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Police sergeant says slain Quebec teenager holding air pistol was perceived as threat

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SHERBROOKE, Que. — Quebec provincial police officers who responded to an emergency call that left a 17-year-old dead testified on Tuesday about a quick interaction with a teenager in crisis that lasted just over a minute.

Their testimony was part of a coroner’s inquest into the 2018 police shooting of Riley Fairholm, who was shot in the head by a police officer in the parking lot of an abandoned restaurant in Lac-Brome, Que., about an hour southeast of Montreal.

Sgt. Wallace McGovern told the inquest he became increasingly uncomfortable as an armed teenager advanced toward officers in the early morning of July 25.

“He was going back and forth and each time he would come toward us, he would come closer toward us, always with his weapon pointing everywhere,” McGovern said.

Provincial police at the time did not know that it was Fairholm himself who had called 911 about a man with a gun in the rural Quebec town in the province’s Eastern Townships. The 911 dispatcher put Fairholm through to McGovern.

The sergeant told the inquiry he asked the caller to describe the armed assailant. McGovern said the caller described a teen dressed in dark clothing, wearing a long-sleeved shirt, with a dark cap and a backpack.

McGovern said the conversation with Fairholm took place as six officers huddled to map out a plan should they have come across the suspect. He said he didn’t make a connection between the 911 caller and the Fairholm he encountered in the parking lot — a teenager dressed in black and waving his arms and screaming with a pistol in hand.

When the officers arrived on scene, McGovern started talking to Fairholm through a loudspeaker. The sergeant said he asked the teenager in English to drop a weapon, which police discovered later was an air pistol.

The sergeant said he cracked open his car door and tried to get out but his partner told him to stay inside. He said that as he was closing the car door, he heard Fairholm say he had been planning this day for five years.

“My first reaction was to get out (of the car) and make a verbal contact with him; it looked like a teenager and my partner grabbed my arm and told me not to; it was too dangerous,” McGovern said.

McGovern said he used the loudspeaker to ask Fairholm to drop the weapon. The sergeant said he repeated his demand at least three times. He said he was in his patrol car and couldn’t hear Fairholm respond.

“I was hoping he would drop his weapon and I knew there was only three outcomes: he would either drop his weapon, start shooting at us or the way he was acting and pointing toward us … somebody would stop the threat,” McGovern said.

McGovern said he didn’t see where the shot came from, but he said he knew one of his colleagues had fired on Fairholm.

“It wasn’t very long; I said in my report it was one to two minutes and obviously it was closer to one minute,” McGovern said.

Fairholm had a faint pulse, but police did not perform CPR on him, McGovern said.

Geneviève Racine, another police officer on the scene, told the inquiry that officers didn’t have proper first aid equipment on hand and that she tried to stem the bleeding from the head wound.

Racine discussed encountering Fairholm’s parents at the hospital. She said they had several tense exchanges, including one involving the teen’s mother, who discovered that police had killed him and that he hadn’t killed himself.

“I had a mother in front of me and I couldn’t hide the truth from her,” Racine said.

The shooting was investigated by Quebec’s independent police watchdog, and the Crown decided not to lay charges.

Fairholm’s family has been critical of the provincial police and Quebec’s independent police oversight agency, known as the Bureau des enquêtes indépendantes, for a lack of transparency.

For his part, McGovern offered his sympathies to Fairholm’s family. He was asked by the inquiry lawyer if the result would have been different had he been able to speak with the teenager for a longer period of time.

“I have no idea it would have changed anything,” McGovern responded.

But the sergeant added that three years later, he responded to a call involving a Cree man threatening to kill himself with a rifle. McGovern said it took three hours, but he was able to bring the situation under control, adding that the man thanked him for his patience.

“Time sometimes works for you,” McGovern said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 14, 2022.

— By Sidhartha Banerjee in Montreal.

 

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Canada’s Denis Shapovalov wins Belgrade Open for his second ATP Tour title

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BELGRADE, Serbia – Canada’s Denis Shapovalov is back in the winner’s circle.

The 25-year-old Shapovalov beat Serbia’s Hamad Medjedovic 6-4, 6-4 in the Belgrade Open final on Saturday.

It’s Shapovalov’s second ATP Tour title after winning the Stockholm Open in 2019. He is the first Canadian to win an ATP Tour-level title this season.

His last appearance in a tournament final was in Vienna in 2022.

Shapovalov missed the second half of last season due to injury and spent most of this year regaining his best level of play.

He came through qualifying in Belgrade and dropped just one set on his way to winning the trophy.

Shapovalov’s best results this season were at ATP 500 events in Washington and Basel, where he reached the quarterfinals.

Medjedovic was playing in his first-ever ATP Tour final.

