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Initial report from the Canadian Press:
Condolences to the family, colleagues and friends of the fallen police officer
Condolences to the family, colleagues and friends of the fallen police officer
"Ottawa police officer killed in a stabbing at Ottawa Hospital"
- Thread starter The Bread Guy
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A more detailed article from CTV.caDirtyDog said:
Mountie held in Ottawa police officer's murder
A Saskatchewan RCMP officer on medical leave is reportedly being held in connection with the death of an Ottawa police officer outside a local hospital.
A lawyer for Mountie Kevin Gregson confirmed to CTV News that his client was being held by Ottawa police. He said he expected charges to be laid later in the day.
Gregson is suspected in the stabbing death of a police officer early Tuesday morning outside the Civic Campus of the Ottawa Hospital.
.....
Gregson, 43, used to work for the RCMP at their Regina headquarters. In 2006, he was arrested for pulling a knife on a Mormon church official in Regina.
He received a conditional discharge after explaining to the court that he had recently undergone brain surgery for cysts on his brain.
More on link
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"The suspect was apprehended and held down by four nearby paramedics, including two women. The paramedics tried to revive the officer, but were unable to."
My condolences to the fallen officer's family.
My condolences to the fallen officer's family.
the 48th regulator
Army.ca Fixture
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PMedMoe said:
Hope his defence lawyer, the Judge and the rest of the Worms have the balls to explain to Constable Eric Czapnik's family how they felt their decision was for the best for our society...
dileas
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For those in the area who may be interested:
I took part in something truly momentous today.
On December 29th, Constable Eric Czapnik, 51, of the Ottawa Police Force was killed outside the emergency entrance of the Otawa Hospital civic campus. As details emerged, we heard that the person who did it was in fact a suspended member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who had recently undergone surgery for brain cysts.
We haven't lost a cop in Ottawa in a couple of decades. The outpouring from the community has been truly astonishing. Two nights ago I got an email from my regiment asking me to get in touch with my troops, as we were sending a contingent. On short notice we got about 30 guys in dress uniform to take part in the procession and funeral.
I had no grasp over how massive this was going to be. I rushed home from class to eat and get into uniform, then back to campus, which was the staging ground for the procession. I found the other members of my unit in amongst literally a horde of police officers and other emergency services- the red serge of the RCMP was everywhere; they sent a thousand. Ottawa Police Service had 1500 members in the procession alone, in addition to all those lining the route for crowd control. Every force in Ontario sent people. Some sent thirty. Some sent a hundred. Ottawa Paramedic Service had a hundred and fifty. There were a platoon of military police. Corrections, the Quebec provincial police, about 50 American officers, and so on and so forth. A variety of police unfiorms I've never seen, nearly all in full dress, medals plainly visible. Reading the medals I saw police veterans of decades of service, both police and military. Officers who have served overseas in the world's worst spots, not content with merely helping people here at home. Orders and decorations for honourable service and bravery.
The procession is estimated as having been about five thousand people- at one point in time we literally stretched the mile from our origin to our destination. The march was cold, slow, and choppy, as any movement of five thousand people must be. We found ourselves somewhere in the middle, with the Ontario Provincial Police to our front and Corrections Canada behind us. There was no particular order of precedence that could be determined save for the Ottawa Police at the front, behind the hearse and honour guard.
We arrived at the Ottawa Civic Center- an eight thousand seat hockey arena, and we filed into the stands. In fairly short order the honour guard trooped in, and the additional escort of uniformed officers lined either side of the red carpet. The casket was brought in by eight of his fellow officers and placed reverently in front of the podium, and his priest led a language in both English and Polish. The premier of Ontario extolled his virtues as an officer, as a hero, and as a better Canadian by adoption than most of us who were born here.
Then, from colleagues, supervisors, and his son we learned about Constable Czapnik, and we learned about Eric. We learned how he immigrated from Poland to give his family a better life. He worked for sixteen years doing interior renovations. We learned how in 2003 he remarried, and then gave his three adult children a baby brother. Then in 2007, aged 48, he decided to become a police officer in Ottawa, following in the footsteps of his father, who for thirty years was a police officer in Poland.
