B.C. First Nations leaders call for inquest after man killed by Campbell River RCMP

WARNING: This story contains details some readers may find disturbing

VICTORIA -- First Nations leaders from across British Columbia are calling for an inquest into the RCMP’s fatal shooting of an Indigenous man last week in Campbell River.

Jared Lowndes, 38, was the fourth Indigenous resident of Vancouver Island to be shot by police since June 2020.

A Mountie opened fire on Lowndes in the parking lot of the Tim Hortons in the 2000-block of South Island Highway on the morning of July 8.

Police had attempted to stop the 38-year-old father of two for an outstanding warrant but he failed to stop, according to police.

When an officer later spotted his vehicle in the Tim Hortons parking lot, the officer boxed him in and sent a police dog after him. Lowndes stabbed and killed the dog and the police shot him dead, according to the RCMP. An officer was also injured in the incident.

Now the First Nations Leadership Council (FNLC) is calling for “justice, accountability, an inquest, and a higher level of oversight” in the aftermath of the man’s death.

The council, which is comprised of the political leaders of the BC Assembly of First Nations and the Union of BC Indian Chiefs and the First Nations Summit, says Lowndes was a loving father of two daughters from the Wet'suwet'en Nation's Laksilyu (Small Frog) House.

“He, like many Indigenous peoples, had experienced a cycle of colonial violence, discrimination, and disenfranchisement that left him distrustful of the police,” the FNLC said in a statement Tuesday.

“Last week, when the RCMP attempted to stop him on an outstanding warrant, boxing him in at a Tim Hortons and sending in a police service dog, his experiences as an Indigenous man likely left him fearful, re-traumatized, and acting in self-defence,” the council said.

The FNLC says Lowndes was shot “multiple times in the head,” a detail his family and friends have also shared with CTV News.

The Independent Investigations Office of BC (IIO) is investigating the RCMP's use of force in the incident. It’s the fourth civilian investigation into the police shooting of an Indigenous Vancouver Island resident in just over a year.

In May, a Tla-o-qui-aht woman was shot multiple times and seriously injured when police responded to a report of a disturbance at a home in Ucluelet, B.C.

In February, a 28-year-old Tla-o-qui-aht man was shot and killed by police on Meares Island, near Tofino, B.C.

Last June, a 26-year-old Tla-o-qui-aht woman from Tofino was shot and killed during a police wellness check in New Brunswick.

“Sadly, condolences will not help to prevent this from happening again,” said Lydia Hwitsum of the First Nations Summit.

“We must urgently see immediate and necessary policy changes and justice reforms that will mandate the protection of Indigenous lives, rather than relying on existing police practices that, as we have witnessed, make it all too easy for the police to devalue and take Indigenous lives unnecessarily,” she added.

The RCMP said no further information about the Lowndes shooting will be released while the IIO investigation is ongoing.

National Police Federation president Brian Sauvé issued a response to the Lowndes family's criticisms of the Mounties' actions in the man's death.

"We send our sympathies to the Lowndes family and friends following the death of Jared Lowndes last week," Sauvé said in a statement Monday. "If Mr. Lowndes had not, however, evaded police, stabbed [police sercie dog] Gator and injured an RCMP officer, and instead turned himself in to the courts to comply with a warrant for weapons offences, he could be alive today."