A 35-year-old Regina man is facing criminal charges following a July 7 incident in which police officers shot and injured him after he allegedly pointed a crossbow at them inside a home on Elphinstone Street. The man now faces two counts of assaulting a peace officer with a weapon and one count of uttering threats, with his first appearance in Regina provincial court scheduled for later this month.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
The sequence of events began when a youth called 911 at 2:11 a.m. CST to report that an adult male was intoxicated, firing a crossbow inside the residence, and punching holes in the wall. Officers arrived at the home, located in the 800 block of Elphinstone Street between Second and Third Avenues, by 2:14 a.m. and entered the building six minutes later. Inside, they located three people: an adult woman and a male youth were safely evacuated before the situation escalated into a confrontation with the 35-year-old man.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
During the altercation, police say the man pointed the crossbow directly at two responding officers, who then discharged their weapons and struck him. Officers immediately administered first aid on scene until paramedics arrived and transported the man to hospital. His injuries were described as serious but non-life-threatening, and a crossbow was recovered from the scene and retained as evidence.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Separately from the criminal proceedings against the man, the Saskatchewan Serious Incident Response Team \u2014 the province’s independent, civilian-led police oversight body \u2014 is conducting its own investigation into the officers’ use of force. SIRT has assigned seven investigators to examine the circumstances of the shooting. The agency is mandated under provincial legislation to investigate any death or serious injury involving a person in police custody or resulting from a police officer’s actions, and it operates independently from the Regina Police Service.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Notably, under a provision of Saskatchewan’s Police Act<\/em>, a community liaison of First Nations or M\u00e9tis ancestry must be appointed to assist in SIRT investigations where a person of First Nations or M\u00e9tis ancestry has been seriously injured or killed. The appointment of such a liaison in this case signals that the man shot by officers is of Indigenous ancestry, and reflects a legislated commitment to ensuring Indigenous communities have a formal role in oversight processes that directly affect their members. The crossbow recovered at the scene will serve as evidence in both the SIRT investigation and the Regina Police Service’s parallel review of the incident.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A 35-year-old Regina man is facing criminal charges following a July 7 incident in which police officers shot and injured him after he allegedly pointed a crossbow at them inside a home on Elphinstone Street. The man now faces two counts of assaulting a peace officer with a weapon and one count of uttering threats, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46,37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1280","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n