By Canadian Press

Mass shooting inquiry: Lawyer calls for witnesses to sort out discrepancies over guns

May 4, 2022 | 2:37 PM

HALIFAX — The inquiry investigating the 2020 mass shooting in Nova Scotia was asked today to sort out conflicting evidence about how the RCMP responded to a woman who says she alerted police years ago to the killer’s arsenal of illegal weapons.

Brenda Forbes, a former neighbour of the man who killed 22 people on April 18-19, 2020, says she told police in 2013 that Gabriel Wortman possessed illegal weapons when she filed a complaint about an alleged incident of domestic violence involving him and his spouse.

Anastacia Merrigan, a participating lawyer at the inquiry, says there is a series of discrepancies between evidence provided by Forbes and the RCMP. 

In a summary of evidence released Tuesday, the inquiry learned that responding officers took “minimal notes” at the time and other information about Forbes’s complaint had been purged from the RCMP’s files.

Merrigan, who represents the Transition House Association of Nova Scotia, says Forbes should be asked to testify at the inquiry.

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As well, Merrigan says RCMP Const. Greg Wiley should also be called to testify about his personal relationship with the killer and his handling of a complaint in 2010 that alleged the gunman had threatened to kill his own parents in New Brunswick.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 4, 2022.

The Canadian Press