Skip to content

Domestic violence tops RCMP priority list

Unlike previous documents, the 2021-22 plan is tailored to the city.
2312 inspector sup c
Inspector Ryan Comaniuk is the St. Albert RCMP detachment's new commander. He began his term on Jan. 4, 2021.

Inspector Ryan Comaniuk has released the St. Albert RCMP’s 2021-22 Annual Performance Plan (APP), a series of year-long initiatives aimed at reducing crime and building trust within the community. 

Working in partnership with the St. Albert Policing Committee, Comaniuk has highlighted a series of initiatives that target three key areas: domestic violence and assault; mental health and vulnerable communities; and crime reduction.  

Comaniuk told the Gazette this is the first year the community has been able to help customize the annual performance plans.

“Before, with all the organizational components that were otherwise force-fed on detachment commanders, it didn’t leave a lot of room for us on the plate to add the customized pieces the community was looking for. So, this in my opinion, is a step in right direction.”

The new plan includes raising more awareness of different issues, providing additional training for officers, creating mental health toolkits for officers, and cultivating confidential informants to combat property crime and drug trafficking. The plan's objectives came from several sources, including trends and statistics, information from police records and public response to the annual policing priorities survey conducted in February.

“We’ve been working very closely with the RCMP and we’re pleased with the direction they are taking,” said Kris Wells, chair of the policing committee. “It reflects the survey and the conversations we had with stakeholders. It’s different from previous years and it’s a necessary shift in engaging current issues and trends. For instance, domestic violence has become a disturbing trend and the impact of the pandemic has had taken a toll on the health of seniors and affected youth.” 

Domestic violence 

Comaniuk cites domestic violence as his top priority. His concerns are based on a sharp uptick of calls. During the 2018 calendar year, the RCMP received 71 calls for service that fell under the Mental Health Act; by 2020, the calls had more than doubled to 162. 

The detachment commander plans to tackle this trend head-on in part because it is complex, time-consuming and expensive on many levels. In addition, domestic violence is dangerous to all parties. Officers never know exactly the volatility of a situation when answering a call. 

“We need to raise awareness. We really want people to come forward when they’re involved in these types of relationships. It’s hard to measure, but there seems to be a bit of a gap with domestic violence reporting. I’ve heard it can take eight, 10, 12 times before a victim will come forward and talk to the police or someone in the community so ... we can investigate it and break the cycle,” Comaniuk said. 

One recent step in this battle was Alberta’s newly passed Bill 17, also known as Clare's Law, which allows individuals at risk of domestic violence to access their partner’s criminal records to find out if their partner was abusive or violent in the past. 

“We’re aware that legislation is in place and we’re making sure we’re meeting the needs of the community when clients come in and say, ‘I’d really like to consider my options,” said Comaniuk. 

“At this point, we don’t know how we’re going to facilitate that. At some point we will reach out to the vulnerable community, either virtually or through a different media outlet. I know the media has covered the legislation, but I think it’s important, and the policing committee would agree with me on this – we need to be consistent with our message so the right people can get the information they need.” 

Mental health and vulnerable communities 

Within the general St. Albert community, there are numerous sub-communities of seniors, youth, vulnerable populations and individuals with mental health issues that need targeted and specialized assistance. 

Seniors are not only dealing with COVID-19 anxiety, there is also a great deal of concern about cyber crime, phone scams and email scams. 

“These activities have doubled, even quadrupled in the last year and a half. Criminals are becoming more and more creative with their methods in trying to defraud seniors. And it’s not just seniors. They don’t discriminate. If they can get money from anyone, they will. Seniors are more vulnerable than other demographics so that really resonates with me," Comaniuk said.

The city’s youth are another sub-community that conveyed their concerns on vaping and DARE, a program that aims to prevent the use of drug use, however fails to deal with current issues. 

“I had good dialogues with them. They were really frank and candid conversations. There’s nothing better than listening to teenagers tell me their program (DARE) was crap. And I’m like, ‘Bring it on. You kids have your perceptions and view and I don’t want to shy away from it.'” 

Comaniuk cites not only COVID-19, but the ongoing provincial jobless rate that puts pressure on families, spouses, children and the elderly, and eventually “the pot boils over and police are called.” 

“COVID only amplifies the situation. A person may have had mild depression a year ago, but is now in full-blown chronic depression that is difficult to treat with prescription drugs. It’s difficult getting counselling so people are dealing with mental health issues and it isn’t getting any better. If anything they are getting worse. And it has a direct impact on emergency services, not just the police.” 

To deal with that, more officer training is planned and another progressive aid is the creation of mental health toolkits. The kits were originally adapted in the United States but numerous Canadian police are also rolling them out. 

“It contains information and recipes for emergency front line responders. It also has items that can comfort someone in a mental health crisis. There are things that an officer can give to a person having a mental health episode. It’s cutting edge.” 

Crime reduction 

The focus for reducing property and drug-related crimes is to take proactive measures.

Comaniuk plans to increase police visibility through proactive patrols and heighten the Crime Reduction Unit’s (CRU) efforts in targeting repeat offenders committing crimes. Part of the CRU’s push is to collaborate with parole and probation services to identify offenders in the community. 

He's also moving to recruit more confidential informants. 

“I come from an intel background. My view in crime reduction is that if you want to be effective you need to be intelligence driven. To put that in context, if you know in advance before a crime appears, or if you know when certain individuals will become active, whether it be property crime of drug trafficking, you have the ability to get out in front of it. Part of being an intelligence led organization is to cultivate intelligence. The only way to cultivate intelligence is to cultivate confidential informants." 

Will the detachment reach its targets? 

Comaniuk responded candidly saying, “I think we’re going to break some new ground. I think we’ll look back in a year and say, ‘Holy, man. We took on a lot. But we did good. We learned a lot and we’re going to make some adjustments.’ It’s an ambitious plan, but it’s a living plan and fortunately we have the ability to make adjustments.”

push icon
Be the first to read breaking stories. Enable push notifications on your device. Disable anytime.
No thanks