An Update from the Commissioners – May 20, 2022

Since proceedings started in February 2022, the Commission has uncovered and shared new and important information about what happened on April 18 and 19, 2020. We will continue to investigate what happened—and explore how and why it happened—gathering information and hearing from witnesses, experts, community members and others. Through this investigation and exploration, together, we will make recommendations that will improve training, policies, and systems to help keep communities safer. In an effort to help answer many of the questions we know people are asking, rather than waiting until the end of our work, we are sharing our current understanding of the facts as we go. As you know, we are working with the Participants, including those most affected, first responders and advocacy groups, to inform our understanding. While we are continuously sharing information, we recognize that questions about what happened and how and why it happened remain unanswered. We will continue to seek answers until the end of our mandate when we will share our findings and recommendations in the Commission’s final report.

So far, the Commission has shared with the public 18 Foundational Documents and over 1,400 supporting source materials that inform our current understanding of what happened. The first 12 Foundational Documents provide detailed accounts of what happened at critical scenes involved in the 13 hours of the mass casualty. Through our investigations, we have spoken to over 200 witnesses and heard from 26 witnesses during public proceedings, with more to come, including senior RCMP officers.

Establishing what happened on April 18 and 19 is an important part of our ongoing work. We also need to look at how and why it happened to identify where systems failed or could be improved so that we can recommend ways to do things better in the future. In recent weeks, we have heard from subject matter experts and examined issues around public alerting, police paraphernalia and access to firearms. Again, this is to help us understand issues that are directly connected to the mass casualty and required in our mandate. In order to deliver strong, realistic recommendations at the end of our work, both we as Commissioners and you, the public, need to understand how things work and how they could be improved.

Next Week’s Schedule

Next week, the week of May 23, proceedings will be held at the Best Western Glengarry in Truro, NS. To watch the proceedings, members of the public can register to attend in person, watch via our online webcast, or listen to live audio by calling 1-877-385-4099 toll free and entering code 1742076 followed by the # sign. You can also watch recordings of the webcasts or read transcripts at a later time that works best for you.

Wednesday, May 25

• Witness: Staff Sergeant (S/Sgt.) Bruce Briers, Risk Manager, RCMP

Thursday, May 26

• Witness: Staff Sergeant (S/Sgt.) Allan (Al) Carroll, District Commander for Colchester County, RCMP

Please remember that supports are available if you or a loved one need them, both on site at the proceedings and through the Commission’s website.

Accommodation for Witnesses

All witness testimony heard by the Commission will be shared with the public.

Accommodations may be allowed to help witnesses with wellness concerns or other private issues so that they can take part in proceedings and share important information. This may include taking additional breaks during testimony, asking a support person to accompany a witness, or providing testimony by video.

Participant counsel will continue to have opportunities to ask questions of witnesses, unless there is a compelling reason to take a different approach.

Anyone who is subpoenaed to appear as a witness, including civilians and first responders, can apply for accommodation. These requests are not automatically granted. We, as Commissioners, will decide if accommodations are needed, and to what extent such requests will be accommodated.

We will not allow accommodations to prevent the Commission from gathering necessary information. Accommodations are designed to help the Commission and the public gather and hear critical information, not to get in the way of that. We consider these requests to ensure we can all hear from witnesses in a way that is constructive and respectful.

Rule 43 of the Commission’s Rules of Practice and Procedure governs the process for requesting accommodation.

Expenditures

The Commission has posted an expenditure update on its website. The update includes a breakdown of expenditures from the beginning of the Commission’s mandate (Oct. 21, 2020) until the end of fiscal 2021/2022 (March 31, 2022). Despite the significant task outlined in our mandate and obstacles created by the COVID-19 pandemic, the Commission’s costs are in line with past inquiries of similar size and scope. More information can be found in our FAQs section of the website here.

Participation Addendum

We recently updated our Participants webpage with an addendum to reflect additional Participants granted participation in the inquiry.

Public Submissions

To do our work well, we are calling on members of the wider community across the country to make public submissions focused on the kinds of recommendations you would like to see. You can share something you have read that you think is relevant to our work, or you can propose a change that you would like to see in your community. Your submissions will inform the final report and recommendations to help make our communities safer.

Thank you to everyone who has participated so far. Remember, you can make more than one submission. You can find more information about how to make a public submission on our website. Please submit your input by Sept. 1, 2022.

Sincerely,

The Mass Casualty Commission

Hon. J. Michael MacDonald, Chair

Leanne J. Fitch (Ret. Police Chief, M.O.M.)

Dr. Kim Stanton