Police, rescuers duck bricks, rocks thrown from roof in meth-fuelled standoff

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This article was published 04/09/2018 (2682 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Police officers and other emergency personnel had to dodge bricks and rocks being thrown at them from a West End rooftop Monday morning by an agitated, raging man believed to be high on methamphetamine.

Officers tried to talk to the man atop the building in the 600 block of William Avenue at when they arrived at about 8:40 a.m., but were forced to take cover as bricks began raining down on them.

He was pulling them from a chimney on the roof of the building, police said. At one point he jumped from that roof to the roof of a neighbouring building and continued to yell and throw rocks at vehicles, apartment windows and emergency personnel.

Crisis negotiators, Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service and members of the Tactical Support Team were called in to assist during what turned out to be a seven-hour incident.

The man was safely apprehended just before 3:30 p.m., taken to hospital and treated for minor injuries.

“We had our officers assaulted and we had a number of fire paramedic members who had bricks thrown at them. Any one of these people could have been seriously injured, if not killed, by what was happening,” Winnipeg police Const. Rob Carver said.

He said the incident is a vivid reminder to members of the public about the on-the-job danger faced by first responders every shift when they go to work.

“These men and women have to go home at the end of the day and somebody was raining down bricks and rocks on them. We’re just really lucky everyone came home uninjured,” Carver said, adding the situation was “terrifying. “

“We want to resolve it with no one injured, including the person who is causing the risk,” Carver said. “If everything goes according to plan, that’s the outcome we want. It isn’t always the outcome we get. The unfortunate part is this happens countless times a month and we’re only remembered if it goes negatively.”

Christopher Robert Baron, 40, of Winnipeg has been charged with six counts of assaulting peace officers, three counts of assault with a weapon and six counts of mischief. He is being held in custody.

“This goes to show citizens we attend to an incident like this, we take all the time we need. We had (used) a pile of resources but what that means is, everyone walked away safe, including the guy who ended up being taken into custody,” Carver said.

Because meth severely impairs a person’s grip on reality, Carver said trying to reason with the person is usually not effective.

“Ultimately we had to use tactics to bring him down and reason is simply not an option,” Carver said.

Monday’s was another incident of meth-fuelled mayhem being faced with increased frequency by first responders as street use of the drug ramps up.

On Aug. 22, police were attacked twice in one day by men suspected of being high on meth. A barbecue propane tank, a snow shovel and a screwdriver were used by drug-addled suspects trying to injure officers. In the second incident, it took three Taser shots to bring the man down.

In those incidents, two different individuals were taken into custody.

Richard Lee Friesen, 30, was charged with assaulting a police officer and mischief under $5,000.

Brett Mikal Keeper, 26, of Winnipeg, was charged with two counts of assaulting police officers with a weapon and was processed on three outstanding warrants.

ashley.prest@freepress.mb.ca