Police actions saved lives as bomber frightened city

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 07/07/2015 (4044 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

I hope you’re sitting down as you’re reading this.

As usual.

Because what you’re about to read is not usual.

At least not coming from me.

A bomb went off Friday morning that seriously injured family lawyer Maria Mitousis and shocked not only those who know and love her, but citizens at large.

Police have arrested a 49-year-old man and charged him with attempted murder.

I feel compelled to commend members of the Winnipeg Police Service in particular — and the people who lead them — for the extraordinary professionalism and dedication they’ve displayed in recent days.

I take that back.

Extraordinary is the wrong word, because I believe the efforts shown during the weekend are a high-profile example of what goes on throughout every sector of our police service.

Just so you know.

Monday morning, as is the routine, I had informed breaking news editor Jason Bell my column would centre on congratulating the cops.

I only say that because that notice was given before Monday’s news conference where Mayor Brian Bowman thanked city police officers — and RCMP and the members of the fire and paramedic service — for their “exemplary” efforts.

That’s a better word than extraordinary.

The mayor went further. He suggested police likely saved lives and prevented more casualties.

For his part, Chief Devon Clunis spoke of the everyday pride he has for the women and men under his command.

Particularly, though, in recent days.

“But to witness their care and their compassion” he said, “their professionalism as they worked tirelessly to ensure that our citizens were safe, truly just filled my heart with pride this past weekend.”

I think what we tend to forget is how much police care and generally how good they are at what they do because they do it routinely every day.

But former senior cops I’ve got to know over the years don’t forget.

On Friday, as events in the bombing case were unfolding, former deputy chief, now lawyer, Joe Gallagher recalled a similar case 40 years ago.

As did former crime superintendent Des DePourcq when he recalled his career highlights as he retired in the mid 1980s. DePourcq had been responsible for all major crime investigations.

“I’ve always enjoyed the thrill of the chase on the investigations,” he told then-reporter, now Free Press publisher Bob Cox. “I don’t think there was ever a day I didn’t want to go to work.”

At which point Cox’s story segued into DePourcq recalling a series of career highlights, foremost among them the 1974 bombing at the old Law Courts building. DePourcq said tracking down a man who mailed the bomb gave him the most personal satisfaction.

“It was one of a few times when we had very little to go on to begin with, but we succeeded,” he said.

Actually, that decades-old case — where county court chief clerk Charles Gilraine had his hand blown off when he attempted to open a package containing a clock radio — appears to have a lot of similarities to the weekend events.

Including police quickly identifying a suspect who had a grudge against a particular person in the legal system.

It was a small-claims case in that instance.

Gallagher recalled being a young officer and climbing in the back seat of a car with legendary detective duo Peter Vander Graaf and Jack Taylor and heading to the suspect’s home soon after the mailed clock, booby-trapped with a stick of dynamite, went off. John Joseph Rogers wasn’t home when Taylor pulled the car into his driveway. But within days, as DePourcq recalled it, he and his partner, Herb Stephen, were arresting Rogers after the FBI caught up to him in Oregon. Five months later, a jury convicted Rogers of attempted murder and Chief Justice Archibald Dewar, a former city cop himself, sentenced him to life.

At the time, Dewar said he did not impose the life sentence because it was an offence on a court official, but because the offence was an action by a wicked, reckless mind.

“There is no place in the life of a community for persons who deliberately attempt to destroy others,” Dewar told Rogers. “I consider you to be a menace to society, extremely anti-social and I find that you will require much attention to reorient your mind. However, that is up to the penal system. My responsibility is to protect the public…”

As is our police service’s responsibility, of course.

Then as it is now.

Anyway, for all the criticism I and others heap upon our police service and its members when we judge they go wrong, there is so much more that they do and get right.

Routinely.

Because, in good times and in bad — whether it’s handing out traffic tickets we deserve but don’t want, or defusing bombs none of us wants — they’re there for us. Which we should all — both the police and the public — always be proud to remember.

gordon.sinclair@freepress.mb.ca