Mayerthorpe Incident
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The Mayerthorpe Incident occurred on March 3, 2005 on the property of James Roszko in Rochfort Bridge, northwest of Edmonton near the town of Mayerthorpe, in the Canadian province of Alberta. With a Heckler & Koch 91, a civilian version of a military assault rifle, Roszko shot and killed Royal Canadian Mounted Police Constables Peter Schiemann, Anthony Gordon, Lionide Johnston, and Brock Myrol as the officers were executing a property seizure on the farm. This was the largest casualty toll for the RCMP in a single operation since the Northwest Rebellion in 1885, where three constables were killed.
The officers initially went to the farm to repossess a truck, but when they arrived they discovered a significant marijuana grow-op on the premises. The four officers remained on the scene to guard it until the grow-op could be dealt with, and were ambushed inside a Quonset shed on the farm. They were only armed with handguns and were wearing soft body armour that would have provided no protection against Roszko's rifle. The officers apparently had not been expecting an armed confrontation, believing that Roszko was not on the property.
After fatally shooting the four officers, Roszko emerged from the shed and fired on two other officers who had heard the initial gunfire. The officers were not hit, and returned fire. Roszko, wounded by the response team, then retreated into the shed.
After losing radio contact with the officers in the shed, emergency response teams from the RCMP, Edmonton and Calgary city police and the military's Edmonton Garrison were called in, and the airspace over the property was closed. The four officers and Roszko were all found fatally shot; it has since been confirmed that Roszko killed all four officers, and then turned his weapon on himself.
One of the deceased officers, Constable Brock Warren Myrol, had graduated a month before from the RCMP Academy, Depot Division. He had been on duty only 17 days.
A memorial service for the slain officers was held in Edmonton on March 10, 2005 and televised nationally on CBC. Prime Minister Paul Martin and Governor General Adrienne Clarkson both spoke at the service. Many police officers from Canada and the United States were in attendance.
On May 19, 2005, Queen Elizabeth II, Queen of Canada, attended a ceremony in honour of the slain officers at the RCMP Training Academy in Regina, Saskatchewan.
The CBC program the fifth estate also made a documentary about the incident, which first aired on December 7, 2005. The full documentary can be downloaded from the CBC website (see links below).
A by-product of the massacre was the halt to marijuana decriminalization legislation in the Canadian Parliament. Only days before the massacre, the leader of the Marijuana Party endorsed the Liberal Party after the government introduced a bill to decriminalize use and possession of marijuana. In the wake of the tragedy, the Liberals shelved the bill, and it was predicted that no action would take place for at least a year. Before a year had elapsed, Martin's government was defeated and the Conservative Party, which opposed decriminalization, was elected. Many media commentators suggested the massacre was an argument against marijuana decriminalization; some others argued the incident only occurred because the officers were on a drug raid. As the details of Roszko's violent history and hatred for the police became apparent, these arguments generally faded from the public discourse.
[edit] James Roszko
James Roszko (1959? - March 3, 2005) was a Canadian man who at the time of the massacre was operating a hydroponic marijuana grow-op in Rochfort Bridge, Alberta. According to documents obtained by the CBC's the fifth estate in a court case to have the search warrants made public, police seized seven growing marijuana plants, and 88 harvested plants from the residence, plus a further 192 growing marijuana plants along with growing equipment from the quonset.
Police also found lists containing the names and call signs of RCMP officers from the detachments in Mayerthorpe, Whitecourt and Evansburg, Alberta. The lists also contained the cellular numbers assigned to their vehicles.
Also found were a .308 calibre Heckler and Koch automatic rife, a 300 Magnum which had been reported missing, and a 9 mm Beretta. The .308 and the 9 mm were not registered.
Roszko was said to have had a history of criminal and drug-related offences, and members of the nearby Mayerthorpe community interviewed in a CBC story the day following the incident described him as a 'dangerous recluse'.