The 21-year-old, who won the Next Gen ATP Finals presented by PIF title last year, ends 2024 holding a 9-8 tour-level record on the season.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.



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Talks to resume in B.C. port dispute in bid to end multi-day lockout

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VANCOUVER – Contract negotiations resume today in Vancouver in a labour dispute that has paralyzed container cargo shipping at British Columbia’s ports since Monday.

The BC Maritime Employers Association and International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514 are scheduled to meet for the next three days in mediated talks to try to break a deadlock in negotiations.

The union, which represents more than 700 longshore supervisors at ports, including Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Nanaimo, has been without a contract since March last year.

The latest talks come after employers locked out workers in response to what it said was “strike activity” by union members.

The start of the lockout was then followed by several days of no engagement between the two parties, prompting federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon to speak with leaders on both sides, asking them to restart talks.

MacKinnon had said that the talks were “progressing at an insufficient pace, indicating a concerning absence of urgency from the parties involved” — a sentiment echoed by several business groups across Canada.

In a joint letter, more than 100 organizations, including the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Business Council of Canada and associations representing industries from automotive and fertilizer to retail and mining, urged the government to do whatever it takes to end the work stoppage.

“While we acknowledge efforts to continue with mediation, parties have not been able to come to a negotiated agreement,” the letter says. “So, the federal government must take decisive action, using every tool at its disposal to resolve this dispute and limit the damage caused by this disruption.

“We simply cannot afford to once again put Canadian businesses at risk, which in turn puts Canadian livelihoods at risk.”

In the meantime, the union says it has filed a complaint to the Canada Industrial Relations Board against the employers, alleging the association threatened to pull existing conditions out of the last contract in direct contact with its members.

“The BCMEA is trying to undermine the union by attempting to turn members against its democratically elected leadership and bargaining committee — despite the fact that the BCMEA knows full well we received a 96 per cent mandate to take job action if needed,” union president Frank Morena said in a statement.

The employers have responded by calling the complaint “another meritless claim,” adding the final offer to the union that includes a 19.2 per cent wage increase over a four-year term remains on the table.

“The final offer has been on the table for over a week and represents a fair and balanced proposal for employees, and if accepted would end this dispute,” the employers’ statement says. “The offer does not require any concessions from the union.”

The union says the offer does not address the key issue of staffing requirement at the terminals as the port introduces more automation to cargo loading and unloading, which could potentially require fewer workers to operate than older systems.

The Port of Vancouver is the largest in Canada and has seen a number of labour disruptions, including two instances involving the rail and grain storage sectors earlier this year.

A 13-day strike by another group of workers at the port last year resulted in the disruption of a significant amount of shipping and trade.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.



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The Royal Canadian Legion turns to Amazon for annual poppy campaign boost

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The Royal Canadian Legion says a new partnership with e-commerce giant Amazon is helping boost its veterans’ fund, and will hopefully expand its donor base in the digital world.

Since the Oct. 25 launch of its Amazon.ca storefront, the legion says it has received nearly 10,000 orders for poppies.

Online shoppers can order lapel poppies on Amazon in exchange for donations or buy items such as “We Remember” lawn signs, Remembrance Day pins and other accessories, with all proceeds going to the legion’s Poppy Trust Fund for Canadian veterans and their families.

Nujma Bond, the legion’s national spokesperson, said the organization sees this move as keeping up with modern purchasing habits.

“As the world around us evolves we have been looking at different ways to distribute poppies and to make it easier for people to access them,” she said in an interview.

“This is definitely a way to reach a wider number of Canadians of all ages. And certainly younger Canadians are much more active on the web, on social media in general, so we’re also engaging in that way.”

Al Plume, a member of a legion branch in Trenton, Ont., said the online store can also help with outreach to veterans who are far from home.

“For veterans that are overseas and are away, (or) can’t get to a store they can order them online, it’s Amazon.” Plume said.

Plume spent 35 years in the military with the Royal Engineers, and retired eight years ago. He said making sure veterans are looked after is his passion.

“I’ve seen the struggles that our veterans have had with Veterans Affairs … and that’s why I got involved, with making sure that the people get to them and help the veterans with their paperwork.”

But the message about the Amazon storefront didn’t appear to reach all of the legion’s locations, with volunteers at Branch 179 on Vancouver’s Commercial Drive saying they hadn’t heard about the online push.

Holly Paddon, the branch’s poppy campaign co-ordinator and bartender, said the Amazon partnership never came up in meetings with other legion volunteers and officials.

“I work at the legion, I work with the Vancouver poppy office and I go to the meetings for the Vancouver poppy campaign — which includes all the legions in Vancouver — and not once has this been mentioned,” she said.

Paddon said the initiative is a great idea, but she would like to have known more about it.

The legion also sells a larger collection of items at poppystore.ca.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.



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