We learned about his time as the oldest Ottawa Police Service recruit ever sent to the police college, where he amused and excelled, topping his class. We learned about his initiation to the Eastern Patrol Division, how when commanded as his first duty to sing a song in the patrol room, he sang an old Polish marching song remembered from his year of conscripted service, and that, had he sung in English, his accent would have made it incomprehensible anyway. We learned that he liked Vodka and Pickles to such an extent that 'Pickles' became not just a nickname, but even a radio callsign when dispatch could not get a response from Badge Nineteen-oh-seven.
We learned how he was Dad; how his eldest son, once upon a time aged only five, breathlessly told him all about how he had just missed Santa while he'd been in the bathroom, and how they went out to search for him with no avail.
We learned that weeks ago he told a fellow officer that he was in the happiest time of his life, that he loved his job, and that he wished he could stop time where it was.
On December 29th, time stopped for Constable Eric Czapnik, as cruelly as it must go on for those who have lost him and who will mourn him.
Thank you, Eric Czapnik - Constable Czapnik - for what you were to our community, and for the bar you set so very high for the rest of us. If ever there has been someone who truly deserved peace at the end of things, you were it.
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"Dying officer thanked paramedic rescuers":
OTTAWA — As Ottawa police officer Eric Czapnik lay dying from a mortal knife wound to the throat, he spoke two final and poignant words to his paramedic rescuers, thanking them.
The patrolman had moments earlier been sitting alone early Dec. 29, writing case notes inside his cruiser parked outside the emergency department of the Ottawa Hospital’s civic campus when a man approached and attacked with a knife.
Four paramedics, none yet publicly identified, ran from the emergency room to help. It wasn’t until a male paramedic grabbed the man in headlock from behind, they realized the assailant had a knife.
As the attacker tried to reach around and stab the male paramedic, a female paramedic wrestled the weapon from his hand. A second female paramedic kicked him in the groin, and all three wrestled him to the ground. Another female paramedic attended to Czapnik.
As he lay dying from the random attack, Czapnik, 51, uttered his last words to the paramedics, according to police sources.
“Thank you,” he said.
That his very final act was an expression of gratitude to others is a powerful testament of a man who, as his mourners heard last week, cared deeply about others and about his community, police said.
The first police officers to arrive on the scene found the suspect restrained with Czapnik’s handcuffs, sitting in the back seat of his cruiser.
None of the paramedics were physically injured. But the incident is reviving debate whether paramedics should wear special protection.":
http://www.canada.com/news/national/Dying+officer+thanked+paramedic+rescuers/2426743/story.html
OTTAWA — As Ottawa police officer Eric Czapnik lay dying from a mortal knife wound to the throat, he spoke two final and poignant words to his paramedic rescuers, thanking them.
The patrolman had moments earlier been sitting alone early Dec. 29, writing case notes inside his cruiser parked outside the emergency department of the Ottawa Hospital’s civic campus when a man approached and attacked with a knife.
Four paramedics, none yet publicly identified, ran from the emergency room to help. It wasn’t until a male paramedic grabbed the man in headlock from behind, they realized the assailant had a knife.
As the attacker tried to reach around and stab the male paramedic, a female paramedic wrestled the weapon from his hand. A second female paramedic kicked him in the groin, and all three wrestled him to the ground. Another female paramedic attended to Czapnik.
As he lay dying from the random attack, Czapnik, 51, uttered his last words to the paramedics, according to police sources.
“Thank you,” he said.
That his very final act was an expression of gratitude to others is a powerful testament of a man who, as his mourners heard last week, cared deeply about others and about his community, police said.
The first police officers to arrive on the scene found the suspect restrained with Czapnik’s handcuffs, sitting in the back seat of his cruiser.
