
Acquitted Kamloops RCMP officer still awaiting internal conduct hearing
KAMLOOPS - It’s been nearly one year since his trial and five years since the event which took him to trial, yet Kamloops RCMP Cpl. Rick Brown has yet to have a conduct hearing from his employer. Brown was acquitted on a breach of trust charge in October of last year. Despite his acquittal, he...

Kamloops tyke shows ‘amazing strength’ in fight for his life
KAMLOOPS - Babies and toddlers cry for all types of reasons, but a Kamloops family is facing a worst case scenario after discovering their child was not crying because of a case of thrush, but rather something much more scary. At the beginning of September, Shantelle Araneda took 18-month-old Sawyer Jules to the doctor. Her...

UPDATE: Officer charged in jail sex trial acquitted
KAMLOOPS – Charges against a Kamloops RCMP officer were dismissed Thursday morning after a Kamloops Supreme Court Justice determined his conduct during an incident at the detachment four years ago did not constitute a breach of trust. Justice Selwyn Romilly said the matter should have been dealt with in “an RCMP internal investigation, and not...

JAIL SEX TRIAL: Judge will decide if RCMP officer’s actions were criminal
KAMLOOPS – It is up to a Kamloops Supreme Court Justice to determine if a crime was committed in the early morning hours of August 18, 2010 now that submissions from both lawyers have concluded in the trial of an RCMP watch commander. Kenneth Peter Rick Brown was charged with breach of trust after he,...

JAIL SEX TRIAL: ‘It was a very tense and uncomfortable environment:’ guard
KAMLOOPS – A former jail guard told a Kamloops Supreme Courtroom this morning his workplace was like a zoo and there was nothing he could do about separating two female prisoners having sex because there were no empty cells available. David Tompkins was one of the RCMP city cell guards working the early morning hours...

JAIL SEX TRIAL: The one-and-a-half minute party
KAMLOOPS – One of the guards who worked during an August 2010 incident in city cells told a Kamloops Supreme courtroom Friday morning he was frustrated when he did not receive direction on how to split up two female prisoners having sex. Kevin Brumm was a relatively new guard at the Kamloops RCMP city cells,...

JAIL SEX TRIAL: Guard noticed two female prisoners were “friendly” before leaving his shift
KAMLOOPS –A prison guard told a Kamloops Supreme courtroom on Thursday morning that RCMP city cells were so full the night of a jail sex incident, two female prisoners had to share the drunk tank. “We had no other choice; all the other cells were occupied,” said David Clark, a guard with the city. Clark...

RCMP detachment was “dysfunctional” at time of jail sex incident: Retired cop
KAMLOOPS – The first man who internally investigated the RCMP watch commander working the night two women had sex in a jail cell told a Kamloops Supreme Courtroom on Wednesday the officer was untrained in his new role in an office he called “a terrible place to work.” Staff Sgt. Garry Kerr was originally responsible...

JAIL SEX TRIAL: “In hindsight I probably should have stopped it:” Accused
KAMLOOPS – An extensive internal RCMP investigation and eventual trial started when one officer casually told another about “a couple of girls getting it on” in cells; the hope was to share a laugh. But Cpl. Kelly Butler told Const. Evan Elgee she didn’t find his story funny. Instead, she wrote an email to upper...

JAIL SEX TRIAL UPDATE: Officers react to what happened in the cell that night
GRAPHIC CONTENT ADVISORY KAMLOOPS – Video evidence in the jail sex trial concluded Wednesday allowing a Kamloops Supreme Court Justice to see exactly what police officers saw that night in Kamloops city cells—and how officers reacted to it. Cpl. Kenneth Peter "Rick" Brown, an RCMP watch commander, is accused of breaching trust in August of...

JAIL SEX TRIAL UPDATE: Court examines video evidence
KAMLOOPS – A now-retired RCMP corporal took the stand in Kamloops Supreme Court Tuesday afternoon to describe one of his last investigations—of his friends and co-workers accused of breaching trust as a police officer. Several officers chose to watch two drunk female prisoners have sex rather than intervene in the early morning hours of August...

RCMP Corporal accused in Kamloops jail cell sex scandal to stand trial next week
KAMLOOPS – A four-year-old case evolving from the Kamloops RCMP jail cell sex scandal will finally get underway in Supreme Court next week after pre-trial arguments wrapped Thursday morning. Cpl. Kenneth Peter Rick Brown is the last of the four participants originally accused of failing to intervene on an August evening in 2010 when two...

Two family doctors leaving Kamloops
KAMLOOPS - The city is about to lose two more doctors after a husband and wife team announced they’ll be leaving their North Shore practice. Last week the Aspen Medical Centre notified its patients that family doctor Arshad Mahmood and his wife Dr. Ambreen Bushra would be relocating, leaving solely Dr. Howie at the practice....

ELECTION 2015: Support and anger during Harper’s Kamloops stop
KAMLOOPS - In a Kamloops warehouse filled with roughly 200 supporters and Conservative Party staffers, Prime Minister Stephen Harper spoke of the economy under his government, touting the latest auditor general results from this morning as proof his government is the right one to be leading our country. The Conservative Party rally kicked off around...

Why vaccinating 71 per cent of 7-year-olds in southern Interior should have you worried
THOMPSON-OKANAGAN - To prevent a measles outbreak, 95 per cent of the population is required to be vaccinated, but the province’s southern Interior isn’t meeting that requirement with only 71 per cent of seven-year-olds vaccinated between 2012 and 2014. With the latest school year comes the annual round of vaccinations and kids will bring reminders...