Raid on potfarm not reasonable

[tibear]

Pea,

Sorry, perhaps your paper has better coverage then what we get.

From what I've heard, he was a convicted pedophile, that was prohibited from having firearms and virtually everyone was afraid of him. However, even after saying this, does the fact that people suspect he has guns warrant going onto his property with a search warrant. The fact that he was a convicted pedophile has nothing to do with the events that happened last week. You can't arrest someone for making people "feel" uncomfortable. He has to take some concrete actions BEFORE the police can take action.

How would you like it if one of your neighbours suspected you had a grow-op in your basement and called the police. They then used only this accusation to raid your home. I bet you wouldn't be happy.

The police need hard evidence. 20/20 hindsight is a wonderful thing and looking back, I'm sure the RCMP would have done things differently with regards to this individual.

However, I'm just as sure that if the RCMP raided suspected marijuana grow-operators or crystal meth labs based only on rumour that a certain segment of the population would be up in arms and scream that we were living in a police state. You can't have it both ways.

Either you want the police to leave Canadians alone until they've got hard evidence to arrest them or do you want the police to be able to snoop around in our lives ensuring that we are doing nothing illegal???

As I said earlier, the only reason the police were on his property was to seize a vehicle that he stopped paying for and that was the only thing that the RCMP could prove. Should they have taken better precautions given all of the rumours, probably, but should they have raided his property looking for guns, stolen property and drugs based on these rumours??? I'll leave that up to you.

 

[peapod]

:bs:

 

[tibear]

Pea,

Rather than belittling the person making the argument how about pointing out the holes in the arguement being made.

 

[peapod]

well its like this....this :bs: is alot easier than this :banghead:

And you deserve to be belittled, trying to use the same tatic that your leader used in the election...that is to use murder to push your political agenda. Shame on you right back at ya :evil:

 

[tibear]

How have I used the murders of these men to further any political agenda????

Not once have I said, inferred or implied that our police should crack down on grow-ops as a result of this crime. NOT ONCE.

I've made a conscious effort not to say anything like that because I knew you and others here would be all over me. Instead, I've concentrated on the "stupid" comments made by the pro-drug culture that are using the murders of these men for their political gain.

Instead of trying to make a point over the death of these men, couldn't we simply mourn the fact that these men died tragically.

BTW, did you hear the comments of some of the family members of these young men with regards to our society?? I found them very interesting.

 

[glenny]

Hey Rev You asked how the hell could he grow pot in there. The lights generate alot of heat. It was probably the perfect conditions

 

[peapod]

tibear said
I've concentrated on the "stupid" comments made by the pro-drug culture that are using the murders of these men for their political gain.

What comments are those? Please show them to me. And I know what your doing to when you use words like pro-drug.

No I am not interested in the comments about society, I am more interested in understanding how this could have been prevented, and can it be prevented in the future. And I also understand that this murder had nothing to do with "Pot", that was just ONE of the many criminial activities he persued.

I also do not like you implying in the "who knew potheads were so violent" that we are supporting criminial activity by discussing drugs. Yes that's exactly how you solve it....you sweep it under the carpet..and pretend reality does not exist. Tibear the majority of canadians do not live in smurfville. It would be nice if we could.

 

[tibear]

Peapod,

Firstly, please take note who started this thread!!!

The "stupid" comments I was referring to was the comments that the police shouldn't be enforcing the existing Canadian laws. IF they left the grow-op people alone that noone would get hurt.

We agree that the officers weren't there to stop a grow op and that is the point I'm making!!! The pro-drug people are using this case to further their cause when in fact, this case has very little to do with drugs! :banghead:

 

[Twila]

RE: Raid on potfarm not r

The Police had on file the fact that this individual was violent. They would have also had on file he was suspected of having weapons.

so they showed up unprepared? Funny, but my ex who was well known to Victoria police was never treated like the pychopath from alberta. They were always prepared when dealing with him. Even if it was to simply pull him over.

So what makes the events in Alberta any different. WHy would their approach be so....trusting?

