As David Westlake was chatting with an RCMP officer, he watched in disbelief as a car screeched to a halt about 80 metres away and two Mounties emerged with rifles and took aim at him
David Westlake is an unbelievably lucky man who still wonders what saved him when two Mounties mistook him for a killer and opened fire.
“I remember a shot that sounded like a sonic boom and then another one that was really loud, and I’m moving at this time,” Westlake told a public inquiry investigating the worst mass shooting in modern Canadian history. The inquiry document also highlights the confusion that RCMP officers faced as they pursued the killer for more than 100 kilometres. Two Mounties fatally shot him at a gas station north of Halifax at 11:26 a.m.
Just before Const. Terry Brown and Const. Dave Melanson showed up in Onslow, Westlake was standing in the front lot talking to RCMP Const. Dave Gagnon, who was behind the wheel of a marked cruiser, a vehicle almost identical to the getaway car being used by the killer.Before the two officers jumped out of their unmarked Nissan Altima, Melanson tried several times to use a police radio to report what they were seeing.
Westlake, however, told investigators he did not hear anyone say, “Show me your hands.” He said the only thing he heard, aside from gunshots, was someone saying, “Get down!”
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