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The AIH Transcript for August 10, 2018

Hosts: Carol Off and Jeff Douglas

Prologue

MATT GALLOWAY: Hello, I'm Matt Galloway, sitting in for Carol Off.

JEFF DOUGLAS: Good evening, I'm Jeff Douglass. This is “As It Happens”.

[Music: Theme]

JD: Tonight:

MG: Darkest just after the dawn. The city of Fredericton New Brunswick is in grief and disbelief, after an early-morning shooting at least four people dead — two of them local police officers.

JD: Shocked awake. Brett Gibbons lives next door to the site of today's shooting. And he'll tell us how he peered through a crack in his door to see the last thing he expected first thing in the morning.

MG: Working wounded. The president of the Canadian Police Association pays tribute to the officers killed today. A terrible reminder of how the job could turn dangerous more deadly without warning.

JD: They won't be nude models, but his subjects will be bear. Our guest won the lottery to take part in next month's grizzly bear hunt in Wyoming. But instead of a trophy, all he plans to take are photographs.

MG: Boy meets squirrel, boy can't lose squirrel. And when the adorable baby rodent continues to follow a German man, he does what any soft-hearted person being tailed by something tailed would do: he calls the police.

JD: And… you may not know his name, but his hand rings a bell. But his other hand is empty right now. And an Ontario town crier is asking for help finding the deeply significant talking stick someone stole from him.

JD: “As It Happens”, the Friday edition. Radio that hopes he will once again speak loudly… and carry a big stick.

[Music: Theme]

Part one: New Brunswick shooting: witness/premier, grizzly bear tags photographer

New Brunswick shooting: Witness

Guest: Brett Gibbons

JD: For residents of a Fredericton apartment complex, the scene outside their units this morning was surreal, and petrifying. It began with gunfire, and then, a suspect exchanging gunfire with police. The shooting in the city's north end left four people dead — including two Fredericton police officers. A 48-year-old man from Fredericton is now in custody, and being treated for serious injuries. Leanne Fitch is the city's Police Chief. Here's what she said earlier today.

SOUNDCLIP

LEANNE FITCH: It's been a very difficult day for our officers and residents of our fine city. As we come to terms with the violent deaths of four of our people in our city — two of which, as you know, are officers. It's one of the most difficult tasks to inform you of the identities of the two fallen officers that we lost this morning in the line of duty. 45-year-old Lawrence Robert Costello, a 20 year veteran of the Fredericton police force. He has worked on various teams throughout his career. And he leaves behind his partner and four children. 43-year-old Sara Mae Burns has been on the force for two years, and served as an auxiliary officer for two years prior to that. She leaves behind her husband and three children.

JD: Chief Leanne Fitch of the Fredericton Police. Brett Gibbons's family lives right next door to the apartment complex, where the gunfire erupted this morning. We reached Mr. Gibbons in Fredericton.

MG: Brett, describe when you realized this morning that something was happening outside your building?

BRETT GIBBONS: It was unbelievable honestly. I didn't believe it first. It just happened so fast. There was just police everywhere. I didn't know what was going on, and then just progressively got crazier.

MG: What did you hear? You're sound asleep when all of this started off, right?

BG: Yeah, I was sleeping on the couch actually, and then I just heard what sounds like eight gunshot went off — loud as could be. Just like a hammer. Now it's just like drilled in my head like just like a hammer like right by my ear. Just the loudest sound I’ve ever heard. And then that was it. But it sounded like a nail gun to me. At first I kind of thought well, what is it? And then I just laid there and waited for a sec to see if I could hear even a siren and I didn't hear anything. So then I just laid back down, and then boom, boom, boom it goes off again, and I'm up, and I'm like what is it? And then my father comes out and he goes Brett, there's something going on here. He heard people thing get down after the second gunshot.

MG: That's terrifying to wake up to — to hear that. Describe what your place looks like in terms of in relation to the complex where the shooting took place?

BG: It's basically a four building complex, but our building is the fifth one. It's off to the side a ways. Ours is directly diagonal from the shooter's window. We can literally see the window from our front door.

MG: And so this was happening essentially just right outside the place?

BG: Right outside our house. Right basically in our back yard.

MG: What happened then?

BG: We we're up, and we're looking around, and we see more police coming. And then after a while we see an armored vehicle pull into the courtyard. And the armored vehicle starts shooting into the windows with teargas.

MG: And how close away is that to you?

BG: Oh god, maybe 50 feet.

MG: 50 feet!

BG: I could throw a rock at them. I was that close.

