More details have come to light about a 2024 arrest on Vancouver Island that left a woman seriously injured, including that she had been carrying a “novelty cigarette lighter” that resembled a gun. The Independent Investigations Office announced last year that the officers involved would not face criminal charges, but the B.C. police watchdog said it was then-unable to release more information due to an ongoing RCMP file. On Thursday, the IIO shared a full report on the incident, revealing for the first time that the woman suffered a fractured shoulder that she apparently sustained “in the course of a struggle to restrain her,” and had to undergo surgery. It also contains a picture of a gun-shaped lighter that RCMP officers located nearby after her arrest. The woman was arrested on the afternoon of Nov. 29, 2024, as members of the North Cowichan-Duncan RCMP were responding to multiple 911 calls about someone waving what appeared to be a handgun at vehicles. According to the IIO report, bystanders helped the officers locate a woman who was “sitting against a tree” with “her hands in her pockets,” facing the Cowichan River. She did not comply when told to show her hands, but “at one point appeared to throw something to one side, on the grass,” the report reads. An officer then approached her from behind and tackled her. She “struggled hard” against multiple officers who were trying to put her in handcuffs, according to the IIO’s findings, but was eventually taken into custody. After being informed she was under arrest for pointing a firearm, the woman told the officers it was “a lighter that someone had given her as a present,” the report said. The IIO found there was no evidence the woman was injured due to excessive or unjustified use of force by the officers, and further commended the RCMP for using a level of force “at the very lowest end of the scale” for a situation involving an unco-operative individual they believed to be armed. “I do not consider that there are reasonable grounds to believe that an officer may have committed an offence,” IIO chief civilian director Jessica Berglund wrote. Last year, Vancouver became the first city in Canada to ban gun-shaped lighters, largely due to concerns about needlessly escalating police incidents.