 

[Reverend Blair]

Hey Rev You asked how the hell could he grow pot in there. The lights generate alot of heat. It was probably the perfect conditions

It gets really cold around Edmonton though, grow lights don't generate that much heat. Pot also likes humidity, although it survives in arid conditions it doesn't produce nearly as many leaves, so the dry Canadian winter would lead to a much-reduced crop.

It just seems like we still aren't getting the whole story here...

The "stupid" comments I was referring to was the comments that the police shouldn't be enforcing the existing Canadian laws. IF they left the grow-op people alone that noone would get hurt.

That is the information we had when this thread was started though, tibear...that the cops had been there to bust a grow-op. Given the way information was dispersed to the media and who was in charge of that information, that points to those against the liberalization of marijuana laws as the ones who tried to use this for political gain.

 

[peapod]

The newspaper I refer to tibear is the three page story in the Globe and Mail, we get that out west to. Maybe if you read it, you might ask yourself the same questions.

How is it possible in a town of 1,600 people that a man can terrorize an entire town?? The Police were afraid of him. Residents of the town actually would pull their childern inside, when he cruised the street looking for childern. The man was a peophile, a violent one! and one apparently unafraid of anything. The man was never convicted of his long list of crimes, because he threatened and imtimiated witnesses and victims. He even stalked an RCMP officer. I find it unbelievable that a man 5' 5, weighing 150 pounds soaking wet could have such power over so many people. Tibear the man had guns!, just because he was not suppose to have them...does not mean he did not have an arsenal. This went on for 15 years. Does it surprise you that someone allowed to behave like this for 15 years and capable of the crimes he committed would have any problem at all killing 4 people.

 

[tibear]

Pea,

Perhaps the problem is the justice system that allows an individual like that to have one chance after another.

I agree with you that this man had problems that should have been looked into. BUT, do you want a state where the police have the right to pull you off the street because you look and act scary?? The man was a pedophile but at the time of the incident had no reason other than the vehicle problem for the police to be bothering him.

Like I said, if you want the police to go after this man on the basis of rumour, please be prepared for them to do the same to you.

BTW, we had guns at home when I was young. Should the police have broken into our homes and raided us?? If a person is convicted of an offense should the police then have the right to 'surprise' raid the person whenever they want to??

Like I said before, being scary and hard to deal with isn't a crime. It makes them a pain in the rear, but nothing criminal about it.

 

[peapod]

Saturday, March 5, 2005 Updated at 1:42 AM EST

From Saturday's Globe and Mail

James Michael Roszko

Violently self-righteous, a convicted pedophile who denied all wrongdoing and spurned all treatment, the hermit who shot dead four Mounties was by every account a walking time bomb whose rage resembled a hissing fuse.

"I wouldn't have wanted to be on his bad side," said Alberta lawyer Guy Fontaine, who once defended the cop-killer. "I've seen the fire in his eyes."

And when Mr. Roszko first sought parole, while serving 2 1/2 years for repeatedly sexually assaulting a young boy, the National Parole Board seemed to recognize the risk he posed.

"You have a tendency to externalize responsibility for actions and circumstances," the board wrote in December of 2000, when Mr. Roszko was 42 years old and nine months into the only prison term he ever served. "You vigorously deny responsibility for the sexual assaults."

His absence of remorse and scorn for supervision resulted in Mr. Roszko serving almost all of his prison term. He never did get parole, but rather was freed on statutory release upon reaching the two-thirds mark of his sentence.

Five months later, after violating the terms of that release — he refused to provide his parole officer with necessary information and refused to take sex-offender programs — he was back behind bars.

Yet the most striking component of Mr. Roszko's lengthy criminal history, which began at age 16, was not his list of convictions. Instead, it was his skill in escaping convictions, perhaps reflecting what the parole board worriedly termed his "preoccupation with legal proceedings."

Growing up in Mayerthorpe, Joan Willington, 29, remembers being told to steer clear of him.

"Pretty much everybody in town knew if there was something gone wrong, they knew it was Jim Roszko," she said yesterday. "He's slick. They [couldn't] pin nothing on him. He was a very slick, creepy little man."

