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"Our police officers are not punching bags ... and neither are any of our citizens who are being attacked out there."

Those were the words of Edmonton Chief of Police Mike Boyd in the wake of two incidents that saw his officers openly attacked by swarms of assailants.

While Boyd's anger and indignation during a news conference was meant to send a signal to like-minded perpetrators and the populace at large, it also indicated the chief's fear that respect for law and order had all but evaporated in the provincial capital.

It began with an attack on two officers who were called in to quell a disturbance outside the Oil City Roadhouse Bar and Vinyl Retro Dance Lounge venues at 107th Street and Jasper Avenue at about 2:30 a.m. on May 10th, 2008.

The initial call had been dealt with but a second fight soon broke out behind a nearby cash store.

Officers attempted to intervene but were met with resistance, being swarmed by about fifteen people and attacked by three men in particular.

Several other police units quickly arrived after a bystander called in. The Air-1 police helicopter flew overhead to assist. The crowd was quickly broken up and three men were arrested.

Carlos Rivera, 37, David Lemire, 25, and James Lemire, 29, were charged with assaulting a peace officer and obstruction.

During the scuffle, one officer was punched and kicked. A police spokesman said that the incident was troubling.

"Definitely, when we're talking about the number of officers and the number of people surrounding them, this leaves us very concerned.

"The actual call that came into dispatch was from somebody's cellphone, so a person standing in the area witnessing this was the first person to call, meaning that our officers who were involved weren't even able to be the first people to alert dispatch to the problem," the spokesman said.

The incident highlighted the concern that Jasper Avenue had taken on the same problems as Whyte Avenue.

But unlike Whyte Avenue, the downtown division isn't adequately staffed to take care of the growing number of bar patrons who spill out onto the city main street at closing time.

Police commission chairman Brian Gibson said discussions were underway with the Alberta Solicitor General's office to clarify the roles and responsibilities of peace officers and community service officers – constables currently patrolling areas such as Churchill Square and Whyte Avenue.

The plan was expected to be finalised shortly but not before the summer's long weekends. In the meantime the downtown area was expected to see six more officers as police move into an already established summer schedule.

Just as Chief Mike Boyd was about to address a media scrum on May 12th came word of a school resource officer being attacked.

The incident took place outside Eastglen High School near 114th Avenue and 68th Street when the officer noticed a car "stunting" during the noon hour.

The officer approached the vehicle and attempted to arrest the driver. A shoving match took place and pepper spray was deployed.

The passenger then got out of the car, allegedly carrying a baseball bat. As the officer was struggling with the driver, the passenger allegedly kicked the officer in the head, rendering him unconscious.

A teacher from the school intervened and held the two men until police arrived. The officer was taken to hospital for treatment of a severe concussion and mouth injuries.

Insp. Teri Uhryn spoke to reporters at the scene.

"He went to confront them in the car and speak to them about it when one of them became very aggressive.

"We found the constable having to fight with two people in the vehicle. One of them had a weapon. Right now we've got the constable at the hospital being checked and he'll be X-rayed. He's got facial injuries at this time."

Cory Andrea Royer, 18, was charged with assaulting a peace officer and resisting arrest.

David Randel Patton, 20, was charged with aggravated assault, possession of an offensive weapon (a baseball bat), and unauthorised possession of a prohibited/restricted weapon (a switchblade).

A woman was also arrested at the scene but it is not known if she was charged.

The suspects, believed to be former students of the school, allegedly knew the officer.

At the news conference, a visibly upset Boyd recapped the events on Jasper Avenue.

"I was outraged at the swarming of two of our police officers.

"While the officer was struggling on the ground, two males jumped on his chest and continued to punch and kick him while he was down. One officer attempted to use the Taser but someone from the crowd pushed him and he missed the target.

"Multiple people attacked the officers, but three primary suspects were the ones that were arrested when the back up officers arrived on the scene."

Boyd held up the officer's jacket, its sleeve torn away.

"I'm connecting the dots here for everyone. In the past several months we've seen an increase in the mugging and swarming mentality in this city," Boyd said.

"I put everyone in our city on notice that the city of Edmonton is not going to tolerate this behaviour on our police officers or on any of our citizens.

"This city is not tolerating this kind of mugging and swarming mentality against our police officers and any citizen in this city.

"Our police officers are not punching bags ... and neither are any of our citizens who are being attacked out there.

"There's a bit of an erosion going on with community standards and certainly we are seeing [that] in particular in major cities in North America.

"This is an attack on society when you have police officers being attacked," Boyd said.

"I can tell you the full force of the law will be brought to bear on this problem. We are going to clean it up. We need to clean it up. This is our city, and we're not going to allow people to destroy a good thing."

Insp. Teri Uhryn echoed the chief's remarks.

"Our police officers are getting attacked right now ... so we need to protect each other," she said.

Staff Sgt. Peter Ratcliff of the Edmonton Police Association said things were getting worse.

"The threat of it is always there. You're never going to go into a bar fight involving a couple of people with only a couple of (officers) there. But 99% of the time, they're only bystanders ... cheering the people on or trying to tell them to stop, like kids in a school yard I guess.

"When it comes to actually being involved and assaulting officers and trying to get the people who started the fight away, no – that's brand new news. It's just wrong."

Approached by media while attending a civic function the next day, Chief Boyd repeated his warnings.

"We are not going to tolerate that kind of criminal activity and thuggery in our city," he said. "We're going to pull out all the stops and we're going to deal with these people that are going to commit this kind of criminal victimisation.

"It was important for me to put everybody on notice, including anyone who might be contemplating doing more of this kind of criminal activity.

"When I said we were going to bring the full force of law to bear on the problem, I'm not mincing my words. That's exactly what we're going to do."