MG: And so you could see from your window…

BG: Front door.

MG: Front door. They’re firing tear gas front door into the window where the shot seemed to be coming from?

BG: Yup.

MG: What happens then?

BG: They just to shoot into it. Everything's quiet at that point. There's just smoke rolling out, and then it's just quiet for a while. More police come in. We start seeing the police evacuating people from the building. And then finally they came to us, and then we left.

MG: How many shots do you figure you heard?

BG: I heard maybe 20, maybe 15.

MG: Once you realize what was going on I mean it sounds terrifying, were you frightened?

BG: Oh yeah. Well, see once it really set in, it was whenever the police shot into the window. Like I felt like I had the weirdest feeling I've ever felt my life was once the police shot into the window. I felt like I got shot. Instantly my whole body just went into shock, and I was so afraid that I was shot. And that I felt like I had to search my body to see did I get shot? What happened?

MG: You're that close that you could feel things?

BG: Oh yes, like once they shot like the bang like you could really feel like the vibration from it.

MG: When did you realize that four people had been shot dead, including two police officers?

BG: After we finally figured out what is going on, people were messaging me because they knew where I lived, and they asked if I was alright. And then they started letting me know what was going on and that four people have died.

MG: So as this was happening, you were getting messages from people outside, telling you a bit more about what was going on?

BG: Oh yeah, I heard so many rumors. I heard four; I heard seven. I really didn't know.

MG: This is a quiet neighbourhood.

BG: Very quiet.

MG: I mean to have something like this happen in your community. How does that make you feel?

BG: Awful. I literally grew up in this area. Like this is you know my childhood neighbourhood that now I forever have a scar on.

MG: We've reached you not at home. You're right now in an arena, right?

BG: Yup.

MG: Why are you there?

BG: Our whole street is on lockdown.

MG: I mean one of the other things that people are thinking about — because it wasn't so long ago and it wasn't so far away obviously — was the shooting of police officers in Moncton.

BG: Yeah.

MG: I mean that was just four years ago. What are the resonances of that in your mind given what you've gone through today?

BG: It's scary — very scary. Because like it's always seems to be somewhere else. It's always in a different city. But then when it's finally like at your front door, and that's what I was there for me. And then that really kind of made me realize how scary it was, and how real it was.

MG: When do you think it will really settle in what has happened in the city?

BG: See that's the thing is really I find I find just in the last hour it's getting more and more scary, and really settling in for me just the reality of it all. It just seems like it's just a bad thing that just happened and just went way out of control, and just craziness that didn't need to happen.

MG: Well, you’ve been through a lot. I'm glad you're okay. And I appreciate you talking to us.

BG: Thank you.

MG: Take care of yourself.

BG: Thank you.

MG: Bye bye.

BG: Bye.

JD: Brett Gibbons lives next door to where the shooting happened this morning. We reached Mr. Gibbons in Fredericton.

New Brunswick shooting: premier

Guest: Brian Gallant

JD: Brian Gallant is the premier of New Brunswick. We reached him also in Fredericton

MG: Premier Gallant, you have had a difficult day. How are you doing?

BRIAN GALLANT: Well, it's definitely a difficult day for all New Brunswickers. And like all of the people of our province, I'm deeply saddened to have heard of the four victims. Our thoughts go out to their families and their friends. Our thoughts go out to the Fredericton police force as well who lost two of their colleagues today. And our thoughts are also with all first responders. Today's a tragic event with really no reason to it. And it reminds us how first responders work very hard and sacrifice a lot, and some even give us the ultimate sacrifice to keep us safe.

MG: What have you learned about those two colleagues that they lost — Rob Costello and Sarah Burns?

BG: Well, I don't know them personally. What I will say is that our deputy premier, who is the MLA of the community in which this event happened, and also a former police officer, knew of them — if he didn't know them very well. Making it very difficult, of course, for him and many others I'm sure that knew these two individuals. When I was listening to reports, and just before I'd be interviewed, and people were talking about the families that these people left behind. It really hits home I mean to think that there's seven children that are going to be told that one of their parents are now gone — it may be more children — details of the other two victims have not been released. To think of that, it's just horrendous. And I know Canadians are thinking of the families and thinking of the community, and we appreciate it. But when you think of what those children may be going to be going through over the next few weeks, months, and even years. We all have to make sure that we're there to support them.

MG: One of the things we heard from eyewitnesses is that they were shocked by this because in many ways they felt that they lived in a safe community. When you learned about this, was that shock the same — that you couldn't imagine something like this happening in a city like Fredericton?

