Drug-fuelled crime a big challenge as Regina’s police chief reflects on 2019

It’s been a year of drug control for Regina police, of both the legal and crime-fuelling kind.

As Regina Police Chief Evan Bray reflects on 2019, he said meth has been the biggest challenge for officers this year.

“This has been an extremely challenging year in terms of the types of crimes we’ve been dealing with,” said Bray. “We are dealing with guns and drugs and gangs.”

He said drugs, like meth, and guns often go hand in hand as officers see people struggling with addiction who are desperate to fuel an addiction. Police are seizing more firearms and drugs and are frequently deploying the SWAT unit.

Bray said police have to be able to think of innovative ways to deal with the problem and can’t arrest their way out of it. He added the only way to stop these types of crimes is to cure the addiction.

Dealing with marijuana has been less of an issue for Regina police in the first full year of legalization.

“From an enforcement standpoint, the sky didn’t fall. We haven’t seen a significant increase in, for example, impaired driving due to cannabis,” said Bray.

He said police put a lot of focus on education and communication early on, explaining that being prepared in advance for such a big change was not a bad thing.

“In terms of education and training to our members, I think it was an appropriate level. We tried to make sure that we were ready when legalization happened and I think we were. The fact that we didn’t see a significant effect on community safety is a positive thing,” said Bray.

He is particularly excited about a pilot project on how police look at sexual assault investigations. The Regina Police Service has partnered with provincial and city agencies to form a violence against women advocate case review system.

For all sexual assault investigations that don’t end in charges, independent experts review the work to make recommendations.

“How are we conducting investigations? Where are we conducting interviews? Are there things that we could do differently that will be less victimizing for survivors of sexual assaults?” said Bray.

Overall, Bray said he’s proud of keeping his officers and the public safe this year, calling it his biggest accomplishment. He said the service has made some positive steps forward in some areas of the crime stats.

“We’ve got some declines in areas, especially crimes against the person. Small declines, but that means less people have been victimized in our city in a serious way.”

— With files from 980 CJME’s Lisa Schick.