R.I.P. CONSTABLE BROCK MYROL

CONSTABLE LEO JOHNSTON

CONSTABLE PETER SCHIEMANN

CONSTABLE ANTHONY GORDON


FALLEN IN THE LINE OF DUTY, MAINTAINING THE RIGHT


R.I.H....ROT IN HELL...JIM ROSZKO


Mayerthorpe. Rochfort Bridge. They sound like quaint English villages, the sorts of places where, on a daily basis, nothing makes a point of happening. News sometimes penetrates the town limits, but usually only in one direction. But every once in an old-timer's lifetime, reporters from all over scratch their heads in the newsroom and mutter "where the hell is that?" Whenever these places are referenced in the national news, always hundreds of kilometres from somewhere the viewing audience might possibly have heard of, you can be sure the event was sudden and horrible.

Those passing through such yawns in the road glance right, then left, and ten minutes later they've forgotten what that sign back there said. Those few who live here, though, feel the heartbeat of the town in their veins after a while: a soothing pulse that sounds like corn rustling. It's not a strong heartbeat, but it's steady.

On March 3, 2005, the heart of Rochfort Bridge went into tachycardia. And the heart of a national police force entered cardiac arrest as four of its Members were gunned down.

The suspect was known to police. Known very well, apparantly: the man's rap sheet was more like a rap book. The kind of guy who didn't feel quite right unless he was breaking a law. His dad had disowned him. His town dearly wanted to. By some unholy miracle, this piece of human excrement managed to get the drop on four peace officers. I dearly hope one of them was able to get off a killing shot of his own. I can't stand the thought that after murdering four cops--one recently engaged and none older than 33--this man could have been allowed the escape of suicide.

Drugs were at the root of this horror, as drugs so often are. Politics will therefore intrude on a nation's grief as each particular cause seeks to hijack this tragedy for its own ends. This is insult piled on obscenity, and yet it's also inevitable. When Chaos chews into our sane and ordered lives, we seek to fit it into our worldview, and never mind the jagged edges. So you'll hear how the demon weed needs to be expunged, and you'll hear that if pot was legal and regulated, this never would have happened. You'll hear the suspect's father say his son was a "wicked devil" ever since he first got involved with drugs, and you'll hear townspeople say he had a hate on for police, drugs or no. None of this posturing will bring those four constables back to life. None of it will resolve this picture into anything you'd want to look at. None of it makes sense.

Absolutely none.