IAN BUSH

Update: The jury recommended that the RCMP install audio-video equipment in all detachments and that its use be mandatory. It also suggested that a police officer not be left alone with someone he or she had arrested. It proposed that RCMP members conduct an "annual self assessment" and have a "continuing education plan to maintain competency." No one was quite sure what that meant.

Our thoughts are with the family of Ian Bush this week, as they continue the agony of the reconvened Coroner's Inquest into their son and brother's death. In case you've been living on a deserted island and haven't heard, 22-year-old Ian Bush was shot in the back of the head in the Houston (British Columbia) RCMP detachment on Oct. 29, 2005 by Const. Paul Koester after being arrested for the crime of holding an open bottle of beer in public and providing false information to the police.

The RCMP's version of events does NOT compute and it has only become more bizarre this week.

This entry has nothing to do with tasers. This is, instead, all about the practice in Canada of police investigating themselves and each other. This is a public service announcement. Only through unbiased police oversight will we ever hope to see a reduction in excessive force and corruption in Canadian police forces - from muncipal police straight up to the beleaguered RCMP. As Ian Bush's sister Andrea said, "If the police knew there would be a real investigation, then that would stand as a warning to them." And, if a Coroner's Inquest is *not* the forum for this urgent debate, then what is?! Knock! Knock! ... Who's there? ... Is Stephen Harper in? We, the families of people who have died in police custody, need to see him about a small matter of national urgency. Another sister of a person slain in police custody questions Mr. Harper's bias in favour of the law enforcers. Knock! Knock! ... Who's there? ... Is the opposition home?

Another issue that we strongly agree with is that families of people who die in custody of police in this country must be provided with funding so that they may be properly represented by legal counsel. The Globe and Mail's Gary Mason puts it this way: "Here we have this contemptible situation where Mrs. Bush is cashing in RRSPs to finance her fight on her son's behalf and yet the Department of Justice and the B.C. Attorney-General's Ministry have three lawyers here, all working on behalf of the RCMP, all at taxpayers' expense ... The entire onus for getting at the truth in this sordid affair is on the Bush family. And that's wrong. That's not how the system should work." BINGO!!

If the jury is unable to agree on any other LIFE-SAVING recommendations, the least it must do is recommend that Mrs. Bush’s LIFE SAVINGS be returned to her.

Globe and Mail reporter Gary Mason has been on this case from the beginning like a pitbull. Unfortunately, his reports are not available to non-Globe and Mail subscribers. HOWEVER, it takes less than a minute and a credit card number to create a free member account, which provides 14 days of unlimited access to everything on their site. Before the end of the 14 days, you can simply cancel your account. I strongly urge all of my readers to create an account and do a search for "Ian Bush" - you have to read this to believe it!!

What is happening in Houston, British Columbia this week should be sounding alarms across the country.