What It’s Like Being a Cop in the Most Remote, Lonely Part of North America

This article originally appeared on VICE UK

When bullets came flying at Cory Robert, a constable for Canada's largest First Nation police service, he says it took six hours to fly in backup to the remote reserve in northern Ontario where he served as a lone on-duty cop.

"I was working late one night, and got a call that someone was barricading and shooting around," he told VICE. Robert says he called in to the Nishnawbe-Aski Police command center hundreds of miles away, and then headed to the scene alone in negative 25-degree weather. "He shot at me about five times… I was just outside, waiting. Basically my job was to make sure this guy didn't run from his house until support got there."

All cops have war stories, but unlike other Canadian cops, the ones serving far north First Nations work almost entirely alone, with few on-the-ground supports. Indigenous cops VICE spoke to said they work around the clock in poor and isolated communities, without the same equipment and resources as their non-Indigenous urban counterparts.

Robert says he's rarely had a partner during his time working for the Nishnawbe-Aski Police Service, which covers policing for two-thirds of Ontario's north. He says he's taken emergency calls at all hours of the day and night, even when he's not supposed to be working.

"You're not on call, but because you're the only officer, the call comes in. You just grow accustomed to answering the radio," Robert said. "You learn to work through it. I'm not saying this is OK, but I've worked 36 hours straight."

"I'm up in Wunnumin Lake First Nation now, I'm working alone. I have no backup or anything," Senior Constable William Michalchuk told VICE. Michalchuk has seen his own share of out-of-control situations working in a community of 700 people, from youth suicides to fires caused by oil drum heating.

Cops VICE spoke to also described run-down buildings and outdated equipment. When Michalchuk first started with the force in 2003, his Wunnumin Lake First Nation detachment burned down in the first few months. "We converted a two-bedroom house into a police station. The two bedrooms were the holding cells, with no flushing toilets."

Michalchuk says the Wunnumin Lake station has since moved into a newer building, but even that is beginning to fall apart. "We're having issues with the foundations," he said. "They're starting to cave in."

Jay Storkson, president of the union local that represents the Ontario First Nation police force, says the tough conditions are the result of chronic underfunding from two levels of government, and go against some basic police standards. He says no non-Indigenous cops are made to answer calls involving guns, domestic violence or alcohol alone.

Storkson told VICE the Nishnawbe Aski Police Service has been asking for funding increases from both provincial and federal governments for about eight years. Storkson wants the government to step in with about $15 million to cover more backup officers. His police union recently voted unanimously in favor of a strike vote, and could walk off the job by the end of the summer.

So far, neither the provincial nor federal government has made a commitment to funding First Nation policing or send representation to union talks. Lauren Souch, a communications advisor for Ontario's ministry of community safety and correctional services, told VICE the ministry is continuing to monitor the situation, and has been in touch with the Nishawbe Aski Nation's grand chief. Dan Brien with the federal safety ministry said they were invited, but "won't be part of the conciliation."

Storkson said he's disappointed the government won't be coming to the bargaining table, and says the funding gap is part of a racist system that hurts Indigenous communities. He says his officers are paid 18 percent less than the Ontario Provincial Police, who do the same training and are given far better resources. "It's a government system. It's set up this way, and it can be fixed, but there's no will to fix it, in my opinion."

If the Nishawbe Aski Police walk out, part of the government's contingency plan would be to bring in the OPP, at a cost of about $90 million. "Why is that even an option?" asked Storkson. "They're entertaining spending almost $100 million, and all we're asking is for a 10 to 15 million dollar bump in our funding."

Officers VICE spoke to said the system seems "set up to fail." The Indigenous police force isn't able to give any special attention to issues like poverty, youth suicide, or addiction, and the cops are left feeling helpless. "You can't drink the water in half of my communities, there's three, four families stacked up in houses. They basically created ghettos in the middle of the forest," Storkson said. "At some point it's going to break down. "

Storkson says he's seen rookie officers forced to cut down 10-year-old kids from ropes after they hanged themselves. "And when your call's done, there's no debrief—you go and look at a wall. There's nobody there to talk to," he said. Rashes of youth suicides have recently hit places like Attawapiskat—a community the Nishnawbe Aski Police cover.

In cases of a murder or assault, lone officers have to secure the scene, treat victims, arrest perpetrators. "It's like a tinder box—it's ready to explode when something like that happens," Storkson said. "The community's tight knit, everybody knows everybody and they're out right away, people are driving around with guns."

Michalchuk says that sometimes he's had to ask civilians to step in and help him in a tough situation. "When you're policing up north, if there's an incident or tragedy, most of the community shows up on the scene," he said.

"One year we had a break in at our detachment," recalled Michalchuk. He said someone had taken off with a carbine assault rifle and all the ammunition. "When I arrived I had no idea anything had happened until a community member asked me about a break-in. Sure enough, the gun was missing."

Still, Michalchuk says he wants to continue working in the northern Ontario lakes he grew up in. "The geographical area is so beautiful, but the underfunding is tough on us," he said. "It's like a Third World country, we're given the bare essentials."

Storkson hopes the government will step in with more support before it gets to a walkout. "We're just looking for fair and ethical treatment like every other police service in Canada."

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