SIU clears Hamilton police after wild stabbing takedown

The province’s police watchdog has cleared the Hamilton police service of any wrongdoing after officers took down a man who went on a wild stabbing spree in an east end apartment building back in March.

Witnesses say that in a confrontation with police after he was cornered, the man had refused multiple demands to put down his weapon. Somehow, he managed to shrug off being shot multiple times by rubber bullets and Tasers to keep waving a knife around.

• READ MORE: Man recounts fending off attacker in Hamilton stabbing spree
• READ MORE: Are Hamilton police quicker to resort to force?

According to the provincial Special Investigations Unit, a 27-year-old man ran around an apartment building on Melvin Avenue stabbing people on March 8. Hamilton police were called in, but by then, the man had left the building and was running alongside the fence that divides 221 Melvin Avenue from 215 Melvin Avenue.

He jumped the fence and went to the back lot of 215 Melvin, which is behind a pizza and sub shop.

The officers surrounded the man and ordered him to drop the 20 cm knife he was holding, but he wouldn’t – instead, he confronted one of the officers with the knife still in his hand, the SIU says.

Repeatedly shocked by Tasers

The officer shocked the man with his Taser, but it had no effect, according to the SIU report. He pulled the Taser’s prongs out of his body and climbed a set of stairs leading to the second floor patio of the building.

He still wouldn’t drop the knife, the SIU says, and started throwing things from the patio at the officers. More officers showed up at the scene, and the officer who fired his Taser gave control over to another officer.

Meanwhile, the man made his way off of the balcony and onto a thin ledge alongside the western wall of the pizza shop. He fell from the ledge onto the pavement, fracturing his spine and his ankle, the report reads.

Even after the fall, the man was still holding a knife. He got up and “hopped for a distance,” but lost his balance and fell over, the report reads. As he stood up, an officer shocked him with another Taser charge.

The man again pulled out the probes from his body and started waving the knife at the officers yet again, and the officer fired his Taser yet again, but missed.

“Around this time, another officer attempted to pepper spray the man, but that too proved ineffective,” the report reads.

Rubber bullets and pepper spray have no effect

By this point, an Emergency Response Unit tactical team showed up and took over the situation. The man had now made his way to the front of the business at 211 Melvin Avenue, next to the pizza and sub shop.

Officers repeatedly told the man to drop the knife, but he wouldn’t. They shot him four times with rubber bullets, the SIU says, but somehow the man still kept hold of the knife. Another officer shocked him with yet another Taser charge, but it still had no effect.

A fifth rubber bullet round finally caused the man to drop the knife. Officers started moving in, but somehow, the man managed to pick the blade back up. This time, the officers overpowered the man and pulled the knife from his grasp.

“The involved officers had every reason to believe that the man constituted a real and present danger,” wrote SIU Director Tony Loparco. “He was holding a knife, its blade measuring about 20 centimetres in length, and waving it at the officers.”

“It bears noting that the man seemed largely impervious to the incapacitating effects of the [Taser]. On a couple of occasions, he appears to have simply pulled the CEW probes from his body while the weapon was discharging. This, in my view, is powerful evidence that the discharges did not amount to excessive force.”

Not criminally responsible

Loparco also says that none of the officers involved caused the man to fracture his spine and ankle.

“These fractures occurred when he, unaided and unprompted by any of the officers, jumped or fell from the second floor exterior ledge of the building at 215 Melvin Avenue.”

The 27-year-old man who was responsible for the attack was found not criminally responsible back in July. A judge said he was suffering from a “severe mental disorder” at the time.

The man was sent to the maximum security Waypoint Centre for Mental Health Care in Penetanguishene.