Political reaction to the swarming events was not long in coming.

A spokesman for Alberta Justice said his department was considering changes to how it prosecutes those who assault police officers.

"The Criminal Code does call for up to a five-year penalty, five years in jail for a person convicted of swarming or assaulting a police officer," David Dear said.

Options included having a single prosecutor handle all cases to ensure offenders are prosecuted to the full extent of the law, and harsher sentences that would send a message that assaults on the police would not be tolerated.

Dear said prosecutors who specialise in offences such as drunk driving have been more effective in getting stiffer penalties.

Staff Sgt. Peter Ratcliffe of the Edmonton Police Association agreed with the Alberta Justice spokesman. He said his members were seeing an escalating level of violence and that the courts need to deal more severely with assaults on police officers.

On May 13th Mayor Stephen Mandel used his annual "State of the City" address to launch an initiative designed to stem the root causes of crime.

Addressing an Edmonton Chamber of Commerce function at the Shaw Conference Centre, Mandel said spoke with Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach who was on side with trying to stop crime before it starts.

Mandel announced he proposed to strike up a taskforce, made up of business and community leaders, to start work in September and have its first report ready by spring 2009.

"We feel we can do more to help those in need, or steer young people away from trouble ... because the real solutions, the ones that will not just respond to incidents of crime, are the ones that tackle it at its roots before it happens.

"There is so much urgency in the crime prevention file. There is so much we can invest (in) better to shift the focus to prevention and not just the impact after a crime occurs," Mandel said.

"We simply have to change direction on this now."

"We've seen things slip ... signs which Chief Boyd calls community disorder. We cannot let it pass by unaddressed."

Later facing reporters, Mandel commented on the two attacks on officers.

"When they get swarmed, when they get attacked with a baseball bat, we have to make sure our police are protected. These people are out there to serve and protect us."

Mandel expanded on his thoughts about the taskforce, singling out drug rehabilitation programs as a priority.

"We don't have a great program for drug rehabilitation. You either put people in jail or put them back on the street," he said. "We have to have more programs in communities to help kids deal in a structured way with some of the problems."

He callenged the committee to look for ways ways to help children growing up with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder.

"FAS kids. 80% of all kids in prison are FAS. Let's start putting some dollars towards that. Let's find what happens to these kids, what do we need to do. Rather than waiting until they're 15 or 16 and they can't function any better and they're in jail, let's give them a chance.

"We are not going to change the face of crime unless we look at making this change. It's absolutely essential," he said.

"I think we need to get back to the idea that police can't do everything. And we've got to find ways to spend time on prevention."

Mandel cautioned that the committee faced tough expectations. "We're not going to spend a few dollars on prevention and all of a sudden crime disappears."

The plan found immediate support from Chief Boyd who hoped the committee would concentrate on the family life of youngsters.

"If you look back in their earlier days, you can see the erosion or the fragmentation around their family life."

It's particularly important to strengthen families and give children the support they need growing up, he said.

"Most people would say it's a very good investment that you can make, because if you make that investment earlier it saves a great number of cases downstream."

Premier Ed Stelmach weighed in with thoughts that binge drinking may be part of the reasons behind recent violence.

"It is getting to be a serious matter. When police officers are actually swarmed on the street, it's like the Old West and we've got to get control of it," Stelmach said.

"This is not the kind of message we want to send to others in terms of safe communities in Edmonton."

Stelmach spoke just as his government was considering toughening up alcohol serving regulations, something the hospitality industry has resisted.

"I know the industry has concerns, deep concerns about the issues. And we want to work with them to find some balance," the premier acknowledged.

"Obviously this seems to be related to binge drinking, consuming large amounts of alcohol in a short period of time, because the price is very low and obviously more money in the pockets to spend," Stelmach said.

“It could be, quite frankly, a symptom of a bit more cash in the pocket to spend.

“We've always heard that you can't legislate away stupidity and unfortunately, even though there was no life lost, some police officers have gone through a pretty catastrophic event.”

The phrase "you can't legislate away stupidity" may have sounded familiar to some observing crime in the provincial capital.

Stelmach's predecessor, Ralph Klein, used the phrase when commenting on a particularly violent weekend in November 2006.

Unlike Stelmach, Klein dismissed the notion that easy money from Alberta's economic fortune was a cause.

"The boom shouldn't have anything to do with it," Klein said. "Those are acts of hooliganism and you can't legislate against it. You can't legislate against stupidity, ignorance and violence.

"People who are hellbent to do these kinds of things are, first of all, bad people and no amount of legislation is going to stop people who are intent on doing harm to other people."

When Klein was the mayor of Calgary in the early 1980s he said he saw a spike in crime which eventually settled down.

In January 1982 Klein blamed "eastern creeps and bums" for driving up the crime rate in in that city.

In the legislature, Solicitor General Fred Lindsay said changes to Alberta's drinking laws were coming in the near future.

"It's not only minimum drink prices," Lindsay said. "It's happy hour times and those types of things. So stay tuned."

The future arrived sooner than expected when on May 14th Lindsay announced details of changes designed "to keep people in a more sober state so they react in a more reasonable manner."

Minimum drinks prices, restricted happy hours and maximums on the number of drinks on tables after 1:00 a.m. were to be law by the end of June 2008 for all establishments serving liquor.

Lindsay said he would study other jurisdictions experimenting with eliminating closing hours, keeping a mass of drunken patrons from hitting the streets at the same time.

The province hired seven new inspectors to ensure compliance and Lindsay said he would have no problem increasing fines if bars don't toe the line. No change to the minimum drinking age was contemplated.

Lindsay described the recent swarming incidents as "disturbing."

deadmonton 2008 - other police matters - Boyd buzzing mad over officer swarming