IT'S CRIMINAL THE WAY WE TREAT COPS

It's one of my earliest memories, being shepherded into the house by a
nervous mother one summer day in Kamloops in 1962. Someone had just
shot and killed three Mounties up by the Peterson Creek bridge, and
the murderer was still on the loose.

There was relief all round when the gunman, George Booth, described by
his own father as a crack shot who could split a match at 50 yards,
was killed by police a few hours later. Still, crossing that bridge
always gave me chills.

The names of the slain policemen are inscribed on the grey block of
the B.C. Law Enforcement Memorial, which sits on the legislature
grounds. So are the names of 90 others -- Mounties, Saanich police,
B.C. Provincials, prison guards, conservation officers -- who died on
the job, going back to colonial times.

The earliest recorded death was that of Johnston Cochrane, a Victoria
constable whose 1859 shooting in the Craigflower area was never
solved. The most recent name etched in the granite is that of Richmond
RCMP Const. Jimmy Ng -- the only son of a Saltspring Island couple --
whose cruiser was broadsided by a speeding car in 2002. Yet to be
added to the memorial is auxiliary constable Glen Evely, whose Vernon
RCMP car was struck last November.

If there's a surprise, it's that there aren't more names, particularly
given the kind of guns and violence encountered by police today. An
uncle who retired as an RCMP staff sergeant once told me he could
count on one hand the number of times, in a career that spanned more
than three decades, that he had pulled his revolver. I relayed that
story to another, modern-day Mountie. "Really?" he replied. "I had my
shotgun out three times last week."

Veteran cops will tell you that a couple of decades ago, they would
encounter weapons in maybe one in 10 drug raids. Now they find
firearms eight times out of 10. Even if the guns are intended for use
against rival dealers and ripoffs, not the police, they're proof that
the multibillion-dollar drug-production industry is a serious business
run by serious people. Intimidation and violence are the constant
currency of many of those involved; they'll spit threats in the cops'
faces even as the cuffs go on. You can make the argument that
marijuana is a relatively harmless drug and should be made legal, but
there's nothing benign about an AK-47 or the kind of person who would
own one.

The sad fact is that many bad guys are no longer afraid of the cops or
the courts, particularly here in B.C., where sentences are generally
much more lenient than in other jurisdictions. There's simply too much
profit and too little deterrent. Police, the ones we depend on to
protect us from criminals, need protection of their own.

Instead, they get rulings like the one made this past January, when a
Supreme Court judge threw out charges against a Fraser Valley couple
whose marijuana-growing operation was raided by police. Because the
police allowed only a couple of seconds between demanding that the
front door be opened and breaking it down with a battering ram, the
court ruled they had violated the couple's right to be secure against
unreasonable search and seizure.

That may seem like a good decision on one level, but try asking the
cops sweating on the doorstep what they think about losing the element
of surprise. Maybe from now on they can shout "It's the police! Go get
your guns while we count to 10!" Or maybe people with grow-ops in
their basements shouldn't bitch when their doors get booted.

Victoria Police Chief Paul Battershill argues that marijuana growers
need to know they'll get much stiffer sentences if they booby-trap,
barricade or otherwise arm their operations. "If they do, then they
won't arm themselves in protecting these grows." That sort of thing
needs to be defined in legislation, a clear-cut message for both
criminals and courts.

Perhaps such a law would have been enough to ensure that the killer of
the Alberta Mounties didn't have a gun available to grab on Thursday.
Or perhaps nothing would have stopped him, just as nothing would have
halted the killer of the Kamloops constables 43 years ago.

All that's certain is that if we're going to ask the police to wade
into harm's way on our behalf, then we are obligated to give them as
much protection as possible.