Coroner's inquest begins into death of man shot by RCMP sniper

A Coroner's inquest into the death of a well-known British Columbia homeless advocate began in Burnaby Tuesday, more than three-and-a-half years after he was killed by an RCMP sniper during a standoff in Lytton.

Barry Shantz, 63, was armed with a shotgun and told a 911 dispatcher he wanted to be shot by police.

His sister, Marilyn Farquhar, was the first to testify at the inquest.

She said the last time she saw her brother was a few weeks earlier in their hometown of Kitchener, Ont.

"And he said, 'I've caused such sorrow and heartache and the pain in my brain is unacceptable,'" Farquhar told CTV News outside coroner's court.

She said her brother was having mental health issues during his visit and may have been struggling with their father's battle with terminal cancer.

Their father would pass away just one month before Shantz's fatal encounter with police on Jan. 13, 2020.

On that morning, his partner Janet McIntyre and her adult daughter called 911 to say Shantz had the shotgun and was suicidal.

According to an Independent Investigations Office of BC report from October of 2020, the first RCMP officers to respond to the call told investigators that Shantz shouted at them from an upstairs window before firing a round from the shotgun over their heads.

Those officers called for backup and over the next few hours members of the RCMP Emergency Response Team began arriving at the house where Shantz had locked himself inside with the shotgun.

The IIO report said snipers were told by superiors that if Shantz came out of the house with the shotgun and was not clearly surrendering, they were authorized to use lethal force.

Just after 2:00 p.m., about six hours after the first officers arrived, Shantz exited the house with the shotgun in his hands and one of the RCMP officers fatally shot him.

"Barry wanted the police to kill him. And unfortunately, that's what the police turned up and did," said Tonia Grace, a lawyer representing Farquhar at the inquest.

"And I think the focus, particularly for Marilyn as Barry's sister, is: How can we prevent this from happening again?"

The IIO cleared the officers of any wrongdoing.

PRISON TIME AND HOMELESS ADVOCACY

Earlier in his life, Shantz spent 13 years in the US federal prison system for his role in a conspiracy to smuggle drugs across the border.

While incarcerated, he impressed Abbotsford lawyer John Conroy with his research skills while looking into the rates at which prisoners in Canada and the United States are transferred back to their home countries.

When Shantz got out of jail, Conroy offered him a job at his Abbotsford law firm.

While working at the firm, Shantz got to know some of the local homeless people that often congregated on the street outside the office and before long he was advocating on their behalf.

He even signed on as a plaintiff in a lawsuit against City of Abbotsford bylaws preventing people from camping in parks overnight.

In a landmark decision that reverberated around the province, Christopher Hinkson, the Chief Justice of the BC Supreme Court, eventually ruled the bylaws violated the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and ordered they be struck down.

SISTER SEEKS SYSTEMIC CHANGE

The inquest heard Shantz believed he had PTSD from his time in prison -- but had trouble navigating the health-care system and wasn't able to find a regular doctor or therapist to help him through his issues.

Farquhar is still left wondering whether Shantz would still be alive if he had been afforded the opportunity to speak with a mental health professional on the day of his death.

"They had six hours of a standoff to bring somebody in," she said. "They had a helicopter there bringing in police officers but didn't bring in a mental health professional."

The inquest is scheduled to last seven days and hear from more than 20 witnesses, including the RCMP sniper who shot Shantz.

The jury of three women and two men will then be tasked with determining a cause of death for Shantz.

They can also make recommendations but are prohibited from finding fault or laying blame for Shantz's death on any individual or agency.