RCMP detachment shuttered following fatal shooting in Neqotkuk First Nation

A police officer fatally shot a man in Neqotkuk on Sunday evening, prompting the First Nation’s leadership to shutter the community’s RCMP detachment “indefinitely.”

Indigenous leaders are now renewing calls for action to address a deadly pattern in New Brunswick: Indigenous people — who represent less than five per cent of the population — account for a massively disproportionate number of people killed by police in recent years.

Bronson Paul died after being shot in the kitchen of his home, according to Chief Ross Perley.

He called the RCMP’s actions “reckless and careless.” He said that Paul’s children and common-law partner were also at home when police fired five rounds. “Shooting a firearm that many times in a house with children is reckless,” he said.

Neqotkuk, also known as Tobique First Nation, is located near the Maine border, roughly 125 kilometres northwest of Fredericton. Under a protocol with local police, members of local tribal security would normally accompany RCMP, helping to de-escalate incidents on-reserve, according to the chief. “Last night, that didn’t happen.”

The RCMP’s Tobique First Nation Detachment is part the local Emergency Services Centre, which is owned by the band. The detachment’s offices will remain closed until further notice, Perley said.

“[Police] will be working out of a different detachment just for safety purposes, for both community members and officers,” he said.

A spokesperson for the New Brunswick RCMP said that community members “can continue to contact police through regular channels should they require police assistance.”

Mental wellness services are in place to support people in the community, according to information posted on the band’s social media. A fundraiser has also been launched to support Paul’s family.

A witness has stated that Paul was unarmed at the time of the shooting, according the chief. That contradicts an account published Monday by the RCMP, which said that Paul was in possession of an “edged weapon.”

The RCMP’s statement outlines how police from a nearby detachment in Perth-Andover responded to “a report of a domestic dispute” shortly after 5 p.m. at a home on Main Street in Neqotkuk.

“As the situation quickly evolved, a man armed with an edged weapon advanced towards members,” the RCMP stated. “A Conducted Energy Weapon (taser) was deployed ineffectively, and a member discharged their firearm at the man.”

The RCMP statement added that first aid “was immediately administered at the scene” before the man was transported to a hospital, where he died.

The case is now in the hands of the Serious Incident Response Team, an agency mandated to investigate police shootings in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.

The SIRT is led by a civilian director, who is appointed by the Nova Scotia government for a five-year term, and decides whether criminal charges should be laid against an officer.

The current director is Erin Nauss, a former solicitor for the Nova Scotia Department of Justice. She oversees a team of seven investigators, including former and current police officers who “answer only to the director” while seconded to the SIRT, according to the agency’s website.

On Monday, the SIRT issued a statement outlining “preliminary information” broadly similar to the RCMP’s statement. It said Mounties were called to the scene of a domestic disturbance where they located a man “who was in possession of a weapon.”

He was Tasered without effect before “another officer fired their service weapon striking the male.” The statement added: “Life saving measures were administered and the male was transported to hospital where he was later pronounced deceased.”

READ MORE: Province not pursuing ‘key recommendation’ calling for task force on systemic racism in policing
READ MORE: Petition calls for police to contact Indigenous crisis teams to avoid deadly shootings
READ MORE: ‘Nothing about us without us’: Mi’gmaq group still waiting for Indigenous-led inquiry into systemic racism

Premier Susan Holt addressed the shooting in her weekly video address. “We are saddened and angered by the death of Bronson Paul last night,” Holt said, in part.

“We will do our part to ensure the investigation proceeds in a transparent, timely and appropriate manner to provide the answers the family and the community needs.”

The six chiefs of Wolastoqey Nation in New Brunswick issued a statement underlining a pattern of police shootings over the past six years.

“While neither Canada nor New Brunswick maintains publicly available tracking of police-related killings, our records show that, since 2020, there have been at least six incidents of law enforcement using lethal force in New Brunswick,” the chiefs said.

“In four of those instances, the victims were Indigenous.”

“Everyone must recognize this is a deep-seated issue and call it what it is: systemic racism leading to disproportionate and unnecessary deaths of Indigenous people,” the chiefs said.

They called for the SIRT to include Indigenous representation and transparency in their process. Their statement also called for measures such as support for community-based policing.

“We demand that leaders, elected and appointed, acknowledge the pattern of systemic racism within their forces and do the hard work to eliminate it from their institutions,” it said.

“We demand regular updates on these efforts, community meetings aimed at listening and healing, meaningful connection with First Nation leadership, and quick action focused on restoring the safety and security of our people.”

The latest shooting came just days after the provincial government officially responded to the final report of commissioner Manju Varma on systemic racism in New Brunswick, which was published in 2022.

The commission had called on the government to address recommendations from the coroner’s inquests into the deaths of Chantel Moore and Rodney Levi — two Indigenous people killed by police within eight days of each other in June 2020 — “without delay.”

However, the Holt government signalled on Friday that no immediate action is planned on that item.

Other recommendations apparently jettisoned by the government include a “task force focused on dismantling systemic racism in New Brunswick policing” co-chaired by Indigenous and Black communities. The report called that one of the commission’s “key recommendations.”

“It seems like all of the recommendations have fallen on deaf ears from the government,” said Perley, the Neqotkuk chief.

In response to last week’s update, Wolastoqey Nation in New Brunswick renewed longstanding calls for an Indigenous-led public inquiry into systemic racism in policing and the justice system.

Chantel Moore, 26, of Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation was shot by a member of the Edmundston Police Force on the balcony of her apartment on June 4, 2020. The officer maintained that when he woke her up for a late-night wellness check, she brandished a knife and approached him before he opened fire.

Eight days later, Rodney Levi, 48, of Metepenagiag Mi’kmaq Nation was fatally shot by a member of the RCMP outside the home of his pastor. Witnesses said Levi took two large knives from the kitchen onto the back deck and refused to drop them, before police Tasered him without effect and then shot him.

Steven “Iggy” Dedam, 34, of Elsipogtog First Nation died on Sept. 9, 2024 after being shot by an RCMP officer while Dedam experienced a mental health crisis in his home. The SIRT investigation found that he was “in possession of multiple throwing axes” at the time, and he threw one towards police before they Tasered him without effect, and then shot him. The encounter lasted approximately two minutes before police opened fire, the SIRT investigation showed.

None of the officers involved in those shootings were prosecuted.

David Gordon Koch is a journalist with the NB Media Co-op. This reporting has been made possible in part by the Government of Canada, via the Local Journalism Initiative.