Mr. Roszko's 2 1/2-year prison term, served at Alberta's Bowden Institution, stemmed from a series of sexual assaults that lasted almost seven years — from January, 1983, to December, 1989 — beginning when the victim was 10, parole records show. Several years elapsed before the victim stepped forward.

Those sex attacks were not Mr. Roszko's first brush with the law. Trouble and drug use had stalked his life since he was 12, when his mother left the family, leaving his father, Bill Roszko, now 80, to raise eight children.

In 1976, Jim Roszko was convicted of a property offence. Three years later he was found guilty of harassment.

He subsequently got embroiled in a dispute with The Whitecourt Star newspaper, threatening it if it printed stories about his troubles. The paper secured a restraining order.

But he was not convicted of another criminal offence until 1999. It was for threatening behaviour.

And in the meantime, a more serious set of charges had come and gone.

In December, 1993, at age 35, Mr. Roszko had an altercation with a school trustee that resulted in his being charged with 12 offences. They included unlawful confinement, assault with a weapon, pointing a firearm, impersonation of a police officer and obstruction of justice. But only seven charges went to trial and Mr. Roszko was acquitted of them all, chiefly because of the key witnesses' credibility.

It was on those charges that Mr. Fontaine successfully defended Mr. Roszko. He remembers his client as resourceful and well organized, with a keen sense of the law. But Mr. Fontaine also recalls his hatred of authority in general and the RCMP in particular, and he wonders how it was that the four slain officers came to be where they were on Thursday.

"They knew who he was. His name had to be etched in the woodwork in those [RCMP] detachments."

While in prison for the sex offences, Mr. Roszko faced fresh difficulties. They arose from an incident on his farm in 1999, leading to charges of aggravated assault, and, once again, an assortment of firearms offences.

Ms. Willington, now a mother of two young daughters, recalls that incident vividly.

Her brother, Bob MacDougall, then a twentysomething who did "typical small town kids' stuff," as she put it, was joyriding in a pickup truck with a friend on Mr. Roszko's property.

The pair knew it was foolish, even dangerous, but they thought the owner wasn't home. "Nobody thinks that anything can happen to them," she explained.

But as the pair was about to drive away, Jim Roszko confronted them, brandishing a hunting rifle.

Mr. MacDougall and his friend got out of the vehicle to talk, Ms. Willington said, but Mr. Roszko was in no mood for talking.

He shot one man in the shoulder, then hog-tied Mr. MacDougall and threw him in the back of the pickup truck.

Somehow, Mr. MacDougall managed to free his hands and turn on Mr. Roszko. The two men managed to "kick his ass," Ms. Willington's husband, Herb, recounted.

"It could have got both of them killed," Ms. Willington interjected. "It was a stupid prank that went bad."

Either way, Mr. Roszko was charged with five offences, including assault. But the two intruders were also charged with assault, which put their credibility in doubt. So, once again, Mr. Roszko emerged unscathed, with all charges dismissed.

After his release from prison on the sex charges , there was talk — only half joking — of farmers in the area grabbing pitchforks to stab him to death.

The justice system works, Ms. Willington said, but at the same time, she wonders how a man like Jim Roszko was walking the streets of her community.

Yesterday, as she, her husband and daughters placed flowers in front of the RCMP detachment in Whitecourt, Ms. Willington felt a sense of peace for the first time.

"[I'm] relieved that he's gone," she said. "Every little town has its monsters and Mayerthorpe's is dead."

With a report from Petti Fong

 

[Karlin]

Re: Still here for your jabs!

I am here, I didn't run away tibear.
I have not seen anything posted here that changes my mind about this horrible event. What is new is the car payment warrant.

I DO mourn the dead officers, thats what makes me so upset about this. It shouldn't have happened, and blame goes to the cop managers who set up this raid, and the laws they are supposed to enforce.

