A policing expert told a fatality inquest that a Winnipeg officer who fired two shots at a stolen vehicle and killed a 16-year-old First Nations girl was following police protocol and training.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Use-of-force expert Chris Butler testified Thursday that officers didn\u2019t have a lot of time to respond when the Jeep smashed into a truck at a busy intersection on April 8, 2020.<\/p>\n
The inquest earlier heard from Const. Kyle Pradinuk, who said he shot at the Jeep\u2019s driver because he believed fellow officers could have been hit.<\/p>\n
Eishia\u00a0Hudson\u00a0was killed<\/p>\n
\u201cIf there\u2019s an immediate \u2026 need to respond, then waiting can carry very catastrophic consequences for the officer,\u201d Butler told court.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Police had responded to reports of a liquor store robbery and chased the Jeep.<\/p>\n
The inquest has heard the vehicle \u201crammed\u201d a police cruiser and hit other vehicles during the pursuit. The chase ended when\u00a0Eishia\u00a0lost control of the Jeep and hit the stopped truck.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The inquest heard Butler was retained by Manitoba\u2019s police watchdog as part of its investigation into the shooting, which was completed in 2021.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Independent Investigation Unit of Manitoba didn\u2019t recommend any criminal charges, based in part on Butler\u2019s opinion that Pradinuk\u2019s actions were consistent with police practices.<\/p>\n
Butler testified the Winnipeg Police Service\u2019s use-of-force policy is consistent with other jurisdictions.<\/p>\n
He said lethal force is justified if officers believe they, their colleagues or people in their protection face immediate risk of \u201cgrievous bodily harm or death\u201d and that there are no other options to resolve the situation.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He relied on documents relating to police policy, eyewitness accounts of the Winnipeg shooting and video statements.<\/p>\n
A cellphone video captured by a witness appears to show the Jeep backing away from officers. But Butler said he didn\u2019t use it in his analysis.<\/p>\n
He said he\u2019s hesitant to rely on video evidence that hasn\u2019t had a forensic analysis because it could be altered or corrupted.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He also testified he didn\u2019t include perspectives of four other youth who were in the Jeep but couldn\u2019t remember why. Three of the youth previously told the inquest they didn\u2019t recall the Jeep moving backward.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Eishia\u2019s death sparked protests and calls for a public inquiry into police-related deaths of Indigenous Peoples. She was one three First Nations people killed in a 10-day period in Winnipeg that year.<\/p>\n
The inquest is not only examining whether the officer\u2019s use of force was appropriate but also whether systemic racism played a role in the shooting. Police had initially identified the robbery suspects as Indigenous.<\/p>\n
\u201cI saw no evidence in my review of this entire incident that the race of the individuals in this case in any way improperly impacted the officer\u2019s risk assessments, decision making and interventions,\u201d Butler said.<\/p>\n
However, he said the suspects were reported as being aged 15 to 18 and that would have been an important factor.<\/p>\n
Court heard some policing agencies incorporate adolescent development or youth in crisis considerations in their training, although there\u2019s nothing specifically relating to this for Winnipeg police.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Danielle Morrison, a lawyer for Eishia\u2019s family, questioned Butler on \u00a0youth characteristics such as impulsive or panic-driven behaviour in high-risk situations.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIs it fair to say that that behaviour may appear aggressive, even when it reflects fear or confusion?\u201d she asked.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYes,\u201d responded Butler.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Inquests don\u2019t assign blame but can issue recommendations to help prevent similar deaths.<\/p>\n
Butler recommended that a traffic reconstructionist report should have been done to better understand the whole event, including the exact positioning of officers and how and when the Jeep moved after the collision.<\/p>\n
He also suggested there should have been pursuit support \u2014 a supervisor communicating with officers and air resources to track the vehicle.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A policing expert told a fatality inquest that a Winnipeg officer who fired two shots at a stolen…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":534075,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194296],"tags":[49,48,22073],"class_list":["post-534074","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-winnipeg","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-winnipeg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=534074"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534074\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/534075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=534074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=534074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=534074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}