St. Arnaud:One Man's Opinion

By Ben Meisner

            It took just 97 seconds from the time that Kevin St. Arnaud  was seen jumping from the roof of the mall in Vanderhoof,  until he lay dead in a soccer field, a couple of hundred meters away.

97 seconds just somehow doesn’t seem long enough for someone to:

1. Make a judgment call, which by the way was wrong, as to whether an individual was in possession of a concealed weapon (the lead investigator on the case suggested to a Coroner’s Jury that a 4 inch drill punch was a weapon)

2. Draw his service revolver twice in those 97 seconds and

3. Fire three shots into the chest of St. Arnaud.

To add to that, there was a back up officer on the scene within seconds, a police dog on the way within minutes and still, it was necessary to shoot an unarmed man.

In his earlier testimony, Constable Ryan Sheremetta had told the court that he had encountered people with concealed weapons many times before in his less than two years of service. If that were the case, then a further question arises as to why he would not have known that a bandaged hand, a plastic bag,  and that dreaded drill punch are not lethal weapons.

But there are other questions that come to mind, first and foremost the fact that the RCMP had, including those who assisted in Vanderhoof in a minor way, 32 RCMP employees working on the file. Even if you discount five of these people as only holding minor rolls, the number is still more than were working on the Highway of Tears file, untill it began to receive major publicity.

Delores Young, the mother of the dead 29 year old man, had no one to assist her, unless of course she could find some of her own money to pay for it.

The police used pictures taken from the air, hired an engineering company to look at the footprints, hired a Lawyer to act on behalf of Sheremetta and sent police officers around the province seeking input from various sources.

Delores Young had not one single penny to try and get some answers to the questions she had about her son’s death.

Common sense would say that police should not investigate police, if justice is to be viewed as being served equal to all, but the Coroner’s Jury made no recommendations to that effect.

Five people testified that the shooting did not take place in the manner that was described by Sheremetta.  Of the five, three were members of the police force or employed by them. The irony being that a fellow officer testified that Sheremetta was standing in a combat position as St. Arnaud turned to " shuffle " back to him when he was shot. Sheremetta said he "charged" at him.

All of that took place, and yet not one single bit of doubt remained when it was recommended by police that no charges should be laid.

Just one more thing to ponder, in the time it has taken you to read this article,  Kevin St Arnaud had been spotted, chased,  and has already taken three bullets to the chest.

Just 97 seconds…and it took more than 2 years to have the story told.

I’m Meisner and that is one man’s opinion.

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