Confusion, lack of command complicated RCMP response to rampage, Nova Scotia public inquiry hears

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The first RCMP officers to respond to a mass shooting in April, 2020, in Portapique, N.S., ditched their police cars and walked into the community on foot because they were concerned their vehicles would make them targets, a public inquiry was told Tuesday.

That revelation, shown in transcripts of radio communication between officers, is the first time the public is hearing from the perspective of the police on scene in the early moments of a gunman’s rampage that eventually killed 22 people. That includes Constable Stuart Beselt, an officer with the RCMP’s Bible Hill detachment with 24 years of policing experience, who told the inquiry’s investigators he was worried about a scenario similar to the shooting of five Mounties in Moncton in 2014.

“He described the police vehicle in this setting as a ‘billboard’ and noted ‘police officers die in their cars,’” according to the interview. “He stated: ‘You’re wanting to get in there as stealthily as possible, basically, and have some advantage of, you know, darkness or whatever the case may be.’”

How the RCMP spent their time after arriving on scene is critical for an inquiry trying to understand where errors may have been made. It took the first officer nearly 22 minutes to arrive in Portapique after the first 911 call that said Gabriel Wortman was killing his neighbours. Once there, Constable Beselt – who was the senior officer among those first at the scene – told two fellow officers to leave their vehicles in the road and “approach cautiously,” saying, “I’d rather be safe than sorry.”

But while the Mounties took a cautious approach to entering the rural community, leaving their vehicles behind and walking down the dark, densely wooded roadway, the gunman continued his killing unabated. Over the course of at least 40 minutes after the first 911 call, which came at 10:01 p.m. on April 18, he went house to house, killing 13 people in Portapique and lighting their homes on fire – before it’s believed he avoided a police roadblock by driving down a little-used private road through a blueberry field.

The RCMP were told about that possible escape route on Saturday night, but failed to follow up on it until the next day, the inquiry heard. It wasn’t until 9:42 a.m. on April 19 that the RCMP realized the gunman had long ago left the area – when a police radio call reported the homicide of Lillian Campbell in Wentworth, N.S., a community more than 40 kilometres away.

Nova Scotia RCMP waited 12 hours before alerting public gunman was driving a lookalike police car

The transcripts show there was confusion among the officers on the ground over who was in charge the night the attack began. It’s also unclear why RCMP leadership didn’t send in reinforcements to help the first three officers who went into the community, and initially kept five other officers waiting at a roadblock near the highway leading into Portapique.

At one point during their response, some RCMP members on the scene grew frustrated at the lack of direction from their superiors. Constable Bill Neil told the inquiry’s investigators he decided on his own to evacuate four children who had been left hiding in a basement for two hours during the rampage, after their parents were killed, since no one in command was giving orders.

“I asked on the radio who was in charge, and nobody answered,” he said. “So I was getting pretty pissed off, right?”

At 12:25 a.m., the four children were finally removed from the scene, driven by Constable Chris Grund in local resident Lisa McCully’s Suzuki SUV because the officers had left their own vehicles outside the community. Ms. McCully had been killed about two hours earlier.

At 11:20 a.m., Constable Grund had radioed the RCMP command centre asking if he could go into Portapique to help, now that five additional officers were on site. He was told to wait.

“Hold off on the second team,” replied Sergeant Andy O’Brien, the lead officer from the Bible Hill detachment. “I only want one team in there if we can avoid having anyone else in the crossfire.”

By then the gunman had been gone for about 40 minutes.

An hour after it’s believed the gunman had left the Portapique area, the Mounties on scene were still taking cover, worried some of the explosions from the burning homes could be gunshots.

“It’s hard to tell right now, ‘cause there’s so much stuff blowing up at the houses it sounds like gunshots,” Constable Beselt said over the radio, according to the transcripts.

The RCMP officer later told the inquiry’s investigators he was employing an “immediate action rapid deployment” approach that trains police to “seek out and neutralize an active threat” during shooting scenarios such as this. But long after the killer had left, unbeknownst to them, the officers weren’t trying to find the gunman – and in fact were being told to “shelter in place” by their superiors until more heavily armed tactical officers arrived.

“Do you want just us to sit tight here ‘cause, if this is active shooter, I, ah, I just don’t know where he is right now,” Constable Beselt said, over his radio, at 11:15 p.m.

By 10:30 p.m., the transcripts show, the RCMP already had the gunman’s name and knew he was driving a lookalike RCMP vehicle. That information was not shared publicly until the next morning, however, while the killer continued his rampage across rural Nova Scotia.

The gunman had escaped by the time Constable Beselt and Constable Aaron Patton saw a flashlight in the road ahead of them at around 10:49 p.m. It was Clinton Ellison, who had just found his brother Corrie’s body at the side of the road. But the police didn’t know that – and prepared for a firefight.

Mr. Ellison said the officers never identified themselves, so he hid in the woods for hours until he felt it was safe to come out. The inquiry, which must produce a final report by November, continues Wednesday.

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