The homes of some of the victims were not searched until calls from family members began to increase, while the RCMP main liaison missed a meeting with a family and in many cases the appropriate relatives were not notified first. “I could not get any information. So I had to find out what I could through Facebook,” Justin Zahl, grandson of victims John Zahl and Joanne Thomas, told police in an interview after the tragedy. “I’m just sad that I did not hear it before.” The Mass Loss Committee, which is leading the public inquiry into the mass shootings that took place on April 18-19, 2020, released documents Monday detailing the plight of family members who lost their husbands, wives, parents and children during the six. With the sole exception of Const. Heidi Stevenson’s family – who praised the RCMP for its “immediate and continued” support – the families of the other 21 victims said they had to ask the police for information. In the case of the Zahl / Thomas family, relatives called 911 and police detachments more than 25 times in 36 hours until they received confirmation that their relatives had been killed. Justin Zahl, who was adopted by his grandparents and refers to them as his parents, lost contact with the couple late on April 18 and started calling RCMP and 911 around 8 p.m. on April 19th. media posts containing a photo of Zahl / Thomas’s house in Portapique were completely burned. “All I could see was my parent’s car and no house,” Zahl said. John Zahl, left, and Joanne Thomas had moved to Portapique in 2017 to retire, the family says. Family members say they repeatedly called 911 and police for 36 hours seeking answers after the mass shootings in April 2020. (Go Fund Me / Gena Lawson) According to investigative documents, sometime on April 20, a woman talking to Zahl via FaceTime spotted an officer holding the scene in Portapique. The woman picked up the phone so that the police officer could speak to him directly. Zahl was described in documents as “extremely emotional” after 24 hours of promises by RCMP officers and envoys that someone would call him back. The officer called the chain of command and was told that no information could be given to Zahl at that time. Almost at 2 p.m. that day, the RCMP officer was assigned to act as liaison with the families – Const. Wayne (Skipper) Bent – spoke to Zahl and informed him that investigators believed his parents were dead. Jennifer Zahl Bruland, the eldest of John Zahl’s four children from a previous relationship living in the United States, also received a call from Bent on April 20. She was not told her father and stepmother were dead, but only that there were “a lot of ‘scenes’ and it was chaotic,” according to a summary of Zahl Bruland’s meeting with the commission. The RCMP told Zahl Bruland that they were not sure when they could fully process her parents’s house because they had many others to arrive first, which made her feel that their scene was not important to the police.
The Mounties had “no idea” how to handle the victims
“Jennifer [Zahl Bruland] participated in doing a lot of research and research for her parents about RCMP. “No family should be asked to do this,” said a statement issued by the Committee on Mass Losses released on Monday. “It became clear that the RCMP had no idea how to handle the situation or how to talk to the victims.” Aerial view of Portapique taken in May 2020. (Mass Accident Committee) While Zahl Bruland said Bent looked like a “real person”, he did not believe he should be the only one assigned to care for the victims’ families. While the big crime unit was discussing adding another link to help Bend, he rejected the idea, saying in a committee interview that he was “a little selfish” having worked hard to build relationships with people and wanted the same message to be goes to every family. He had some support from Cpl for a while. Rodney MacDonald.
Officers aimed to notify the families by the end of April 19th
Cpl. Angela McKay, in an interview with the committee, said their goal was to reach out to one person from each family before leaving on April 19, even if they were not relatives. “I believe that goal has been achieved,” McKay said. The documents show that more than 100 emails from family members of Portapique residents arrived between April 19 and 20 – many not from immediate family members. McKay said the investigation needed to be re-examined to determine the individual’s relationship to the victims. However, documents show that some families other than the Zahl / Thomases, including Madsen / Gulenchyns and Bonds, were also not notified by 20 April. Joy and Peter Bond’s sons also made several calls to 911, Truro police and the RCMP, asking for information about their parents who died at their home in Portapique late April 18. Documents show the bodies were discovered late in the afternoon on April 19 – but Corey and Harry Bond were not informed. After receiving several emails from the shipping operators regarding the siblings’ searches, Bent contacted them around noon on April 20 for a photo of their parents. He reportedly asked them to meet him at the Great Village fire station for information. The bodies of Peter and Joy Bond were discovered late in the afternoon of April 19, 2020, but their sons were not informed of their parents’ death until the next day. (Facebook) A family alert diagram prepared by McKay shows that Bend informed Harry Bond of his parents’s death around 12:45 p.m., but Bond does not remember. He said in a written statement that he “still has no information” after sending a photo of his parents to Bend. The brothers headed to the fire department, but according to the summary of the committee meeting with the family, Bend did not show up. Neither did any other RCMP officer. No one contacted them to say the meeting had been canceled, moved or delayed. After waiting more than an hour for Bent, Bond said he and his brother continued on to Portapique because “they were not about to learn anything about our parents and the RCMP was not cooperating.” They arrived in the community around 2pm, where police had cordoned off the entrance. Bond said police asked him for his contact details and his parents’ address to help identify him.
The brothers get answers in Portapique
“I broke down. I told them we had been doing this for 24 hours,” Bond said. Sgt. Bill Raaymakers and two medical examiners came to talk to the brothers. The Raaymakers offered to go to the Bonds’ house himself and confirmed that they were dead around 3:30 p.m. after Harry Bond shared a photo with him. According to the documents, the RCMP’s policies are not clear on how close relatives should be notified of the death of a loved one, but it should happen “as soon as possible”. In the case of the mass shootings, police spoke to families both in person and by telephone to broadcast the news.
The victim’s son was never notified
Corrie Ellison’s adult son, Connor Reeves, never received confirmation that his father had been killed. Just months after the rage, Bend realized he existed and realized that it was Reeves – not Ellison’s father, Richard – who was a legal relative. Reeves was not invited to a family reunion with the RCMP. Everything he learned about his father’s death came from other sources – most notably from his mother, through his uncle Clinton. Corrie Ellison has been described as a thoughtful and kind friend. His father, Richard Ellison, says he never received official confirmation from the RCMP that his son had died. (Clinton Ellison / Facebook) A summary of a committee meeting with Reeves said he was not “hiding” and while not approaching the Mounts themselves, he appeared on walks and memorial marches asking for public inquiry. Reeves said he appreciated Bend’s surveillance months after the incident, but was disappointed he was not given the opportunity to sit in person with any RCMP officers. Ellison was shot late April 18 when he went to investigate the fires he could see in the community of Portapique where his father lived. Clinton’s brother, who had gone with him, hid in the woods from the perpetrator and was eventually rescued by police. When Richard Ellison called 911 to report that one son was missing and the other was probably dead, McKay notes that the call, made at 1:38 p.m. on April 19, confirmed that the notification of Corey Ellison’s closest relative had been completed. Richard Ellison said he never received official confirmation from the RCMP that his son was dead. When media reports surfaced after the shootings, Bend wrote in an email to the research team that Clinton and his partner were the official family contacts. “I have come in contact with one family member for each family, as the huge numbers make it insurmountable to talk to each family member,” he wrote.
Politics has no direction in certain situations
The documents state that RCMP policies do not consider what to do when a victim’s family members know that their loved one has died, as did the Ellisons and Gina Goulet’s family. In Goulet’s case, her body was found by her fiancé, David Butler, just before noon on April 19, when she passed by Goulet’s daughter, Amelia Butler. Gina Gule has been described as a devoted mother, twice a cancer survivor and a lover of music and dance. (Committee on Mass Accidents) Amelia Butler did not receive any official notification about the relatives. The documents also state that, despite the fact that they gave their details to at least four different police officers, no one called …
