Gonzo cops breaking the law!  Continuing my look at the haywire actions of the RCMP in Powell River, this month I’m going to tell you about a bunch of things I’ve seen the police do, things that have nothing to do with the legitimate duties of law enforcement officers, thus proving that they’re not really cops at all and are just a gang of thugs.

For instance, one time when I purchased an item from a local merchant I discovered that the proprietor was an informant who shared information about his customers with the cops.  Upon finalizing the sale I was told that a copy of the invoice I received, which had my name and a description of the item I’d purchased on it, would be forwarded to the RCMP.  The RCMP?  It wasn’t actually explained to me why the pigs needed that information and when I objected the employee backed down about sharing my info with the cops.  Nonetheless, data collection for the cops WAS going on.  Acquiring data about financial transactions is NOT lawful police activity.  In fact, it amounts to the illegal theft of private information.

In another instance of the police being involved in something that has nothing to do with law enforcement, in 2010 the BC Hydro employee who used to read my electricity meter began bringing an RCMP bodyguard to my house with her.  Allow me to recount that totally bizarre situation and how I dealt with it.

One morning in October 2010 a white BC Hydro pickup truck drove down my driveway and arrived at my house.  This wasn’t unusual.  Back then, before the wireless smart meters were installed, BC Hydro came to my home to read the electricity meter every two months and they were scheduled to read the meter that day.  But what was unusual about the visit was that instead of just one person getting out of the vehicle as usually occurred, two people emerged from the truck, one being a female meter reader, the other being an armed male RCMP officer in his full police uniform.

I was home in my office at the time and I watched through my window as the zombie RCMP officer and the BC Hydro employee slowly meandered along my front lawn, apparently waiting for me to show myself to them.

I must say, I was alarmed as hell to see a cop there that morning and of course I assumed that I had a legal obligation to show myself to him.  So I stopped what I was doing and went to the front door and opened it up and presented myself to the cop and the meter reader, who were both standing there on the lawn waiting for me to come out.

The BC Hydro employee greeted me by my first name, which was extremely strange since I’d never met her before, and informed me they were there to read my electricity meter.  This was half-true.  The BC Hydro employee did disappear around the side of my house to, presumably, read the meter.  But the zombie cop didn’t.  He just stood there on my front lawn staring at me in a menacing manner.  Then when the meter reader returned they both got into the vehicle and left.

What I took from the presence of a cop with the meter reader was that he was just there as a show of muscle to intimidate me.  As such, it occurred to me that I wasn’t bound by any obligation to make contact with him and the BC Hydro employee like I had.  Deeply troubled by what had happened, I complained about the incident to both BC Hydro and the local RCMP detachment.

Then four months later the same thing happened a second time!  I was sitting in my office one morning when a BC Hydro meter reader showed up with a zombie cop in tow.  Here we go again!  While it looked like the same meter reader, it was a different cop this time.  And both of them had grim expressions on their faces.  They didn’t look very happy that morning at all.

Through my office window I watched the two of them stroll across my lawn and then I watched as the zombie cop walked up onto my porch and began staring into my vacant living room through the glass door like a Peeping Tom while the BC Hydro employee waited on the lawn.  At that point I got up from my chair and left my office and, very cautiously, approached my living room door to find out what was going on.  When I arrived at the door the cop demanded that I open the door to speak to him.  However, I refused to open the door.

Through the unopened door I asked the cop what he wanted and he told me that, like the previous cop, he was there to read the electricity meter.

“Why is it necessary for the RCMP to participate in the reading of my meter?” I then asked him.  Fumbling for an explanation, the cop said that since I had an electricity meter to be read he had to be there that morning.  At that point the BC Hydro employee darted off to the side of the house in the direction of the meter.

I then opened the door and walked out onto my porch with the cop and queried him again about why the RCMP were coming to my house with BC Hydro.  He told me it was because of the incident that had occurred previously between me and the meter reader.  Huh?  I didn’t know what he was talking about!  I denied the accusation on the spot, telling the zombie pig that I didn’t know the meter reader and had never met her, which was the absolute truth.  I then asked the cop what the meter reader had accused me of doing to her.  He didn’t answer the question so I asked him a second time and still didn’t get a reply.  I then asked him to identify himself and he told me his name was Pelat.

The meter reader then returned and as they were departing the cop suddenly stopped in his tracks and reached into his jacket for something.  Taking his lead, the meter reader stopped too.  I tensed up, worried about what he was going to do next, maybe pull out a gun or arrest me or something.  But no, he was only taking out an identification card.  He then walked up to me and handed me the card with his full name of J.A. (Jeff) Pelat on it and made to leave again.

As they were leaving I asked the cop if I could expect the RCMP to come to my home every time BC Hydro read the electricity meter.  The cop answered yes.  In turn, I told the cop that it’s illegal for the electricity company to bring police officers to my house when they read the meter.  It isn’t illegal, he blurted, and if I have a problem with it I should contact the local police chief and talk to him about it.  I then told the cop that he was trespassing on private property and that I didn’t want the RCMP to come to my house ever again.  The zombie cop replied by telling me the RCMP can come to my house any time they feel like it.  That was the last thing he said before the two of them then got into a BC Hydro vehicle, the meter reader in the driver’s seat and the cop in the passenger seat, and left.

I did report this second incident with the cops to BC Hydro but I refrained from reporting it to the RCMP detachment this time out of fear of reprisals.  Fortunately, after that event the RCMP stopped coming to my house with the utility company.  I never did get an explanation of any kind for why the Crown’s electric company was bringing the cops to my house though.

However, while the cops stopped showing up with BC Hydro meter readers, they didn’t stop coming to my house altogether.  Allow me to recount another unsettling incident that reveals the rigid class structure the RCMP operate under and how they deliberately instigate social conflict by pitting family member against family member, as does the justice system generally.  This incident is yet another example of the RCMP being involved in something that has nothing at all to do with legitimate law enforcement duties.

It was about 9:40 in the evening on Sunday, July 31, 2011.  I’d just finished watching a movie and I randomly stepped out onto my front porch to get a breath of fresh air.  By this time the sun had gone down and it was dark outside.  As I was standing there I happened to take a look to my right and to my surprise I saw two prowlers lurking in the dark about a hundred yards away from me on my driveway, just waiting there.

I stared at the pair of prowlers for a few moments, fully expecting them to see me and walk away and leave my property like all other people observed trespassing do.  But instead of leaving they starting marching in my direction and as they got closer I saw that they were RCMP officers.  Oh shit!  Of course, as soon as I saw that they were cops I thought for sure I was going to be arrested.  Why the fuck else would two pigs be coming to my house to find me after dark?  I was totally petrified.

Anyway, as I stood there frozen like a statue, the cops came right up to me and asked me if I was Callum Houston and when I confirmed that I was they told me they were from the local RCMP detachment and their names were Stewart and Houseman.

Luckily, though, they weren’t there to arrest me.  But, while I wasn’t arrested, I was accused of something I wasn’t guilty of.  And you won’t fucking believe what I was accused of and why the cops came to my house that night.