BG: There's no doubt that it was a shocking event to hear about. With that said, we're very proud of having safe communities and a safe province. But, even though we're a small province with small cities and small communities, we're not immune to these types of events. We were reminded of that, unfortunately, today, but also a few years ago when we had the shootings in Moncton. This is a reminder that across our country, these types of events can happen. So we need to make sure that we all work together to keep our communities, and ultimately, our families as safe as possible. And that's what we do here. But, unfortunately, there are events like this that will happen. And we'll make sure that we band together to grieve together, and through our resilience get through this together.

MG: I was going to say the mind automatically goes back to what happened in Moncton four years ago, when three police officers died. And I'm just wondering how the province came together and healed after that, and what you think that might offer in terms of people who are who are reeling and worse from today?

BG: Well, let me say this: I first want to answer that by saying that we recognize that every event is different. The impacts to the community, the impacts to the individuals can be different, but there can certainly be some commonalities. So we'll do everything that we can learn from what happened with these shootings in Monkton, and the grieving process, and how the community and the families were able to get through it. And make sure that anything that can apply in this situation that we do it. But I don't want to say that they're exactly the same events because no situation really is. But I will say that I felt it personally. My wife and I talked about it very quickly before I came to the capital. So I can only assume many families across the province felt the same way. There is a heightened sense I think in New Brunswick of the stress that would be added on top of, of course, the terrible event itself when we don't have the suspect apprehended. One of the things that was very difficult for the community last time was it did, during the Monkton shootings, take some time to have the suspect apprehended. That uncertainty caused much additional stress for the province. There were rumors of the suspect being in certain communities across the province. Effectively Monkton was shut down — locked down. And other communities felt very much as if the suspect could be near them. So that uncertainty I think was yet another level of stress that the whole province went through. So I think that the moments where we heard of the shootings but the suspect was not yet apprehended, a lot of people's minds went to that — because our province not very long ago went through a very difficult time together when we had that uncertainty. So when the Fredericton Police Force apprehended the suspect, I think there was certainly a sigh of relief from all the communities in our province to say OK, we're not going to go that uncertainty again. And then obviously we continue to mourn with those that we've lost and continue to offer our support to them.

MG: It's been a long and difficult day for you and for your province, Premier. I appreciate you speaking with us today. Thank you.

BG: Thank you very much for your time.

MG: Bye now.

BG: Bye bye.

JD: Brian Gallant is the premier of New Brunswick. We reached him in Fredericton. We'll have more coverage of the Fredericton shooting, coming up on this program. You can find all of these interviews on our website: www.cbc.ca/aih.

[Music: Horns]

Margret Lawrence plaque

JD: Margaret Laurence was one of Canada's greatest writers, best-known, of course, for "The Stone Angel", although, in the 1980s, religious groups did attempt to ban her books from schools, calling them blasphemous. In the long run, that didn't work. Today, the late Ms. Laurence was recognized as a Canadian of Historic Significance. Parks Canada placed a plaque at her childhood home in Neepawa, Manitoba. In 1984, Margaret Laurence was a guest on this program — and she explained to our former host Elizabeth Gray who she would like to be — and why.

SOUNDCLIP

ELIZABETH GRAY: Margaret Lawrence, who is the person you'd like to be?

MARGRET LAWRENCE: I think it would be a Metis woman called Madeleine Wilkie.

EG: who is she?

ML: Well, she was a fantastic person. She was the wife of Gabriel Dumont, the great buffalo hunter and the leader of the South Saskatchewan Metis. And he was Louis Riels right-hand man.

EG: Well both of them are well-known, but she isn't. Tell us about her?

ML: Well, we don't even know what she looked like. If she ever had her photo taken, it hasn’t survived. She married Dumont in 1858. And for many years, when Gabriel's duties didn't permit him to leave Saskatchewan, she made the long trip to the Hudson Bay post at the junction of the Red and Assiniboine Rivers to sell the haul of furs and hides. And she would be accompanied by a few Metis men, but she was the only woman. For a while they prospered. But in 1884 when Riel returned to Canada with his wife and family, Madeleine took them in and looked after them. And at the Battle of Batoche the battle in the spring of ’85, Madeleine tended the wounded in her own home. And when Gabriel had to choose between staying and dying on the scaffold with Riel or going to the USA and keeping on protesting and fighting, Madeleine urged him to go on living, which he did of course. I don't know if I'd really have to be her, but I certainly would have liked to possess her courage and her steadfastness.

