Key takeaways:
- Tim Mills, now retired, and Cpl. Trent Milton was part of the emergency response unit.
- A public investigation into the Nova Scotia mass shooting was heard from a former officer who led the tactical response and was crucial to the RCMP for not having adequate staff, the right technology, or mental health help to deal with the happening and its aftermath.
Two RCMP tactical officers testifying Monday at the investigation concerning the 2020 Nova Scotia mass shooting say responding was made more difficult by not having enough staffed units, overnight air help, or the technology to identify their locations.
Emergency Response Team leader Cpl. Tim Mills chose to retire six months after the shootings, and Cpl. Trent Milton, who took over crew leader duties, answered questions together in a witness panel.
In his testimony, as in his behind-the-scenes interview, Mills stated he was proud of his unit’s actions but didn’t hold back criticism of his ex-employer, naming it a “broken organization.”
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“The RCMP as an organization likes to give this image they overlook about their members… Commissioner Brenda Lucki has said, ‘We’ll do whatever we can. We can’t do adequately.’ The way we were treated after this is awful — it’s why I left the RCMP,” he told Monday morning. He said senior management failed to help tactical officers in the weeks after the mass shooting by turning down a plea for time to debrief together.
Mills said he offered to have the teamwork on administrative tasks at headquarters for two weeks to allow them to process together with the trauma they underwent.
But despite initial help from psychologists who met with the team, he said the eight part-time members of the group were told to return to their everyday front-line responsibilities in their home detachments or take sick leave.
Source – cbc.ca
