22-year-old dead after Saturday police shooting

April 16, 2014 · 0 Comments

By Brock Weir

A 22-year-old man is dead after an altercation with police in Aurora.

Just before 9 p.m. on Saturday, York Regional Police responded to a 9-1-1 call reporting a “man with a gun” on Leslie Street near State Farm Parkway. At the time, York Regional Police say they had reports of “people shot” but no other persons sustaining injuries had been found.

“At the scene, there were no other injured parties found,” said Constable Laura Nicolle of the York Regional Police on Monday. “If that was alleged in the call, we are going to thoroughly investigate that to see if anyone else was involved, but I don’t know the status of that as of now.”

By 11 p.m., police confirmed the YRP was involved in the shooting and the man in question was taken to hospital with no vital signs, where he was later pronounced dead at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre.

Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit (SIU), which is an arm’s length provincial agency that investigates reports involving police where there has been a death, serious injury or allegations of sexual assault, has assigned four investigators and three forensic investigators to probe the circumstances of the shooting.

“Preliminary information indicates on Saturday, April 12, at approximately 9 p.m., officers with the York Regional Police interacted with a 22 year old man in Aurora,” said the SIU. “Officers discharged their firearms. The man was taken to Sunnybrook where his death was pronounced.”

The SIU asks that anyone who might have witnessed the incident to contact their lead investigator at 416-622-1898 or 1-800-787-8529 x1898.

The mandate of the SIU will be to consider whether any officers involved in the incident committed a criminal offence.

Although few details were available at press time, the SIU said an update on the investigation was expected later this week, but they did confirm they have spoken to “a number of civilian witnesses” over the course of the weekend and into the early part of this week.