JD: Former “As It Happens” host Elizabeth Gray, in conversation with Canadian author Margaret Laurence. Today, Parks Canada installed a plaque at Ms. Laurence's childhood home — honouring her as a Canadian of Historic Significance.

[Music: Piano]

Grizzly bear tags photographer

Guest: Thomas Mangelson

JD: Like 7,000 other people, Thomas Mangelson really, really wanted to be one of the winners in Wyoming's grizzly-bear lottery. Next month, the state is holding the biggest grizzly hunt ever in the mainland US. A very limited number of hunters will have a chance to kill up to 22 of the rare bears. But to do so, they have to have their names drawn in a lottery. Against extremely long odds, Mr. Mangelson's name was selected. And he's overjoyed about it — despite, or rather, because of the fact that he'll never take a shot with anything other than his camera. We reached Thomas Mangelson at his home in Jackson Hole.

MG: Mr. Mangelson, you have the opportunity to bag yourself a grizzly bear. This is something that a lot of hunters have tried to get that chance to do. You have no intention though of killing a grizzly bear. Tell us why?

THOMAS MANGELSON: Well, I’ve watched grizzly bears for most of my adult life from Alaska, to British Columbia, to greater Yellowstone, and have learned to pretty much fall in love with bears. I love bears. I see how smart they are. How intelligent, sentient, and emotional they can be you know having cubs and losing cubs and all that. So I just think it's a crime to kill something that is that intelligent and has the same kind of emotions that we do.

MG: And so given that, why did you put your name into a draw to get a permit that would allow you to shoot a grizzly bear?

TM: Well, basically to somewhat I suppose foil the process. They only let one person in the field per day, and then you have ten days to, quote, “bag a grizzly”. But there's nothing to say that you'd have to shoot a grizzly with a gun. So it's a way of delaying for a period of ten days anybody being on the hill shooting a grizzly bear.

MG: So you get that number, and somebody who might want to, as you say, shoot the grizzly bear not with the camera, but with a gun is pushed back in the queue?

TM: That's exactly right. And that season starts September 15th and goes to the middle of November, so maybe we might save a bear. Who knows?

MG: Why is Wyoming allowing people to hunt grizzly bears now?

TM: They're pushed by the hunters. The outliers can make a lot of money — maybe 5,000-10,000 dollars, maybe more — leading a trip to kill a bear. And, unfortunately, The Wyoming Game and Fish Department, the governor, and the legislature, and the game commission want to provide hunting opportunities for what they called their constituents, and that's what they're mandated to do. So it kind of comes down to that.

MG: The hunters have been saying that the grizzly bears in some areas are too populous and too assertive. You know these bears well, tell us is that the case? Are there too many bears in some of these areas?

TM: No, there's not too many bears. There are a number of bear scientists who have written lots of papers that there's a lot of habitat that's not filled by grizzly bears that would be really good habitat, and places that they could go without getting into any human areas. But yes, of course, once in a while a bear we'll get near humans and maybe cause problems. If that's the case, then you take out that bear, and move it, hopefully, physically, and not kill it. And move it to some wilderness area — forest area — where it’s not going to get into trouble. You know once in a while they’ll come back, and if they’re a problem, then maybe you have to do something else. But that doesn't mean you have to open season and kill 22 grizzlies for fun or for sport, as they call it. Or harvest them. There’s something like 700 now, but they're not exploding. The population is now basically leveled off.

MG: One of the guides who presumably will be leading hunters out in this hunt has said that what you're doing is like being Monday morning quarterbacked by people who don't have a clue what's really happening on the ground. What's the reaction been like from hunters to what you're doing?

TM: Well, I’ve had one death threat a couple of ugly hate responses. But there's been a really outpouring of sort of congratulatory comments from the normal, average person in Jackson Hole.

MG: But a death threat!

TM: Yeah, but you know people like say I don't have a clue or Monday morning quarterbacking. I mean I spent 40 years observing bears. And if these people would spend three days observing bears, you know without hunting them, they would probably not want to shoot a bear either. I mean there's a lot of hunters that don’t want to shoot bears. They realize it's an important you know carnivore of the landscape. And it has a place — it's at an apex predator like cougars are and bulls are for that matter. And it’s taken from 1975 to this year you know to get the population a bit up. And they’re taken off the endangered species list. One year they are on the endangered species list; the next year they’re hunted. There's something wrong with that. So whoever mentioned that you know Monday morning quarterbacking that they need to actually go out and watch a bear — spend time with it and watch its cubs.

MG: If your number comes, up what are you going to do?

