Nunavik police frightened by illegal weapons

KUUJJUAQ — Though an epidemic of sawed-off shot guns in Puvirnituq is making unarmed police offers there extremely nervous, but the Kativik Police Force isn’t moving ahead with a plan to provide Nunavik’s cops with sidearms.

“It’s a touchy subject,” said KRPF chief Brian Jones.

In June, the Kativik Regional Government was supposed to decide whether to supply every member of its police force with sidearms to replace the shotguns that KRPF members now keep for emergency use only.

But the activities of a gun-happy cop in Puvirnituq apparently side-tracked the plan to arm police in Nunavik. In August, this constable, who has since been fired, borrowed a KRPF shotgun to go on an illegal caribou-killing spree.

When the KRG held its regional council meeting last week in Kuujjuaq, no one even brought up the issue of authorizing sidearms for police — despite the growing unease of many constables in the region.

Last year, 254 illegal firearms were confiscated in Nunavik, some with sawed-off barrel stocks and modified firing pins.

During the past 30 days alone, police have confiscated three sawed-off shot-guns in Puvirnituq.

One armed man in Puvirnituq was apparently intending to shoot his girlfriend when he was stopped by police.

Police also seized a .22-calibre rifle and 131 rounds of expanding hollow-point bullets. According to Lieutenant Al Patterson in Puvirnituq, this kind of ammunition is used “basically for shooting people.”

Hollow-point bullets leave a small entry point, but, on exiting, they leave a fist-sized flesh wound.

“They’re done up as if they’re going for a gang-bang down south,” said Patterson of the gun-toters and their weapons.

Patterson said that he and the other constables in Puvirnituq now wear bullet-proof vests at work.

“It’s pretty tense here,” Patterson said.

In his opinion, something is happening in Puvirnituq to triple the number of criminal offenses that were recorded by police in the community during the same time period in 1997.

Patterson believes that the types of drugs coming into the community may be responsible for this change. He suspects that the new drugs are probably LSD and PCP.

“The violence we have seen is indicative of these drugs,” Patterson said. “And more and more drug dealers are going for the young kids.”

But the police aren’t sure who’s bringing the drugs into the community.

“We’re not getting the information we need. They’re not telling us who’s supplying it. There are 1300 people in this place and it could be any one of them,” Patterson said.

KRPF chief Jones admits that there’s a growing crime problem in Puvirnituq. But he wants to focus on crime prevention rather than guns.

“We can take away the guns, but that’s just part of the problem,” Jones said.

Jones wants to get all the community organizations to work together on improving the situation. The KRPF has also developed an in-school program on police and drug-related issues that will be introduced at Kuujjuaq’s Jaanimmarik School in October.

At a recent meeting in Kuujjuaq, the KRPF released some statistics on drugs seized over the past few months. “Kakivak,” a joint operation by KRPF and Quebec’s provincial police, has netted nearly three kilos of hash destined for the Ungava Bay coast.

No seizures were reported for Hudson Bay communities, but Jones said that police had also confiscated a sizeable amount of drugs and illegal alcohol on that coast.