The Alberta Serious Incident Response Team (ASIRT) is investigating an officer-involved shooting in Strathmore early Sunday morning.
On Dec. 25, at approximately 3:30 a.m., the Strathmore RCMP responded to a call where a male was causing a disturbance at a gas station. The male was located, and he confronted the RCMP members with a weapon.
Members discharged their sidearms. The male was struck, treated by EMS and taken to hospital with injuries from the incident, an Alberta RCMP media release said.
ASIRT has taken over and is investigating the circumstances of the incident, and asked motorists and residents in the area to avoid the Highway 1 and secondary Highway 817 intersection while there was a heavy police presence on the scene investigating. Traffic was diverted for several hours.
“The Alberta RCMP believes in processes that seek the facts and it’s important that processes taken to assess the actions of all those involved, including the police, are fair, transparent, and defendable,” the release said. “This is why, as soon as we became aware of this incident, we immediately notified the Director of Law Enforcement and initiated our internal review process.”
In addition to the ASIRT investigation, the Alberta RCMP have started the internal review process to gather a full account of what took place during the incident. RCMP training, policy, police response, and duty status of the members involved are subject to review.