TM: I'll just go out and look for bears, and photograph them, and do like I do every fall.

MG: And you’re not worried about the threats from the hunters or what other people might say who are who are waiting on that list not to take a picture but to bag themselves a bear?

TM: The public has a right to see those bears. I had a school group of 40 kids that were from Kansas, and you know they were thrilled to see a grizzly bear. And their teacher said oh, this might be the only bear these kids will ever get to see. So if a hunter bags that bear and puts it on this wall, all those people, all those kids, all those millions of people will be robbed of that experience for one person who gets put the head on the wall. And so the hunters think they put money into buy licenses it gives them a pre-emptive right to kill a bear are quite wrong.

MG: Thomas Mangelson, we'll leave it there. Good luck. I appreciate you talking to us today. Thank you.

TM: You're welcome. Thank you for calling.

JD: Thomas Mangelson is a nature photographer and a conservationist. We reached him in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. And you can see some of Mr. Mangelson’s work on our website: www.cbc.ca/aih.

[Music: Indie rock]

German squirrel attack

JD: In their last update on the suspect's state, German police said he'd fallen asleep. They also helpfully provided his name: Karl-Friedrich. I don't mean they gave us the name they found on his driver's license or something. I mean they provided him a name, because he didn't have one before, because he's just a baby, and because he’s a squirrel. Karl-Friedrich was taken into custody after police in the city of Karlsruhe received a panicked call from a man whose name was not been provided. He informed the dispatcher that Karl-Friedrich — who at that point had no name, being, as I mentioned, a tiny squirrel — was chasing him down the street. Immediately, a police car was sent to the scene. I'm guessing they didn't use the siren. And when the officers rushed over, after they took a minute to find someplace to park, and maybe had a sip of water, and finished whatever conversation they were having, they discovered that Karl-Friedrich was still in hot pursuit of the unnamed victim — or warm, cuddly pursuit. Who knows how long this game of cat-and-mouse between baby-squirrel-and-man would have gone on, had the police not been contacted? Well, I do actually: not very long. Baby squirrels get tired. Which Karl-Friedrich did: in a statement from the Karlsruhe police, they say, quote, "the squirrel has fallen asleep in fright." Which is much better than the version I got from Google Translate, which reads, quote, "The squirrel has fallen asleep because of the horror." Unquote. Anyway, Karl-Friedrich is recovering from the horror at an animal rescue centre. And I assume the man he was persistently following has already recovered — possibly after a stiff drink — straight, no chaser. Not even a little one.

[Music: Fiddle]

Part two: New Brunswick shooting: police, Emmett Till sign, Ottawa town crier

New Brunswick shooting: police

Guest: Tom Stamatakis

JD: When the gunshots rang out in Fredericton, New Brunswick this morning, at first, some witnesses did not know what the bangs were:

WITNESS: THREE: Went around out back because they were out back, and there's two cops laying there that were I believe deceased on the ground. And there was one deceased civilian. I tried to help them bring one in the truck, but they couldn't get him in. He was too heavy. So we just evacuated the building and came over here

REPORTER: How are you doing?

WITNESS THREE: I don't know. Right now, I'm just very startled. Very, very startled.

JD: Those are witnesses to this morning's shooting in Fredericton, describing what they saw and what they heard. As you heard there, Two Fredericton police officers were killed in the shooting this morning: Lawrence Robert Costello and Sara Burns. The two other victims have not yet been named. These deaths come just four years after three RCMP officers were shot dead in Moncton. Tom Stamatakis is the President of the Canadian Police Association. We reached him in Vancouver.

MG: Tom Stamatakis, what went through your mind when you heard about this morning shooting in Fredericton?

TOM STAMATAKIS: Well, sadly having been through it before, I'm always initially shocked that it's even happened. I then obviously you know devastated that it's occurred, and immediately thinking of the impact on the families and loved ones, not just of the police officers who were killed, but I understand there are two innocent civilian deaths as well. And then the broader community who will also feel the impact of losing not just two police officers in this case, but like I said, two innocent civilians.

MG: I want to ask you about that impact in just a moment. But the reports that we're getting in — and this is all early obviously — but the reports that we're getting are that the officers who were shot were attempting to get to victims who had already been hit. How do police prepare for walking into a situation like that?

