exist from soldiers in response to Item #4 of our ATI Act request for records of ‘complaints and witness accounts of any inappropriate or illegal action observed while working in High River’. Will you be interviewing any of the 310 Canadian Forces personnel that were deployed in High River?
Please let me know if I can be of any further help to your investigation.
Sincerely,
Dennis R. Young
Canada’s National Firearms Association
1330 Ravenswood Drive SE
Airdrie, Alberta T4A 0P8
Phone: 587-360-1111
Alberta, NWT & International Director
cc The Right Honourable Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada
The Honourable Steven Blaney, Minister of Public Safety
RCMP Commissioner Bob Paulson
