Drug-related feuds among criminal groups behind recent shootings
Published on: July 21, 2015 | Last Updated: July 21, 2015 5:29 PM MDT, Source
Drug-related feuds involving groups of up to 100 young men are behind dozens of recent shootings, many in northeast Calgary.
So far this year, Calgary has seen 63 shooting events, which have claimed seven lives. Police said 25 of the shootings took place in District 5 in the northeast quadrant of the city.
In comparison, there were a total of 54 shooting incidents in all of 2014.
Staff Sgt. Quinn Jacques of the Calgary Police’s guns and gangs unit says the gunplay and potential risk to the public is “extremely concerning.”
“We have never before seen this kind of accessibility to and prevalence of guns in our community. Disputes over drugs are nothing new, but the use of guns to resolve these disputes has now become the rule instead of the exception,” Jacques told reporters Tuesday.
“Whether it’s during a break-in at a local residence where a registered weapon is stolen, at a smash and grab at a local gun shop, or being smuggled into the country, there is a troubling ease of acquiring guns in Calgary.”
However, investigators are still trying to pinpoint why so much of the violence is taking place in northeast Calgary, Jacques said, adding: “The connectivity to the northeast is one of those things we don’t have a good sense of.”
Most recently, a fatal shooting on July 11 in the 5300 block of Rundlehorn Drive N.E. in the community of Pineridge had residents on edge.
Steven Sharda, 20, was found shot to death in the driver’s side o
f a silver SUV parked in front of the Pineridge Greene apartment complex. A second man was found in the vehicle with gunshot wounds and taken to Foothills Hospital in critical condition.
No charges have been laid at this time.
Earlier this year, the guns and gangs unit said a number of shootings — including one in which a bullet shot through the front door of a busy Co-op grocery store on 52nd Street N.E. — were the result of “friction” among criminal groups.
Jacques said the vast majority of incidents are targeted attacks. About 60 per cent are drug-related, although the number could be higher as police have not determined a motive for 33 per cent of the shootings.
Unlike the violence between two gangs — the FOB and FOB Killers (FK) — that resulted in at least 25 homicides between 2002 and 2009, the most recent incidents involve individuals of different cultural backgrounds and walks of life who move between small unnamed criminal groups.
“When we talk about groups, they don’t have names, they don’t self-identify, and in this day and age, they don’t have a hierarchy or structure,” Jacques said, adding the members are very fluid, moving back and forth around the country.
“I can tell you that in my opinion or my best guess, there’s probably somewhere between 60 and 100 young men that are involved in this conflict.”
To combat the recent spate of violence, the guns and gangs unit, along with the gang enforcement and gang suppression teams and other members of the police service, both in uniform and undercover, are targeting groups suspected of committing the shootings, Jacques said.
Investigators are also working with the groups involved in hopes of coming up with a peace accord, and partnering with provincial and national law enforcement counterparts.
Coun. Ray Jones, who represents Ward 5 in northeast Calgary, had voiced concerns about the attacks at a council meeting Monday, particularly about the risk of a bystander being injured or killed.
But after meeting with police on Tuesday morning, Jones said he feels more comfortable about how police are tackling the problem.
“The unfortunate part was, one of the things that came up was the fact that the police are arresting them and the courts are letting them out,” he added.
He encouraged members of the public to be part of the solution.
“Everybody kind of turtles when something like this happens rather than report what they’ve seen,” he said. “If there’s a drug deal going down, report it.”