TS: You know there's a significant amount of training. We try and equip police officers across this country with the right equipment. You know there's a lot of knowledge that's transferred to them right from the recruiting process, then on an ongoing basis through in-service training. But the reality is that you can never be completely prepared. Our officers are responding to incidents on a daily basis where they often know very little about what they're what they're getting into. They have little or no control over the environment that they're responding to or having to work within. And then anytime as a police officer — and for any first responder for that matter — when you show up at a scene and someone's hurt, your initial and instinctual reaction is to go in and try and help. Unfortunately, often when you do that, that's when you expose yourself to more risk. And, in this case, obviously if those are the circumstances that led to the tragic death of two officers who no doubt made a significant contribution to the community there.

MG: But as you say I mean all the training that you can have doesn't prepare you for a situation if you're going in to help and shots are coming at you.

TS: No, and that's the challenge with policing is you know the incidents that we respond to happen unexpectedly, and there's no set playbook. So every incident is different. And as much as you try and prepare or mitigate the risk, you can never anticipate how something is going to unfold or how another person is going to respond, whether it's to the police presence. You don't know what kind of crises a person might be in that’s committing these kinds of heinous crimes. It's one of those things that you hope never happens. But, unfortunately, it does happen.

MG: How similar does this to you look to this shooting that happened in Moncton four years ago, when three officers were shot and killed?

TS: Well, I don't know all the circumstances of this incident yet. I mean it's still unfolding, and we're getting information over the last few hours. But certainly there are similarities, and they’re the kinds of things that I have talked about.

MG: What specifically what are the similarities that you see, even at this exit?

TS: Well listen, there's no doubt the police officers in this case when they went to work last night or this morning, they weren’t anticipating being involved in this incident. And for sure we know that in Monkton, that was exactly the same case. They showed up to work like they do every day, anticipating that they would be you know responding to calls, interacting with people in the community, and I'm almost a hundred per cent sure that they weren't anticipating that they'd be involved in an incident that would result in the tragic loss of their lives. And that's ultimately in the aftermath of an incident like this the kind of self-reflection that does occur because police officers when they go to work do expect to finish their shift and go home to their loved ones. They don't expect you know whatever they're responding to is going to turn into a tragedy.

MG: The city needs to be policed — and we'll need to be policed in the days and weeks following the shooting — how will officers go back to work tomorrow?

TS: It will be tough. You know there are going to be lots of emotions. People are going to be devastated. There will be relationships that will no doubt be affected. People will feel like you know they could have done more to help, or you know something could have been done differently. That's only natural in the aftermath of something like this.

MG: You're an officer yourself. I mean how does something like this affect you personally?

TS: You know yeah, it always has an effect. You know you feel the loss because it is a community that interacts with each other frequently. You know we all attend training conferences and other events that occur across the country. You know I know and will have interacted with police officers from Fredericton. So it does feel like a loss of someone you know, in some ways a family member because of how close the community is. And you know we'll rally around and try and offer support to the service, but also to the families of the officers that were killed tragically. And the police community generally is very resilient, and will continue to serve citizens right across the country. But it is tough. It’s a tough day any time something like this happens. And it really causes a bit of self-reflection. And you start to think about how vulnerable you can be at times. But you know you move on and try and move on with the right kinds of support so that you can move on in a healthy way.

MG: Difficult day for people in your profession. Mr. Stamatakis, we'll leave it there. I appreciate you speaking with us today. Thank you.

TS: You're welcome.

MG: Bye now.

JD: Tom Stamatakis is the President of the Canadian Police Association. We reached him in Vancouver.

[Music: Ambient]

Emmett Till sign

Guest: Kevin Wilson Junior

JD: Emmett Till was a 14-year-old boy. He was dragged from his bed in the night, he was tortured, and he was killed, and then he was dumped in a river. And in 1955, his death galvanized the civil rights movement. Now, more than 60 years after his murder, signs marking the spot where his body was recovered in Mississippi have been repeatedly vandalized. Most recently at the end of last month. Kevin Wilson Junior. is the filmmaker behind the short film “My Nephew Emmett”. He has alerted authorities to past vandalism at the site. We reached Mr. Wilson in New York City.

MG: Kevin Wilson Junior, how did it feel to hear that this sign had been defaced what just 35 days after it replaced another sign that had been shot up?

KEVIN WILSON JUNIOR: Yeah, it was quite frustrating to me. As I had actually been the one who found the sign had been shot back in 2016, when I was on a location scout for a film in the area about Emmet Till. We'd visited various monuments in the area as it related to Emmett Till. And we found the sign had been shot up, and was riddled with about 50 bullet holes. So I took a photograph of it, and posted it online. It made folks aware of what happened. And then Patrick Wiens of the Emmett Till Interpretive Center down there and got in touch with me, and they started raising funds to have the sign replaced. You know the sign and I found it had actually been the second time it had been shot up. So they raised the money to have it replaced and now he's been shot at again. And really it's disrespectful to Emmett Till's legacy — to his memory — and also, to the folks who gave of their hard-earned money to keep his legacy alive. So it's been quite frustrating to say the least.

