Kamloops mayor concerned about recent rise in gun crime

The mayor of Kamloops, B.C., wants to make sure police have sufficient resources after a rash of gun-related crimes in the community.

"We need to make sure our manpower is where is needs to be,"said Mayor Ken Christian.

"It's very uncharacteristic and it's got to stop. This is just beyond coincidence at this point in time," he said.

Police are still searching for 41-year-old Michael Boyer. He was involved with an incident on Saturday night that sent a police officer to hospital.

And it comes just over a week after a 16-hour armed standoff that shut down Highway 5 and resulted in the evacuation of the G&M Mobile Home Park in Kamloops.

Earlier inOctober, two men were sent to hospital with gunshot wounds after shots were fired at a North Shore home.

• Surrey mayor calls city's gun violence a 'regional' problem

Christian feels the city needs to look at how police are staffed to make sure they have the resources they need.

"British Columbia is in the grips of an opioid crisis and a lot the crime that we are seeing is fed by that industry," he said.

"It's not acceptable, and we need to do everything that we can to interrupt the drug trade."

Timing 'bad luck': police

Cpl. Jodi Shelkie with the Kamloops RCMP said the recent increase in gun related violence is just a coincidence.

"It's busier than it normally is. This is a group, apparently, of unrelated events so far from what we can tell," she said.

Shelkie said people shouldn't speculate on this being anything more than"bad luck" when it comes to timing.

"We have had a fairly quiet year the past year," she said.

She added the Kamloops RCMP are looking at their resources,but people should feel safe right now.

Christian said the recent spate of gun violence is an issue that will likely be brought before the city's community safety committee.

A date for the next meeting has yet to scheduled.