What If There Had Been A Video Camera In the Vanderhoof RCMP Shooting? One Man's Opinion

By Ben Meisner

The biggest single item to come forward to level the playing field in law and order could very well be the cell-phone camera.

Yet another announcement has been made that a further inquiry will take place into the tasering and  death of Robert Dziekanski. This brings to 8 the number of inquires that will be held into his death.

Can you however imagine if there had been no video of the events leading up to the death of Dziekanski what would have been the result?

The public was told the following morning that Dziekanski had been involved in a struggle, untrue, there had only been three officers involved, wrong again, there were four .

The police said they had kept him on his back as protocol calls for, wrong again. The police had spun the events to a point where it looked like Dziekanski had brought on his own death. Attacked the police leaving them no other option.

Sergeant Pierre Lemaitre of the RCMP PR section was either given a bill of goods or tried to sell the public a bill of goods.

Had it not been for the man who sought to have his video returned, what would the public know today?  We certainly haven’t been given an opportunity to see the video taken by the Airport Authority of Vancouver,  and let’s not kid ourselves, it exists.

That video is in the  hands of  the police as part of their investigation and so the public will have to wait for the inquest, or one of the 7 other probes to get a look at it.

A reader recently sent along a link to a video of a man being stun gunned in the US because he wouldn’t sign a speeding ticket. He also was not read his rights and by the way,   when another  polioce officer arrived on the scene, he was fed a BS story  of the events, and he told his  colleague "good job". 

The video camera attached to a phone will go a long way  to ensure that  all walks of life must act with a little more common sense and great deal more respect.

The RCMP learned in recent weeks that spinning it will not work when the video is staring you in the face. Their argument that a video is just a part of an investigation is not too different than saying the fellow police officer who witnessed the shooting of Kevin St Arnaund in a field in Vanderhoof does not hold as much weight as the evidence of the police officer who pulled the trigger.

If the  old gentleman who witnessed the shooting had been  holding a  "video phone" can you imagine  what  might have happened?  What would the story  have been?

The officer who did the shooting was reassigned to Kamloops, the officer who said her view was quite different , remains on leave, paid leave and has been instructed by the RCMP not to talk to the media.

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

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