MG: At the top of the sign it says “River site”. Tell me about the location of the sign, and why that is so significant in the story of Emmett Till?

KWJ: This site marks the location where Emmett Till's body was found floating in the Tallahatchie River. In 1955, J.W. Milam and Roy Bryant abducted Emmett Till from his uncle's home in the middle of the night. They tortured him all night, shot him, and then dumped him in the river. There was someone fishing at this location when Emmett Till's body washed ashore. So this sign signifies the exact location where his body was found. So it's a really sacred place because, as folks know, and others should know, Emmett Till's murder, and the subsequent acquittal of J.W. Milam and Roy Bryant galvanized the American civil rights movement. So this sign and others in the area are very critical to the conversation about freedom, equality, justice, and American history.

MG: Why do people keep shooting at this sign?

KWJ: You know I can only speculate why it's happening. I think that there’s still attitude there in Mississippi — and then, of course, across this country — toward African-Americans, and toward minorities, and people of colour. You know that exist. You know that existed hundreds of years ago, and, of course, during that time when Emmett Till was murdered. When I found the sign the first time back in 2016, there were folks who said oh, you know that's what they do in the country: they shoot up signs. It had nothing to do with it Emmet Till. But then my rebuttal to that was that myself and my partners in my filmmaking endeavor visited a number of signs, a number of markers in that area, and Emmett Till’s sign had been the only one that had been shot. There were other signs marking where J.W. Milam, one of Emmett Till's murders, lived. There’, stop signs and all kinds of billboards and things in the area that hadn’t been shot up. So I think it's very specific to Emmett Till. There’s some a racial motivation involved with that.

MG: How do people feel in Mississippi about remembering the story of Emmett Till?

KWJ: You know contrary to what I thought folks would feel, there are a lot of people there who were very much moved by his story, and who are supportive of what we're trying to do. And so a lot of people that I came across down the Greenwood and Muddy Mississippi area were very helpful. You know there were those, of course, who you could tell had you know different attitudes about Emmett. So there was one gentleman actually I was speaking with who said well, you know Emmett Till did more than just whistle at Carolyn Bryant, as if he had done anything to deserve being tortured and murdered.

MG: This is the white woman that Emmett Till was alleged to be with, which led to his murder?

KWJ: Yeah, Carolyn Bryant. So there are still folks who feel that his death may have been justified. So there's a handful of those folks who are still there. You know I think that there's the potential to bring about change, especially in that area. But we have to, again, I don't mean to get too political, but we can't have leaders of this of this country emboldening the white supremacist. You know we have that type of leadership. You know that just makes the conversation that much harder to have.

MG: Do you see a connection between that? Between, as you say, leadership that is emboldening white supremacists, and people putting 100 bullets into a sign remembering Emmett Till?

KWJ: Absolutely. Absolutely, I think you know the sympathies that President Trump has for white supremacy, and those sympathies have been made evident by his own words, have given those folks a sense of comfort. You know it's gonna be hard to get past this. I think we may end up seeing a lot more of it. And what I do hope is that as a release this time in particular, there's some type of security measure taken there — video cameras or something. You know I hope the federal government gets involved. I hope it becomes a federal historic site, so that it's a federal crime to vandalize this site. It has to change. It absolutely cannot continue to happen. It's more than just a bullet hole and someone shooting up a sign. They're really making a loud statement about how they feel about African-Americans, and it’s speaking loudly. So we have to take measures to ensure that can't continue to happen.

MG: Kevin, it's good to speak with you about this. I appreciate it. Thank you so much.

KWJ: No problem. Thank you so much. Thank you.

MG: Bye now.

JD: That was filmmaker Kevin Wilson Junior. He's in New York City. And we've posted more on this story on our website.

[Music: Electronic]

Ottawa town crier

Guest: Daniel Richer

JD: For thirty-seven years, Daniel Richer has been a town crier in Ontario. He's introduced Prime Ministers, foreign dignitaries, rock stars. And as a First Nations master of ceremonies, he doesn't just use the standard town-crier bell — he also uses traditional instruments, including what's called a "talking stick". That stick has travelled all over the world with him. And over the years, it's been mended and amended by people near and dear to him. People like his grandmother who added a wolf pelt to it. Yesterday, someone walked off with that talking stick. We reached Daniel Richer in Ottawa.

