THUNDER BAY -- Though the city’s deputy police chief acknowledges the 2014 homicide numbers were “unprecedented,” he doesn’t see any sign that they will let up this coming year.
Andy Hay said there are a number of underlying issues that contributed to 11 murder cases the Thunder Bay Police Service investigated during the past 12 months that are still present heading into 2015.
“It’s not stranger on stranger. It’s within their lifestyles and social circles,” he said, citing poverty, addiction and housing issues as significant factors to many of the cases.
“Until those issues are addressed we really can’t expect a dramatic change in the crime and homicide rates that we’re seeing…There is nothing I see that the police can do to reduce the number of homicides other than reassure people it’s not stranger on stranger crime.”
That is the highest number of murders the city has seen in a single year since statistics were first collected in 1980, despite Thunder Bay claiming the dubious title of “murder capital of Canada” in 2012 when there were seven such cases and 2010 when there were five.
The city will finish with a rate of 9.01 murders per 100,000 people, which is significantly higher than rates seen in Winnipeg (3.37), Edmonton (2.71) and Toronto (2.04).
“It’s concerning for the police and concerning for all the community because it damages the reputation of this city. It taxes our resources and it really puts a question on quality of life in Thunder Bay,” Hay said.
Despite the higher per capita numbers, Hay insists the type of crimes in Thunder Bay are much different than those in some of the other cities.
None of the killings involved serial offenders, nor were people targeted at random.
“For the most part homicides in Thunder Bay are typically isolated incidents that have occurred between people who were known to each other,” he said.
Investigators were also able to make arrests and lay charges in the vast majority of the cases.
The case of 44-year-old William Darryl Wapoose, whose body was found in Chapples Park in September, is the only one that remains unsolved.
Nine of the other cases have at least one suspect facing charges while the suspect in the August death of eight-year-old Brandi Wingert is also deceased.
