Montreal Gazette:
Wildlife officers demand tougher hunting rules
Halt gun licence exceptions: union. Recent killing of Laval police officer highlights holes in licensing guidelines
DEBBIE PARKES, The Gazette
Published: Thursday, December 29, 2005
The union representing Quebec's 500 provincial wildlife officers has renewed a demand that the province automatically revoke the right to hunt of anyone barred from possessing a gun.
The move was prompted by the recent killing of Laval police officer Valerie Gignac, union president Paul Legault said.
If a person is too dangerous to possess a gun, they shouldn't be allowed to hunt, said Legault, who first requested the change in a letter to Natural Resources and Wildlife Minister Pierre Corbeil two years ago, and renewed it in another letter on Tuesday.
Corbeil has asked his staff to study the union's request, department spokesperson Marie-France Boulay said yesterday.
When the request was made two years ago, Corbeil turned it down.
Gignac, 25, was shot dead on Dec. 14 while responding to a routine call. The man charged with first-degree murder in the case, Francois Pepin, had been prohibited by a judge in 1999 from possessing a firearm, but an exception was made for hunting season.
During Gignac's funeral service, her brother, Steeve Gignac, said he hoped his sister's death would send a "clear and coherent message."
Legault said automatically revoking the hunting licence of anyone prohibited by a judge from possessing a firearm wouldn't be a sure fix, as guns can be obtained illegally, but the change would provide another level of control, he said.
Wildlife officers don't have access to the provincial police database.
If they stop a hunter, about the only thing they can ask to see is a hunting permit.
If the hunter produces one, there's little the wildlife officer can do, he said. However, if a person doesn't produce a hunting permit, the officer can confiscate the individual's weapons.
That said, wildlife officers can ask a local police detachment to do a police database check on a hunter, Legault said.
A few years ago, some officers did, and found out that a few hunters they felt were behaving suspiciously had in fact been prohibited from possessing firearms, Legault said.
In those cases, the judges hadn't even made an exception for hunting season, Legault said.
Legault explained that, in Quebec, people wishing to buy a hunting permit must first obtain a hunting certificate, which requires passing a short course on hunting and gun safety.
These are normally valid for a person's lifetime, but the permits must be purchased annually.
The idea would be for people to automatically have their hunting certificate revoked if prohibited by a judge from possessing a gun, with no exceptions for hunting season, Legault said.
"If we ask them for their hunting permit and they don't have one, we'll be able to intervene," he said.
Legault also said his union has long been fighting for access to the police database.
"We've been asking for that for 10 years, for the security of our officers," he said.
