In the early hours of January 5, 2021 – just five days into the new year – the Vancouver Police Department (VPD) executed a man in cold blood on East Hastings Street in the Downtown Eastside (DTES).
The VPD claims it was called by paramedics at approximately 5AM to respond to a man “acting erratic and aggressive” outside the Grace Mansion at Princess and Hastings. Video footage of the incident depicts a man in clear mental distress: he is injured, completely unclothed, wandering the street and running headfirst into a glass door. The man, carrying an unidentified object over his shoulder, is then shot to death within seconds of approaching a VPD officer.
At the time of this publication, the VPD has yet to release the victim’s name to the public. He was 37 years old.
WHY DID THE VPD SHOOT TO KILL?
With a taser, baton, and pepper spray on their belts, why did officers choose not to use ‘less-than-lethal’ means to disarm the man? Seconds into their encounter, and with what appears to be at least two metres between them, the VPD officer emptied at least three live rounds into the man. He was left dead and naked like an animal in the street.
We at VANDU know why they shot to kill. The VPD patrols the DTES like guards in an open-air prison, with every unhoused and poor resident a potential enemy to be contained or eliminated. The VPD’s PR department has convinced polite society that their officers police “differently,” but we in the streets know these thugs won’t hesitate to harass, terrorize, and use lethal force with impunity. The VPD’s short-lived ‘Neighbourhood Response Team’ was a prime example of the police’s presence as an occupying force in our community.
The police claim to be the only legitimate force that can protect us and respond to crisis. We call bullshit. In the name of protecting property and profit, our lives as drug users are made expendable by the VPD. The police are the crisis in the DTES.
DRUG WAR: THEY SHOOT US DOWN, WE FIGHT BACK
Only days before the execution, on January 2, the VPD shot another man just blocks away on Princess Avenue. In November last year, they killed someone for the ‘crime’ of taking too long in a Tim Horton’s bathroom. Who will be the next of us to be taken down by the cops?
City hall, the media, and so-called ‘independent investigators’ will do the VPD’s dirty work of covering up this execution with the same old story that has justified the thousands of premature deaths in our community for decades: this man was an addict, this man was a danger to the public, this man deserved to die.
The blood spilled on Princess and Hastings marks a sick escalation of the already deadly, endless war on drug users and poor people. We will not let trigger-happy cops play target practice on our brothers and sisters. We will protect our own.
SPEAK HIS NAME
We at VANDU are asking residents of the DTES to come to us if they can provide a witness account of the execution or can help identify the victim. See our contact information below.
The VPD callously took this man’s life. We refuse to allow it to take his dignity and personhood in death. If the police continue to refuse to name the victim, we will seek ways to speak his name. We will march with rage.
VANDU will be holding a community vigil for the victim on Tuesday, January 12. Attendants are asked to gather at our office at 380 East Hastings at 1:30pm.
Telephone: 604-683-6061
Email: tips@vandu.org
Brenda
January 7, 2021 at 2:50 pm
And were supposed to trust the police!
Jen
January 8, 2021 at 3:12 pm
does anyone know who the cop is?
Andrew Date
January 8, 2021 at 4:57 pm
very bad policing
Samona
January 8, 2021 at 8:37 pm
See where was the peer negotiator there I bet if a peer could have talked to him it would have been different outcome for sure. And why did she not use tasor or beanbag gun instead of her pistol
Ms Sheila Borton
January 8, 2021 at 9:36 pm
I would never ever trust Cops because they’re Krucked and they’re all Corrupt in every way !!
munroeflora@gmail.com
January 10, 2021 at 5:09 am
They are the thugs fukin VPD.
E
January 12, 2021 at 4:54 pm
This is such bullshit. He was waving a sword at them. Of course they shot him. So would anyone who valued their life. The police aren’t the problem in this situation, as much as you want them to be. This kind of extremely biased, dishonest reporting is shameful.
Lisa Beketa
February 7, 2021 at 6:03 am
Nope not the victim’s name. Not the cop’s name. Not much about it, a day later! Not two days before a guy had the whole block on lock down because the cops took this situation and, I believe, used it as training. 16 hrs of bullshit. I watched the whole thing from my living room. They could of ended it in an HR or TWO. This guy shot a guy in his SRO. Again a man with mental problems as well a drug addict . wondering why they wouldn’t take some time to see what this guy was about. 3 mins, 16hrs. Big fuc…. difference. Not to mention, life or death.Some think their in some kind of action packed cop show I’ve seen them drive around standing on their running board with their big guns ready to use it on the poor bastard their looking for. That probably stole some merch to live, yet another day. They don’t make sense. They never have. We have enough things killing us. We don’t need them jumping on the death band wagon.
Lana Idestrup (nee: Eklund)
February 12, 2021 at 4:49 am
When my brother was killed by the VPD on August 1, 2002 they were called to help him, a Mental Health call.
At inquest held in September 2004, they ruled my brothers death accidental. They said there was only one car available with a psychiatrist nurse and she wasn’t one of the police to respond. In the history of what the hey call deaths in custody there’s had not been handed down so many recommendations on how to handle mental health calls. I’m very sorry for the soul who was gunned down, because the officer that responded was incapable of truly helping the individual who needed help!
They said the same thing about my brother that the officer was scared my brother ran down the apartment hallway into the dark bedroom to get a phone, he wasn’t hurting the officer or officers they had already excessively sprayed him with pepper spray.
My brother was loving kind with not a mean bone in his body, he just turned 33, gay over weight and needed help, our mom had just passed away twelve days before they hog tied him and placed a knee on the back of his neck.
I’m so angry and saddened to know that the VPD have and are continuing to value people who are in distress and desperate need of help this way.
He was someone’s son, perhaps a husband or a dad, someone’s sibling, RIP