MG: Mr. Richer, when did you realize that your talking stick had gone missing?

DANIEL RICHER: Well, we were shooting a TV show for TFO, and so we were going to different places and different locations. And when we got back to the vehicle — time to transfer everything to my car — we realized that the talking stick was missing. So we immediately went back to where the last time we'd seen it, and it was gone.

MG: And how did you react?

DR: Cold sweat. I just couldn't believe it. It's such an important piece to me that I would be so careless with it.

MG: What did you do upon realizing that it wasn't there? I mean often if we lose things, we’ll start scrambling around trying to figure out where it could have been. Maybe it was packed into a different space. What did you immediately do?

DR: Well, I phoned a few places, and then I phoned the police. But, unfortunately, the police don't take a report unless there's a serial number, which is to me very hard to understand. I mean if you lost the Mona Lisa, you wouldn't expect the serial number on it. And this is such a unique piece. I mean there's no two piece alike, and I have a complete description of it, I have pictures of it, but they still wouldn’t take a report.

MG: Well, describe the talking stick to us?

DR: It’s a Salish talking stick, so it’s in the Salish style. So it’s cedar. It's about six-and-a-half-feet long. It has the thunderbird at the top. There's also a whale, and a raven, and a bear. The bear has faces in its paws because it's a female bear, so those are babies about to be born. There's four moons that represent the four directions. And there's a face that represents man looking forward to a good life.

MG: How long have you had it?

DR: I've had it since 2006. It's an important piece for many reasons. First of all, it represents the Salish People. It was given about ten years prior to that to Bert Stevens. Bert Stevens was the town crier for Sidney, B.C. And he was a very special crier because he was blind. And so he read his proclamations from Braille or from someone whispering in his ear. And when he knew he got near the end of his trip as a town crier, he had an international championships, and I won. And he gave me the stick as part of his gift from him to me, but also with permission of the Salish people so that I would keep on representing them also when we travel around the world the great culture.

MG: And what did it mean for you to have that stick?

DR: Well, to me, it was a great occasion to talk about First Nation to people in general — not only abroad, but here. you know when you're doing the European town crier, you use a bell, you use a drum, you've hit people with sounds so that they'll stop talking.

MG: That hear ye, hear ye kind of thing?

DR: Oh yeah. Hear ye is American, but with the talking stick, you make no sound. it's just a question of respect. And it's all in softness, it's all in purity, it's a message from the heart to the heart. So people are always amazed that I get as much attention as much quiet with the talking stick — if not more — than I do with my bell.

MG: Tell me more about that. How does the talking stick work, and how would you, as you say, get more attention than you would with a bell?

DR: You know when you ring a bell, you ring a bell. There are twenty thousand ways of ringing a bell, but a talking stick is very unique. First of all, you raise it with your left hand because it's the side of the heart. And you have faith that the people will respect the symbol, and they do. There was actually a big event, and we were invited on stage, and I was asked to do a proclamation. And rather than using a bell as I was offered to do, I used the talking stick, and the whole street went quiet because word got around, and because people respect it.

MG: What have your days been like since this stick went missing?

DR: I sort of figured that that park there are a lot of homeless people, unfortunately. And one of them might have picked it up. It's not an evil thought on my part. You see something a bag that's left there and nobody around it you will pick it up. And the problem is what do you do with it once you've gotten it? So I figured that if it's homeless people, they don't have a phone to phone me, and they don't know where to drop it off. So I've been I've been phoning different venues where I know that homeless people go to. I’ve been passing the word on social media. And I'm just hoping I have faith.

MG: Is that why you're reluctant to say that the stick was stolen?

DR: Yes, because this talking stick, to me, has such power that I have faith that it will come back. That it will encourage people to do the right thing.

MG: If it doesn't come back — and I hope it does — but if it doesn't come back, what happens to you as the town crier?

DR: Well, I'm still a town crier, and I guess I go looking for another talking stick. But I've had bells stolen, I've had tricornes stolen, and I've never made a big thing of it because you know you can replace a bell; you can replace a tricorne. But a talking stick this unique is what it’s worth to me., and what it brings to the people that I meet. That cannot be replaced.

MG: I hope the person who has it brings it back to you, and I hope that the stick is returned.

DR: I hope so too.

MG: Mr. Richer, thank you. Good luck.

DR: Miigwich.

JD: Daniel Richer is the longtime town crier for the National Capital Region. We reached him in Ottawa.

August 10, 2018 episode transcript

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