ETF ‘Had No Alternative,’ Official Says
By Curtis Rush, The Toronto Star
The fatal shooting of the armed man who took a hostage in front of Union Station last month was legally justified, the Special Investigations Unit has ruled.
An Emergency Task Force officer shot and killed Sugston Anthony Brookes on Aug. 25 with a .308-calibre rifle from about 30 metres after Brookes tried to kill his estranged wife and fled, ultimately taking Nicole Regis as a hostage in front of Union Station when confronted by a uniformed officer.
He was soon surrounded and for 40 minutes police tried to get him to put down the gun, but he resisted.
“I am satisfied on all of the evidence that the officers involved in this case were put in a position where they had no alternative but to shoot Mr. Brookes,” interim director James Cornish said in a statement.
“There were a number of officers on the scene who were trying by all conceivable means to get Mr. Brookes to give up, including a trained hostage negotiator,” the statement read.
“By a cruel twist of fate, Ms. Regis was compelled to endure being held hostage by Mr. Brookes whose mood changed throughout the ordeal. Ms. Regis was afraid for her life but was able to maintain her poise. Mr. Brookes did not give up and eventually an officer, who must have feared for the life of Ms. Regis, had a clear shot at Mr. Brookes and took that shot.”
The dramatic hostage-taking and shooting, witnessed by hundreds of early morning commuters, began at 8 a.m. when Brookes fired shots at his estranged wife with a sawed-off .22-calibre semi-automatic rifle as she arrived for work in the TD Centre lower-level food court. One bullet grazed her temple and she lived only because Brookes’ gun jammed when he squeezed the trigger as she lay helplessly on the floor.
A uniformed paid duty officer was working on Wellington St. W. when he heard a radio call about the shots and heard a description of the shooter. He approached Brookes and was about two metres away from him when Brookes reached under his shirt and pulled out a sawed-off rifle and pointed it at the officer. The officer withdrew his service firearm and yelled for Brookes to stop, the SIU says.
The officer kept his firearm drawn and followed Brookes south toward Front St. At that time, Brookes grabbed Regis at random and the officer broadcast the hostage situation over the police radio at around 8:10 a.m. Police officers, including the ETF team, arrived and took up their positions.
Throughout the next 40 minutes, the investigation revealed, Brookes whispered to Regis about how his estranged spouse had wronged him and that he had recorded a tape of those wrongs. Brookes also told Regis he expected to be killed by a sniper but that she would be unharmed.
Brookes pointed his gun in the direction of the police officers on scene several times, the SIU said.
A trained ETF sniper was behind Brookes about 27 metres away out of Brookes’ view. At 8:50 a.m., the officer indicated over the radio that he had a clear and unobstructed line of fire. The ETF supervisor, who was also a trained negotiator, authorized the sniper to shoot. The ETF officer fired once, striking Brookes in the head.
At the time, Brookes was on probation for assaulting and threatening his estranged wife and their children, the statement says. He was also prohibited from possessing any firearms or other weapons.
In the weapon recovered, police found five live rounds in the ammunition magazine.
“A shell case from a previous firing had not been properly ejected and another live cartridge was lodged behind the fired shell case, making the gun temporarily inoperable,” Cornish said.
The SIU also examined the audiotape Brookes left behind. In it, he made references to his wife, children, divorce, lawyers, social workers and “the system.” Although on the tape Brookes said he had “made a decision,” he did not record specifically what he was planning to do or what that decision was, the SIU said.
In addition, Brookes did try to kill his estranged wife and “likely would have been successful had his rifle not jammed. The fact that the rifle was jammed was not known to anyone other than Mr. Brookes until after he was killed.”
The SIU is a civilian agency that investigates circumstances involving police and civilians which have resulted in serious injury, sexual assault or death.