None of the paramedics were physically injured. But the incident is reviving debate whether paramedics should wear special protection.":
http://www.canada.com/news/national/Dying+officer+thanked+paramedic+rescuers/2426743/story.html
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"Paramedics met with Czapnik's family:
Widow thanks four who intervened and tried to save officer:
Two days before the funeral of slain Ottawa police Const. Ireneusz "Eric" Czapnik, his widow and three eldest children met privately with the four paramedics who tried desperately to save the man's life on a chilly morning last month.":
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/Paramedics+with+Czapnik+family/2449873/story.html
Widow thanks four who intervened and tried to save officer:
Two days before the funeral of slain Ottawa police Const. Ireneusz "Eric" Czapnik, his widow and three eldest children met privately with the four paramedics who tried desperately to save the man's life on a chilly morning last month.":
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/Paramedics+with+Czapnik+family/2449873/story.html
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Update:
Ottawa Citizen
1 Oct, 2010:
" 'What if we were two seconds faster?'
Paramedic who tried to save police officer after fatal stabbing has often relived events":
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/What+were+seconds+faster/3606395/story.html
"Two of the paramedics returned to work shortly after the incident, but the other two remain on leave because of stress injuries.":
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Paramedics+honoured+heroism/3600017/story.html
Ottawa Citizen
1 Oct, 2010:
" 'What if we were two seconds faster?'
Paramedic who tried to save police officer after fatal stabbing has often relived events":
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/What+were+seconds+faster/3606395/story.html
"Two of the paramedics returned to work shortly after the incident, but the other two remain on leave because of stress injuries.":
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Paramedics+honoured+heroism/3600017/story.html
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Reviving this one to post an article about the trial of Gregson.
Gregson a killer, not a 'murderer': Defence
Killer Kevin Gregson had a “love affair” with knives.
He would brag about how skilled he was with knives, of the ways he could harm someone with one.
And when he slashed Const. Eric Czapnik’s neck, he absolutely intended to cause bodily harm which he knew could cause the officer’s death.
That was what the jury heard Tuesday afternoon in the Crown’s closing arguments.
In detailing the evening of Dec. 28, 2009, the night Gregson said he decided to get a gun, Crown Brian Holowka said the accused was dressed, armed and looking for a fight.
“He was prepared for violence. He did something to cause (Czapnik) to exit his vehicle. The attack was a surprise,” Holowka said.
“He made a series of choices, he told (Czapnik) to get down on his knees, he threw away his BB gun, he chose to pull his peacemaker and repeatedly stabbed Const. Czapnik knowing it wold inevitably bring his death. These are the facts. I’m asking you to ignore speculation and support findings of guilt in first-degree murder,” Holowka said.
After two weeks of often graphic testimony and gut-wrenching videos, the jury is expected to begin its deliberations Tuesday morning when Justice Douglas Rutherford wraps up his charge to the jury.
More at link (including links to other articles)
Edit to add: At the link there is a video of Czapnik entering the hospital after being stabbed. It's a 12 minute video, but at about the 4:12 mark, a paramedic comes in, followed by Czapnik (seen holding his neck) at about 4:15.
Gregson a killer, not a 'murderer': Defence
Killer Kevin Gregson had a “love affair” with knives.
He would brag about how skilled he was with knives, of the ways he could harm someone with one.
And when he slashed Const. Eric Czapnik’s neck, he absolutely intended to cause bodily harm which he knew could cause the officer’s death.
That was what the jury heard Tuesday afternoon in the Crown’s closing arguments.
In detailing the evening of Dec. 28, 2009, the night Gregson said he decided to get a gun, Crown Brian Holowka said the accused was dressed, armed and looking for a fight.
“He was prepared for violence. He did something to cause (Czapnik) to exit his vehicle. The attack was a surprise,” Holowka said.
“He made a series of choices, he told (Czapnik) to get down on his knees, he threw away his BB gun, he chose to pull his peacemaker and repeatedly stabbed Const. Czapnik knowing it wold inevitably bring his death. These are the facts. I’m asking you to ignore speculation and support findings of guilt in first-degree murder,” Holowka said.
After two weeks of often graphic testimony and gut-wrenching videos, the jury is expected to begin its deliberations Tuesday morning when Justice Douglas Rutherford wraps up his charge to the jury.
More at link (including links to other articles)
Edit to add: At the link there is a video of Czapnik entering the hospital after being stabbed. It's a 12 minute video, but at about the 4:12 mark, a paramedic comes in, followed by Czapnik (seen holding his neck) at about 4:15.
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