Tibear, I never set out to "further a political agenda" with my post. It seems that you and I are BOTH doing that , as everyone does, by stating an opinion. Sure, Cool. Whats wrong here Tibear, is that your accusations are just "distraction" anyways; lets stay focused on the situation at hand eh? Why do you try to de-rail a conversation with these rhetorical and meaningless games like "hey, you are just saying that to further a political agenda". Whats with THAT?

On the 'vehicle warrant' - quoting tibear[for information only]:
"As I said earlier, the only reason the police were on his property was to seize a vehicle that he stopped paying for and that was the only thing that the RCMP could prove. "

K - I had not heard that tibear, ty. So the pot grow-op was not the issue after all, it was all about an vehicle payment. It seems a bit trumped up, like an excuse to 'go git him'. I am sure you will agree it was not worth going after him for a late payment!! There are other ways to get those guys that staging a big raid.

Why is the media story of this event trying to slide our focus to pot instead what was on the search warrant? That is a big question - is it about police and govt. trying to demonise pot?

There are grow-op raids by police every day in Canada. Each one of these raids could turn out this badly. Its just a dumb law to enforce, thats my point...

...and that if the pot laws reflected Canadian attitudes , if they were 'just laws' and if the law were finalised and not left in this state of limbo [partly due to American interference in Canadian law and culture] - THIS WOULD NOT HAVE HAPPENED and will not happen again.

I would be glad if they took down a meth lab.
I would be glad if they got automatic weapons in a raid.
But pot isn't hurting anyone, it may very well be good medicine for many health issues, and raids on pot grow-ops should not occur, and this raid-gone-wrong should not be pumped up by media and police as a grow-op raid if it wasn't on the warrant. That could backfire on plans to demonise pot.

Sure,tibear, I would use this event to express my concerns over pot laws and be perfectly justified in doing so.

Karlin

 

[mrmom2]

Who says they found drugs where is the evidence?

 

[peapod]

Well there was pot mr mom...hahahahahhahaahahahaha that sound to funny but not enough to warrant a major grow op.

 

[mrmom2]

There no question the guy was a total nut job.But the just because the globe and mail said there was a grow op is not evidence.has anyone seen any pics of plants or equipment.There not telling us what really happened.

 

[mrmom2]

why cause you say so

 

[peapod]

"why cause you say so" are you sure you are a mom?

Well no mr. mom not cause I say so, I have read a few articles from different newspapers, and the CBC, would you mind telling me where I should find out about the story. I have no reason to doubt that he a small operation, one that came to light investigating another charge....

Saturday, Mar 05, 2005 Email this to a friend
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Alberta man who killed Mounties feared by police and pals


James Roszko was the suspect in the shooting of four Alberta RCMP officers during a grow-op bust. (RCMP photo)

ROCHFORT BRIDGE, Alta. (CP) - RCMP who policed the community where Jim Roszko lived were just as scared of him as everyone else.
For years, RCMP and court officials tread cautiously around the man who on Thursday shot and killed four officers on his property. Roszko's mother, Stephanie Fifield, who lives in a trailer on his property, reported that the dispute was over a pickup truck.

RCMP were at his farm to seize the truck when they discovered the grow-op and property believed to have been stolen.

"No, my son was not the devil," said Fifield, who acknowledged he did have a fierce temper. "When he gets a grudge against someone, he will be mad at you for the rest of your life. That's the way he is."

Others tell a different story. Often officials had delayed serving court documents or seizing property when Roszko was around.

Friends, family and even his lawyer have said he hated the RCMP and blamed them for everything wrong with his life.

Guy Fontaine, who represented Roszko for about 15 years, said he can't understand how Mounties could not have been aware how dangerous the man was.

"I cannot for a moment in my mind understand why the RCMP exposed themselves," he said. "They would have had a full awareness of him. That will haunt the entire RCMP as to how four of their personnel could have brought it on. They knew about his weapons, too."

An RCMP sergeant had once turned down an invitation to enter Roszko's property without a gun.

On another occasion, the RCMP detachment lent a bailiff a protective vest when she had to pass beyond the two padlocked gates that barred his farm.

People were afraid of his temper, his guns, his dogs and the booby-traps on his land.

