Yesterday’s News: Shooting death of RCMP officer rocks Nunavut

A single shotgun blast on a cold winter night. An RCMP officer dead. A gunman barricaded inside his home. Police outside, desperately trying to communicate with the suspect.

That was the scene in Kinngait on March 5, 2001, after Const. Jurgen Seewald, 47, responded to a report of a possibly armed man threatening a woman.

As Nunatsiaq News marks 50 years of covering Nunavut and Nunavik, we are looking back through some of our front pages from the past half century to revisit some of the important events of the day.

Today’s front page is from March 9, 2001.

As was reported, an altercation broke out between Seewald and the suspect. Seewald was shot once, in the body.

The other RCMP officer in the community quickly arrived. Seewald was taken to the local nursing station but died from his wound.

With the gunman barricaded inside his home, a 15-member RCMP containment team from Iqaluit was called to the hamlet, then known as Cape Dorset.

Inuktitut-speaking police negotiators tried to communicate with the suspect, the local radio station broadcast appeals for him to give himself up and nearby residents were ordered to remain indoors.

It ended peacefully after 16 hours when the suspect surrendered to police.

That chapter was closed, but it was just the start of a long story involving numerous court appearances and dramatic testimony.

During the trial, the suspect’s common-law partner testified that on the night of the altercation she had called police and the officer tried to subdue her partner using pepper spray.

The two men began wrestling toward the front door, where a shotgun was. The woman saw her partner holding the stock of the gun, the officer held onto the barrel.

A single shot rang out.

The woman said the suspect turned to her and said “I shot him,” then put on his jacket and walked past the dying officer to leave the apartment.

Const. Seewald had been a peacekeeper in the former Yugoslavia and a 26-year RCMP veteran. His wife and daughter wept in court as his killer was handed a life sentence in February 2004.

The case was finally closed in September 2009 when the Supreme Court rejected the suspect’s request for a new trial.

When it happened, Seewald’s passing was the first death of a police officer in the North in 25 years.

On a lighter note, the Stanley Cup made a stopover in Rankin Inlet. The front-page photo shows residents enjoying the rare opportunity of seeing hockey’s greatest prize up close.

A few months later, the Colorado Avalanche led by Patrick Roy and Joe Sakic went on to win the Stanley Cup for the 2000-2001 season.