GROW-OP MANIAC KILLS 4 MOUNTIES

Slaughter Worst Since Northwest Rebellion

A CRAZED gunman with a simmering hatred for cops shot four RCMP officers to
death at a rural marijuana grow operation in Alberta yesterday, the
country's worst police bloodbath in more than a century. Mounties exchanged
shots with gunman James Roszko, 47, at a remote grow operation near the
village of Rochfort Bridge north of Edmonton around 10 a.m. Four hours
later officers moved in to find their fallen comrades -- two from
Mayerthorpe and two from Whitecourt, and the gunman dead.

"The loss of four police officers in a single event is unprecedented. You
would have to go back to 1885 to the Northwest Rebellion to see something
of this scale," said devastated K-Division commanding officer Bill Sweeney,
at the Mayerthorpe RCMP detachment yesterday afternoon.

Police sources said the grow operation north of Mayerthorpe was raided by
the Edmonton Police Service and RCMP Green Team Wednesday night. Two
officers were left behind on guard when the rest of the team left around 3
a.m. yesterday.

Officers Ambushed

"They were shot and two more who came out to the farm later in the morning
were ambushed," said one source.

"He just cut them down."

The gunman continued to fire as other officers arrived on scene.

The site was secured and air space over the area was closed as a safety
precaution. Tactical resources were deployed, including the RCMP emergency
response team, area police officers and about 20 soldiers.

Around 2 p.m. tactical officers made their way to a barn entrance, using a
tractor as cover. Officers were later seen dragging what appeared to be a
human body by the elbows.

Mounties then moved in en masse. Sources say Roszko had turned his gun on
himself.

"The scene was not what officers were hoping to encounter," said RCMP
spokesman Cpl. Wayne Oakes from the Mayerthorpe detachment last night.

The killings touched off shockwaves across Canada.

Last night, Prime Minister Paul Martin issued a statement expressing his
condolences to the families of the fallen officers. "Canadians are shocked
by this brutality, and join me in condemning the violent acts that brought
about these deaths," he said.

Calling it an "unprecedented and unspeakable" loss, RCMP Commissioner
Giuliano Zaccardelli said yesterday's massacre of four Mounties must spark
public debate on Canada's drug strategy.

Large-scale marijuana growing operations -- often booby-trapped and linked
to organized crime -- have become a "plague" in Canadian communities and
led to "incomprehensible" acts of violence, he said.

"The issue of grow-ops is not a Ma and Pa industry," he said.

"These are major, serious threats to our society and they are major,
serious threats to the men and women in the front line who have to deal
with them."

Government Bill

Zaccardelli wouldn't say if the Liberal government's proposed pot
decriminalization bill will prompt grow-ops to flourish, but said he hoped
there will be more talk of sentencing reform for perpetrators in the wake
of the murders.

"Hopefully, this type of a tragedy will make us review and rethink and
reflect and bring a perspective to some of these issues as Canadians,
because we don't want anybody killed or harmed over these kinds of things,"
he said.

Deputy Prime Minister Anne McLellan, whose Public Safety portfolio oversees
the RCMP, said the government is open to revamping the decriminalization
bill and is committed to ensuring police have adequate tools to fight the
"scourge" of grow-ops.

McLellan stressed the government is upping the penalties for grow-ops to
combat their "unacceptable growth."

"We are not in the business of legalizing marijuana. We are in the business
of putting in place a new penalty regime for small amounts of marijuana,"
she said. "

Liberal MP Dan McTeague, a vocal opponent of his government's push to
decriminalize pot, said yesterday's tragedy is a "wake-up call" that the
bill must be scrapped.