Rural community shocked by OPP officer's death

LEADBURY, Ont. — The Ontario Provincial Police are mourning the loss of one of their own after the calm in this rural community was shattered by a shootout that killed Const. Vu Pham, a 15-year veteran of the force and father of three.

"I am deeply saddened by the loss of this young brave officer who was committed to protecting the citizens of Ontario," OPP Commissioner Julian Fantino said Monday afternoon after learning Pham succumbed to his injuries at the London Health Sciences Centre, where he was being treated.

The province is reeling from the second death of a policeman in the line of duty in a week.

"It impacts society overall when those who are entrusted with the duty to protect and safeguard are killed in the line of duty," Fantino said. "It diminishes our society gravely.

"But on the other hand, it also highlights the significance of these very fine men and women who put themselves at grave risk and (in) harm's way — very often for strangers — to simply do their duty and their jobs, and Const. Pham is just one of these heroes."

Fantino noted that Tuesday he and other police officers were gathering to honour a Peel police officer killed while on duty last week.

Const. Artem "James" Ochakovsky died from injuries sustained in a vehicle collision March 1. He is to be buried today.

"There's trauma and the sense of loss is felt in every police detachment throughout this province," he said. "This is a tragedy. We're just trying to hold it together and do what we have to do to see this difficult time through."

Pham, 37, was shot after he pulled over a vehicle and confronted an armed suspect at 10:18 a.m. Monday on North Line, a rural road in Leadbury, Ont., about 90 kilometres north of London. The officer was "immediately incapacitated," Fantino told reporters at a media conference earlier in the day.

He would not reveal the nature of the call that Pham was responding to, nor the reason he pulled the suspect's vehicle over.

"There was nothing fancy about it. He was just doing his job," said Fantino, who flew to London to be at Pham's bedside.

Reports suggested Pham was shot in the head or neck, and that there was an exchange of up to 25 shots. He was airlifted by helicopter to London Health Sciences Centre, but doctors were unable to save the officer's life. No other officers were injured.

Fantino said the suspect in the shooting is a 70-year-old man who was later shot by police. The suspect remains in a London hospital but the extent of his injuries are unknown.

Earlier Monday one of the shooting victims was treated at a Seaforth hospital.

"We had one patient brought in who was stabilized and transferred to London," said Mary Cardinal, site administrator at Seaforth hospital.

Cardinal could not say whether it was the police officer or the suspect, but said the nature of the injury was a "gunshot wound" without specifying how many times the person was shot.

Pham was born in Saigon, Vietnam, and joined the OPP in 1995. During his career he served in Cochrane and in Parry Sound and was attached to the Huron County detachment when he died.

He is survived by his wife, Heather, and three children, Tyler, 12, Jordan, 10, and Joshua, 7.

In the legislature Monday, Premier Dalton McGuinty offered his condolences to Pham's family and to the police.

"I think it's an opportunity for all of us just to reflect on how much we count on these men and women every single day to go out there and put it on the line," he said. "They spend so much time away from their families devoted to our families. And so we're very grateful for everything they do and the sacrifices they make."

There have now been 104 OPP officers killed in the line of duty; Pham becomes the 24th member of the force to die after being shot, according to statistics provided by Fantino.

Special Investigations Unit spokeswoman Monica Hudon said her agency has sent nine investigators to the scene. The SIU is an arm's-length agency that investigates incidents involving police which end in death, serious injury or allegations of sexual assault.

The Huron County detachment will also conduct a parallel investigation into the incident.

Police set up a massive perimeter, blocking off several kilometres of farmland, while OPP and SIU officers milled outside at the crime scene on North Line.

Neighbour Francis Hunt, who lives further down the road, recalled hearing the mid-morning gunfire.

"I was just coming out of the barn. I heard six or eight shots," Hunt said. "I thought it was hunters, maybe coyote hunting."

But then he saw a quick succession of police cars and ambulances tearing down the road, and discovered something far darker had happened.

"Everybody's in shock. For this community . . ." he trailed off, shaking his head.

His sentiments were echoed by Elgin and Ruth Schade, who say they were stunned to learn of the shooting in their usually quiet, pastoral community.

"People are shaken up," said Schade, who was following the story on television, despite living minutes away from the heavily barricaded crime scene.

Houses in this tiny community north of London are scattered, with wide swaths of open farmland separating friends and neighbours.

Bonnie Glanville lives just metres from where the shooting took place. She told the Seaforth Huron Expositor that she looked out her window Monday morning and saw a light-coloured pickup truck being pulled over by an OPP cruiser. She said she thought she was witnessing someone getting a speeding ticket.

"I realized something wasn't quite right when he quickly jumped out of the truck," Glanville said, before describing hearing the sound of shots and watching the officer get shot.

Residents were struggling to pinpoint which of their neighbours may have been involved in the altercation, as police were withholding the name of the suspect.

"It's disappointing, and the thing is nobody is immune to disasters like this," said Neil Dolmage, a farmer who also heard the gunshots and lives about one kilometre from the site of the incident. "The officer who's died, I feel badly for him — just (being at) the wrong damn place — and feel bad for the family of whoever did the shooting."

Dolmage said he could still see police lights flashing late Monday evening.

With files from Kenyon Wallace, and Ken Meaney and Phil Couvrette, Canwest News Service