POLICE RAIDS ILL-PLANNED, JUDGE SAYS

Report Tabled on Fatal Shooting of Drug Dealer

WINNIPEG police will heed a judge's recommendation that officers do
better planning before potentially dangerous raids to avoid the kind
of confrontation that resulted in the fatal shooting of a north-end
drug dealer five years ago.

In a report released yesterday, provincial court Judge Charles Rubin
said when officers execute a search warrant, a fully detailed, written
plan should first be prepared, listing the various tasks and the
individual officers assigned those tasks.

Rubin made this and two other recommendations as part of his report
into the Dec. 16, 1997 fatal police shooting of Abe Hiebert.

Rubin also recommended that police have a debriefing session after a
raid and that senior officers make sure junior ranks have clothing
clearly identifying them as police officers.

Acting Police Chief Menno Zacharias said yesterday the force is now
reviewing its policies and procedures on raids to see if they can be
improved.

He added that in the five years since the Hiebert shooting, the
department has already addressed the issue of identifiable police
clothing. Officers not in uniform and involved in street operations or
raids now wear navy blue windbreakers with "POLICE" written in yellow
block letters on the front and back. But Zacharias said if the
measures recommended by Rubin had been in place at the time of the
police confrontation with Hiebert, the outcome would have probably
still have been the same.

He did not have any comment on the length of time it took Rubin to
write the report. The last day of testimony for the inquest was May
25, 2000. The provincial court has since sped up the process by which
judges write inquest reports.

Hiebert's daughter, Angela Nichols, declined yesterday to comment on
Rubin's report. She filed a statement of claim Dec. 3, 1999 against
the police service and the officer who shot her father, Det. Sgt. Len
Small.

Hiebert, a known Talwin and Ritalin dealer, was shot once in the chest
after repeated warnings to stop his attack on officers who were
attempting to break down the back door of his Dufferin Avenue home in
order to execute a search warrant. The raid occurred at a time when
Hiebert was on bail for an earlier drug-trafficking charge.

Hiebert, 60, attacked officers with a baseball bat and pepper spray,
injuring one officer in his left leg and temporarily blinding another
officer.

Hiebert was pepper-sprayed by police, but that had no effect. After
three warnings to drop the bat, he was shot by Small. Small's lawyer,
Hymie Weinstein, said Rubin's report exonerated his client because it
did not criticize his decision to use lethal force.

However, Rubin said the officers, including Small, could have done a
better job planning their raid.

"It is obvious that the police intelligence with respect to the
residence at 479 Dufferin Ave. was deficient," Rubin said.
Specifically, officers did not know Hiebert had modified the back door
after an unreported home invasion and had already struck a plea
bargain with the Crown for a 26-month jail sentence early in the new
year.

Rubin wrote that if all that information had been known to police,
they might have anticipated resistance and "the ensuing violent
confrontation might have been avoided."

Rubin also addressed the fact that several officers involved in the
raid -- excluding Small -- went to a Christmas party hosted by Canada
Customs and Revenue before the raid. The officers admitted they had
consumed a small amount of alcohol. The officers have already been
disciplined for drinking on the job.

"These issues could possibly be attributed to a developing culture
within the Winnipeg Police Service that encourages some members to
believe that they are, in fact, outside the area of responsible and
accountable behaviour, which is required within the service as a
whole," Rubin said.

Rubin also said in his report that he had no problem with police
investigating themselves, as homicide detectives reviewed the shooting
to see if any criminal charges should be laid against the officers.
None were.

"It is my determination that the protocol and policy in place at the
time of this occurrence was appropriate and timely," Rubin said. "It
was also professionally performed."