"The debtor is know to be extremely aggressive," bailiff Brenda Storm noted in her report after an attempted seizure of property from Roszko's farm in August 1999.

"(I) learned he was quite dangerous, has a long history of assaults, (was) in possession of a number of firearms, (and) would most likely shoot anyone on the property on sight."

She attempted to convince the local veterinarian to accompany her, but he refused to do so, fearing for his own safety.

Even two men who were Roszko's close friends a number of years ago said he was unstable and a "nut case."

The Fast brothers told the Edmonton Journal that Roszko had guns and ammunition buried all over his place. He also had grenades.

"I can't believe that a police officer would go out there and not expect something to happen," Travis Fast said. "The last thing I would ever do is put on a police uniform and turn up his driveway. There is no way you would make it."

Storm said that when Roszko initially refused to let her inside, RCMP advised her to go home and try another day.

"It was deemed simply too dangerous by the RCMP to simply break in, even though I had the legal right," she wrote. "No one wanted to be shot at by the debtor."

Storm did enter the property while RCMP waited outside the gate.

"He dominated the conversation for quite some time and basically blamed all his problems upon the RCMP," she noted.


In the end, she was unsuccessful in finding any property to seize, but she concluded her report by noting that Roszko was terrorizing the community.

"It has been my experience that several people are quite afraid to give information about the debtor because . . . they are really afraid of retaliation of a violent sort by Jim Roszko."

Other court officials had similar experiences.

Ken Hosack said that when he informed RCMP he was going to the man's farm to get property he was told he would have to be accompanied by two RCMP officers "being we were going on James Roszko's property."

He said he had just finished seizing 650 bales of hay when Roszko roared into the yard.

"The person was driving very wildly. This black truck pulled up beside me. He was swearing profusely," Hosack noted in his report.

He said Roszko then roared over to confront the RCMP and began swearing at them. Roszko offered to show Hosack where he kept the cattle and other possessions the bank was after, but only if Hosack came with him alone.

"I made a decision that I would not be alone with this radical man."

Roszko's lawyer said his client was charged with threatening a school board trustee when a bus route was changed, forcing his brother to walk more than a kilometre.

Fontaine said Roszko underwent a psychiatric assessment at Alberta Hospital on one occasion, but was given a clean bill of health.

"I know Roszko was always self-righteous. He certainly had a disdain for the authorities. He certainly had no respect for the RCMP so what occurred here doesn't surprise me."

Fontaine admitted being a little afraid of his client.

"I would not have wanted to be on Roszko's bad side," he said. "I saw the fire in his eyes that he exhibited if he expressed any dislike for anybody."

Court documents also show two acquaintances who attempted to sneak onto Roszko's property one night to steal some gasoline and vandalize his trailer were greeted at gunpoint, beaten and one was shot.

The pair ended up jumping him and beating him with his own shotgun.

Residents say Roszko also left behind him a string of abused young boys.

Donna Kirsch, who grew up in the area, said Roszko was a sexual predator who loved to befriend young boys and lavish them with gifts.

"He used to go to the school, outside the high school, and try to lure the young boys into his vehicle by offering them money and stuff," said Kirsch, who grew up in the area. "It's been going on for years."

Roszko was convicted April 28, 2000, and sentenced to 2½ years in prison for sexual assaults on a boy between 1983 and 1989. He served his sentence in Bowden Institution in southern Alberta.

Roszko was "blacklisted" in the community and one of his victims distributed posters accusing him of being a child molester, said Bruce Bridgewater, who operates a local grocery store.

Kirsch said she is glad Roszko is dead.

"I'm sure everybody is."

Canadian Free Press March 2005

This should be about why those officers were sent there in the first place and why this individual alluded his crimes for so many years not about pot.

 

[glenny]

If it was that cold a protable heater would solve it.BTW who cares about leaves you want the bud LOL I think the cops just screwed up Sadly. Oh I also heard that some are now calling for automatic 2 year sentences for growning first time or not. Federal time for growing a plant how stupid I almost think that I'm living in the states.