Knife seized at scene of shooting death, police chief says

Winnipeg police Chief Keith McCaskell said investigators seized a knife at the scene of a police shooting that killed Craig McDougall over the weekend, following claims by some that McDougall was not armed.

McCaskell spoke at a news conference on Tuesday,hours after Manitoba First Nations chiefs called for a public inquiry into the shooting.

McDougall, 26, was shot by officers who responded to a disturbance call around 5 a.m. Saturday at a house on Simcoe Street, in the city's West End neighbourhood. Police said he refused repeated demands to drop a knife.

McCaskell revealed few details of the case, saying that would jeopardize the investigation, but he did respond to a question about claims that no knife was involved.

"There was a knife seized. I can tell you that," McCaskell said.

McCaskell also said police had received two calls about a disturbance at the house. He added that three officers, two male and one female, were involved and are currently on administrative leave.

Earlier, at a morning press conference outside the house, family members said police had been called to deal with a fight between two young women, and officers had arrested McDougall's father.

McDougall had just arrived home and was talking on a cellphone to his girlfriend as the situationunfolded, family memberssaid.The girlfriend heard everything, including the gunshots, they said.

One witness at the news conference insisted there had been noknife, and several others said McDougall posed no danger to police because he had been on one side of a metre-high fence, while the officers were on the other.

"When I saw my son lying on the ground, I wanted to go to him to help him, but I was thrown on the ground and handcuffed," the slain man's father, Brian McDougall, said in a statement read by another family member.

"I was a few inches away from comforting my son, but I was prevented."

'Would never harm someone'

The family is in "deep mourning" and "shock" over the death of McDougall, described as a "good son" and "a caring person."

"We all loved him. I know my son would never harm someone with authority," the father said in the statement.

Chief David Harper of the Garden Hill First Nation described McDougall's death as "unacceptable" and questioned the use of deadly force.

"We just[saw] this past weekend a man carrying a knife [in one hand] and a head in the other hand, and he is still alive today," he said, referring to the police capture of a man in the brutal stabbing death of a Winnipeg man on a Greyhound bus last Thursday.

The family wants "healing and closure,"the father's statementsaid, "but before we do that, we need the truth to come out."

Native leaders are hiring a private investigator to probe the shooting, and have retained Don Worme to represent the family's interests, they said.

Wormerepresented the family of Neil Stonechild at the public inquiry into his death. The inquiry concluded Stonechild had been in police custody before being found frozen to death on the outskirts of Saskatoon in 1990.

Worme also represented the family of Matthew Dumas earlier this year at an inquest into the 18-year-old Winnipegger's death by police gunfire in 2005.

In addition to a public inquiry into the conduct of the Winnipeg police, native leaders called on the provincial government to establish an aboriginal police commission, an aboriginal justice college to train native workers in the justice system, and an independent police complaints agency to replace the current Law Enforcement Review Agency.

The government should also create a permanent special investigations unit,including First Nations representatives, to investigate cases such as the shooting of McDougall, they said.

The chiefsvowed to hold"further legal and political actions," and said they will file formal complaints with Manitoba's Human Rights Commission and the United Nations.

Police Act under review

Manitoba Justice Minister Dave Chomiak said he sees no need at the moment to order an investigation into the Winnipeg Police Service.

Chomiak acknowledged a 150-year legacy of bad relations between police and aboriginal people in Manitoba, and said changes to the system will take time.

Changes stemming from a review of the Police Act that is currently underway are expected in the next year, he said.That process may deal with some of the concerns raised by native leaders, he said.

In the meantime, the justice minister said he has full confidence in the Winnipeg police force, and trusts thattwoinvestigations currently underway into Saturday's shooting and the July death of a teenager who was jolted with a police stun gun will uncover the full truth.

Taser also deployed

Police saidearlier this weekthatMcDougall had refused to comply with demands to put down a knife. Astun gunwas also used on him, but failed to subdue him, police said.

Const. Jacqueline Chaput, a police spokeswoman,couldn't say how many times McDougall was asked to put down the knife.

"Officers have to make split-second decisions in these types of incidents," she said Sunday. "They felt that they had to protect themselves. They had to protect the people around them, the public. And at that point, they had to escalate to a higher level of force.

"Our officers don't make the choice to use their firearms lightly. If they chose to in this instance, it's because they were forced to," she added.

Anexternal police agency will review the investigation into the shooting, Chaput said.

Saturday's shooting isthe second recent confrontation between Winnipeg police and an aboriginal male that resulted in a death.Michael Langan, 17, died after police jolted him with a Taser in late July.

Nephew of J.J. Harper

McDougall's uncle wasJ.J. Harper, a37-year-old native leader who was killed by police in March 1988 after he was stopped by officers who mistook him for a suspect in a car theft.

Harper's death sparked outrage in the aboriginal community, and prompted an inquiry into the provincial justice system's treatment of aboriginal people.

The inquiry's final reportin 1991 said the justice system was failingnative people on a massive scale. Among its140 recommendationswere calls for an independent aboriginal child welfare system,an independent justice system for aboriginal peopleand more aboriginal police officers.

Movement has been made on somerecommendations; others have not been implemented. Some critics have argued that not enough has been done to reform the system, while others complain the changes required to implement some recommendationswould be too extensive.

Gordon Sinclair Jr., whose book Cowboys and Indians probed the handling of Harper's death, said McDougall's death illustrates how little things have changed in two decades.

"The police and the government have yet to learn any lessons from this of a meaningful kind when it comes to the justice system. Aboriginal people are still being shot, police officers are still investigating themselves, and no one seems to care," he said.

"J.J. Harper would have said, 'I died in vain.'"