Homicide, police shooting, attack on off-duty cop

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This article was published 12/06/2024 (493 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A man was stabbed to death, an off-duty police officer was the victim of a random attempted carjacking, and a knife-wielding suspect who had run into traffic and threatened people was shot by officers in a violence-fuelled afternoon in the city’s core Tuesday, escalating concern about public safety.

Police said they expect an increase in calls to 911 as the summer arrives.

“The police are very busy… the time frame is close, but that’s not uncommon, and moving into the summer days now, that won’t be uncommon,” Winnipeg Police Service spokeswoman Const. Dani McKinnon said as police outlined the three separate incidents of violence, which began just before noon and culminated around 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, at a news conference Wednesday.

“We’ve continued to talk about public safety, we’ve continued to talk about deployment of resources, we have some new initiatives… it’s difficult, we all have to work together — it’s not going to be easy.”

Justice Minister Matt Wiebe called the string of incidents “very concerning.”

“We take these incidents really seriously, and Manitobans deserve to feel safe in their communities, and that includes in all parts of the city and all parts of the province,” he said.

Man killed in stabbing on Kennedy

In the first incident, 49-year-old Ricky Dwayne Mancheese was stabbed on the sidewalk of Kennedy Street, between Sargent and Cumberland avenues, down the block from an elementary school, at about 11:50 a.m.

Patrol officers found him and desperately tried to give him first-aid before paramedics arrived. He was pronounced dead in hospital. No suspect has been identified, police said.

Homicide detectives have spoken with Mancheese’s family. Police spokesman Const. Claude Chancy said he did not know whether Mancheese lived in the area, which has several apartment buildings.

Ed Menard, who lives near the crime scene, said it came as no surprise to hear a person had been attacked in broad daylight.

“I’ve seen drive-by shootings. I’ve seen stabbings. I’ve seen a massive amount of assaults,” he said outside his building Wednesday afternoon. “It’s a weekly occurrence. What are the police doing about it?”

He’d like to see a dedicated office in the community where police are stationed.

“(The neighbourhood is) no longer the families who are trying to work their way out of the system,” he said. “What you have now is the gang-banger wannabes, the wannabe tough boys, the thieves, the crackheads, the dealers, that’s it.”

Chancy said it was too early to discuss a possible motive in the killing, which was the 18th slaying in Winnipeg this year (police include the 2023 deaths of two children in their internal 2024 statistics).

“It’s still a fluid investigation,” said Chancy. “The investigators are still in the process of following leads, interviewing people and potential witnesses.”

Police appealed for public assistance, especially video surveillance.

Stick shift foils attempted carjacking

About four hours later, a man waved down an off-duty officer who was driving on Smith Street near police headquarters. The man, who pretended to be in distress, tried to carjack the officer, police said.

Chancy said the man got the officer to pull over at about 4:15 p.m. He opened the door of the vehicle and started to pummel the officer as he threatened to kill him.

Chancy said the officer got out of the vehicle and the suspect tried to drive off, but he was foiled by the stick-shift.

“It’s probably one of the best theft-deterrent systems a vehicle can have — it had a manual transmission,” said Chancy. “The person trying to make off with it couldn’t operate it.”

Three other off-duty officers, who were nearby, rushed over and handcuffed the suspect.

Police say the accused, 27-year-old Bob Umar Kulagbanda, had been released from police HQ just 20 minutes earlier, after officers took him in on warrants for probation violations.

He’s been charged with assaulting a peace officer, uttering threats, robbery and failing to comply with a probation order. He is being held in custody. The officer went to hospital on his own to get checked out.

Last March, Kulagbanda pleaded guilty to three firearm offences and two breaches of court orders and was sentenced to the equivalent of one year time served in jail.

Court was told police arrested Kulagbanda on Dec. 9, 2021, after he was seen “acting a little bizarrely” in the area of Selkirk Avenue and McKenzie Street and hiding a sawed-off .22-calibre rifle under a parked van.

Kulagbanda was on bail for that offence and bound by a court order not to possess any weapons when on June 23, 2022, he followed a 12-year-old girl to her home brandishing a modified airsoft pistol. The girl ran out the back door and to the nearby home of a friend, whose mother called police. Kulagbanda was arrested a short time later in possession of the pistol as well as a knife.

He was released on bail and rearrested three times for breaching his release conditions before his March sentencing.

Kulagbanda told a probation officer he carried the weapons for protection. According to a pre-sentence report prepared for court, Kulagbanda has a history of substance abuse and mental health struggles.

Police shoot man near HSC

Later on Tuesday, at about 5:20 p.m., a man who had gone to a business on Arlington Street near Notre Dame Avenue called 911 after he saw a stranger trying to set fire to the fuel tank of his truck, which was parked on the street.

Police spokeswoman McKinnon alleged the man had tried to use a torch lighter to set fire to the tank, but wasn’t successful.

The suspect, armed with a knife and a rock, began running into traffic on Notre Dame Avenue, confronting people and yelling at them. Patrol officers arrived at 5:23 p.m. and saw a suspect, who was still armed and in the street, she said.

Police tried to use a Taser on the man twice, but it failed to subdue him.

An officer shot the man, who was taken to the Health Sciences Centre, a short distance away. While he was in unstable condition, his condition was later upgraded to stable.

McKinnon said she couldn’t answer many questions on the incident because the Independent Investigation Unit, which probes all serious incidents involving police officers in Manitoba, has taken over the investigation.

The IIU, a civilian oversight agency, said the man was believed to be intoxicated. The agency has asked witnesses or anyone with video of the incident to call investigators at 1-844-667-6060.

Jessica Hatfield, 40, who lives near Beverley Street and Notre Dame, said she was playing video games when she and her roommate heard a gunshot ring out sometime around 5 p.m.

“It was really too close for comfort,” Hatfield told the Free Press. “Then, a pained scream and sirens.”

She said she saw the man lying on the Notre Dame median at the crosswalk at Tecumseh Street near HSC. He appeared to have been shot in the chest, Hatfield said.

She said paramedics transferred the person into an ambulance on a stretcher at about 5:35 p.m. Notre Dame was closed between Beverley and Home streets for several hours.

‘Everything is getting more intense out there’

Community advocate Mitch Bourbonierre said there have been more “negative incidents” in the inner city.

“Everything is getting more intense out there,” he said.

Bourbonierre, who organizes community walks in the inner city, said it’s safest when people are present and watching over each other.

“What we all have to do is, in a way, just outnumber folks by presence,” he said.

He’d like to see more people — and more police — in the downtown core.

“There seems to be more groups emerging every day that just want to hand out food, and be supportive, and have a presence in the neighbourhood,” he said.

“More friendly foot patrols, more actual police officers walking around, leading with a host mentality, rather than an ‘us and them’ mentality. More community groups walking around, more events to bring people downtown and into the inner city.”

The justice minister pointed to the promise of provincially-covered paid overtime for police officers, who will focus on spots with high retail crime as an example of how the government is approaching the problem.

As of this month, homeowners and small business owners can submit an application for a $300 rebate on the purchase of a security system. The government announced the program this spring.

Wiebe said the province is focusing on investments in on-the-ground crime prevention while addressing the root causes of crime.

“This is a big undertaking,” he said. “We’re meeting that challenge, and we’re working toward addressing those issues.”

— with files from Dean Pritchard and Malak Abas

erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca