On October 21st, the Delta police arranged a Community Call-in conference to speak on the Tsawwassen Mills mall incident; where a driver killed 3 and struck two different groups at different mall entrances during a Truth and Reconciliation event on September 30th. The police called it a “medical incident” within an hour on Twitter, in a press release later in the day and in following press releases since. Eyewitnesses say the driver revved his engine before and after the collision, that his face expressed anger, that he was prioritized by first responders while 2 Tsawwassen First Nations Elders bled out on the scene. The victims included Elders Virginia Splockton and wilapiya Barb Joe, and Gwenyth Brigit Dwyn who died later in hospital. The driver was released from hospital the same afternoon with no charges laid against him, and his name concealed from the public.

The Community Call-in did not allow for comments or questions by the families effected or the community, instead it was a conversation the Delta police had with itself with the opportunity for the public to watch online. The meeting included the following police board members; Chair board member Ian Tait, Chief constable Harjinder Singh Sidhu, and Finance and Risk assesment member Michelle Laviolette.

Delta police human resources, Lori Mayhew, began by bringing concerns forward from the community about the Delta police’s initial news release on September 30th which included, “The incident is not related to the Truth and Reconciliation Walk that was taking place on Tsawwassen First Nation lands at the time. There is no ongoing risk to public safety.”

She says, “I have had some outreach where the wording in this release, news release, has further harmed the community by planting – anchoring in people’s minds a reason for this accident. Putting out there already that there was a medical emergency. And then severing the connection between the incident and the event that was going on at Tsawwassen Mills mall. Saying that it was not related to the walk, which is technically correct but people were gathered in that spot for the finishing event. And so I just wanted to raise that the wording of this has caused some harm in the community and that looking, at maybe, some further training on how to do trauma informed communication with communities. Thank you.”

Chief Constable of Delta Police, Harjinder Singh Sidhu, responded by indicating that this was a tragic mass casualty event and something they don’t often see. . “Thank you for that question. As we indicated in the beginning, this is a tragic event a mass casualty event. You know something we don’t often get in Delta. And there was a lot of.. I was at that event personally and as part of the walk, so there was a significant amount of people there. And the event was occuring, and then all of a sudden this tragedy occured during that. So there’s a lot of infor.. uh, stuff, going on as you can appreciate involving a mass casualty event and you know, our initial concern is obviously get to the scene, get resources there to tend to the individuals that are injured, and then, you know, once we have that under control then trying to identify what’s going on. So our team responded to that, and so, our initial concern is because of the significance of the event obviously on Truth and Reconciliation day – that it was occuring. Yes there was a walk, the location where this collision occured was a Post event that was going to occur for the house unveiling. So unfortunately as you know, an incident like this in today’s environment with the social media thing, starting.. going out immediately that, you know, a vehicle had crashed into the the walk. You know, a lot of people sadly have reflections of the Lapu Lapu that didn’t occur too long ago in the province so, as a result of that, you know, our immediate concern is ‘what do we know right now?’ ‘what do we get out to the community immediately to try to first, assure that, you know, there is no on-going threat. Secondly, that, you know, what do we know factually at that point? Uh, or information that we have to be able to share, to provide more light, on that too. Essentially, reassure people that, you know, this wasn’t something intentional, if that was the case at that time. That’s our focus on that immediately. Once we have control of those situations, we deal with the immediate scene, then we have time to kind of slow things down to try to get the facts of what that was. So, at that time, we did receive information from the medical first responders that they treated the driver.. I can’t give too many details because it’s an ongoing investigation, but there was information received that this could be a possible medical, and that’s when he was treated for. And again, I can’t get into details, and I know that that’s very frustrating for people, ’cause people want answers, but in order to ensure the integrity of the investigation, you know, we can’t share all that immediately. So that was our initial intent, was to get out what do we know, uh.. that information did come from medical responders that were first on scene. So we thought that was important to get out immediately – that there was nothing to indicate, at that time, that you know, this was intentional in nature because sadly, that’s the world we live in today.. and we saw Lapu Lapu, we have the incident up in Kamloops a few days earlier, we knew the community was already a bit, you know, broader community was already on edge. So, you know, was trying to address that. And so that was the purpose of trying to get that immediate release out there. In regards to the connection to the Post event location, a lot of the information immediately was that the vehicle hadn’t crashed into the actual walk. So we were trying to clarify that. We did do a second release the next day, and then we did clarify a lot of that information about where the collision occured, how it was a Post event. So, once we had that information, we did clarify the next day. So, the immediate concern at that time, was to get what we knew, and you know we’re not baseing anything.. it’s only a possibility, and a full investigation is going to be conducted. I have a major crimes section that have taken lead on this, and you know at that time what we knew we wanted to get out to calm the community down. And now, you know, it is frustrating i get it from a perspective of people wanting answers immediately, we’ve come to no conclusions on this investigation. We are commited to following all the evidence, and if it leads to criminal charges then those will be forwarded to crown council” …

1;24 2nd shorter video; “there’s a lot of questions in the community including why chargers weren’t immediately laid, we understand that desire for answers, but our responsibility is to follow the evidence wherever it leads without rushing to conclusions.. We are committed to being as transparent as possible, in sharing information as we can, as the investigation progresses while ensuring the integrity of the investigation. We remain in direct contact with the victim’s families *starts turning his chair* and the Tsawwassen First Nation leadership to, uh, share information with them and hear their concerns and provide appropriate updates as we can. We owe it to the families to ensure this investigation is thorough and grounded in evidence. I’ll take any further questions you have about that incident…. if not i will turn it over.”

Michelle Laviolette speaks up, “Ya. Actually, sorry. I just have a comment to make. Chief Sidhu, I was at the Indigenous women in industry conference at the time of the event. and also later that afternoon was at the orange shirt society event in west vancouver with Phyillis Webstad and I just want to say that it was an incredibly emotional day, but we needed to know that it was not terrorism.” Laviolette gets emotional here, “So I thank you for your release because just having that removed was an incredible help, thank you.”

Sidhu responds, “Thank you for that. Ya this has been very [in factful]. You know, you never know when you’re gonna get it right.” He proudly smiles here and says, “So you try to go thru everything you can, and get what you can. ” He then quickly lowers his smile to finish with, “recognizing that lives have been shattered by this, so thank you for that.”