'Plain Clothes' RCMP vs. off-duty HRM-PD

METRO HALIFAX (July 30, 2008) - William Drummond was allegedly hit with a Taser several more times by a plain-clothes police officer after being tasered once by an RCMP officer Jun. 22. [LINK] [LINK]

This extract refers to the ugly taser incident in Digby, Nova Scotia. [LINK] [LINK]

For those that don't know, Digby is a (very) small town in Nova Scotia. The population is only about 2,300 people [LINK]. I'm actually surprised that even one uniformed RCMP officer was on duty that evening.

The chances that another "plain clothes" (RCMP??) police officer was also on duty in Digby that night is approximately zero. Makes no sense. A tiny Nova Scotia town with one uniformed RCMP officer on duty in the evening? Sure (but that about maxes out the probabilities). But this tiny town also having another RCMP officer on-duty in 'plain clothes'? Not much chance of that.

In other words, this so-called 'plain clothes' officer (alledgedly with the 2nd taser) was more than likely one of those very same off-duty, assless chaps (not that there's anything wrong with that) "charity" bikers from the Halifax Regional Municipality Police Department - the ones that appear to be on the wrong side of this ugly incident.


If a 2nd taser really was involved, then it seems clear that it does not belong to the local police (the RCMP) - they've denied having a 2nd taser. So who had the alleged second taser? Who is this so-called 'plain clothes' police officer? The only answer that seems to make any sense is that the so-called "plain clothes" officer was not a (the?) local RCMP officer. So perhaps he was one of those off-duty bikers from Halifax?

If this conclusion is true, then this ugly taser incident in Digby may not just be a case of simple assault and stupid racism. There may also be assault with a deadly weapon, misuse of a firearm, and many more criminal charges that perhaps should be filed against the so-called "plain clothes" officer reportedly weilding the 2nd taser.


HRM police officials need to answer a few questions:

1) Are off-duty police officer permitted to carry tasers to Digby on "charity" biker events?
2) Have HRM checked their tasers for any unauthorized taser deployments on that date?
3) Are any tasers missing? Or does any Halifax-employed officer have his own personal (highly illegal) taser?
4) Does HRM-PD track and account for their tasers as firearms (as they are legally defined in Canada [LINK])?


Note that one of the HRM police officers involved in the Digby incident has been suspended for "another matter". [LINK]

Nothing to do with 'unauthorized this-or-that of a taser', eh? (Just asking!)


This ugly taser incident in Digby is huge even on its face.

But there seems to be more angles to this story than may first meet the eye. And some of those angles may be much more serious (with respect to the seriousness of the associated criminal charges) than the seemingly-obvious facts about the assault and racism (but they're all interconnected too).

This reported 2nd taser needs to be followed-up. I suspect it will lead somewhere very interesting (large fan + lots of sh1t).


[Note - This is just a suggestion for further follow-up. But what else explains the mysterious 'plain-clothes' officer in Digby that night?]