David Matthew Wynn (October 18, 1972 – January 21, 2015) was a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

police officer A police officer (also called a policeman and, less commonly, a policewoman) is a warranted law employee of a police force. In most countries, "police officer" is a generic term not specifying a particular rank. In some, the use of the ...

in the St. Albert

RCMP The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP; french: Gendarmerie royale du Canada; french: GRC, label=none), commonly known in English as the Mounties (and colloquially in French as ) is the federal and national police service of Canada. As poli ...

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

. David Wynn was shot and killed by Shawn Rehn in St. Albert's Apex Casino during a routine license plate check. He is the namesake of a defeated law, Wynn's Law, that would have made it more difficult for suspects to make bail if they had a criminal history. David Wynn was posthumously awarded a bravery award by the RCMP commissioner.

Background

Wynn was born in

Newcastle, New Brunswick Newcastle is an urban neighbourhood in the city of Miramichi, New Brunswick, Canada. Prior to municipal amalgamation in 1995, it was an incorporated town and the shire town of Northumberland County. Situated on the north bank of the Miramichi R ...

in 1972. Before becoming a police officer, Wynn was a

paramedic A paramedic is a registered healthcare professional who works autonomously across a range of health and care settings and may specialise in clinical practice, as well as in education, leadership, and research. Not all ambulance personnel are p ...

for

Emergency Health Services Emergency Health Services (EHS) is a branch of the Nova Scotia Department of Health tasked with providing emergency medical services. It is also responsible for transportation of patients between hospitals and medical facilities. At present, all ...

in Bridgewater, NS from between 1996 and 2009. In 2009 he joined the St. Albert RCMP.

Death

Const. David Wynn was shot in the head during a routine license plate check on January 17, 2015. He succumbed to his injuries four days later on January 21.

Apex Casino shooting

On January 17, 2015, Const. Wynn was at the Apex Casino in St. Albert, Alberta. He had been undergoing a routine check of the license plates in the parking lot — a common task on a slow night such as that one — when he found a plate that was not registered to the truck it was on. Suspecting vehicle theft, he went inside the casino to check the video footage. A second officer, Aux. Const. Derek Bond, was called in to help review the tape. At around 3 am, the two officers identified the man, who was still in the casino at the time. They chased after the man, who fled. When Wynn tried to grab the suspect by the arm, the man turned around and shot him in the head. Bond attempted to subdue the shooter, but in the struggle was shot in the torso and right arm. The shooter fled the casino to an unoccupied home, where he shot himself. Police found the body shortly after when they identified the stolen vehicle outside the home. The man was identified the next day as Shawn Rehn, a 34 year old career criminal. Later that day, it was announced that Const. Wynn was not expected to survive. On January 19, Wynn's family gathered to say their final goodbyes. Over the next several days, words of support came from across the country. Wynn was taken off life support on January 21, 2015.

Funeral

The funeral saw attendance numbers in the thousands. Among notable attendees were then Prime Minister

Stephen Harper Stephen Joseph Harper (born April 30, 1959) is a Canadian politician who served as the 22nd prime minister of Canada from 2006 to 2015. Harper is the first and only prime minister to come from the modern-day Conservative Party of Canada, ...

and then Alberta Premier

Jim Prentice Peter Eric James Prentice (July 20, 1956 – October 13, 2016) was a Canadian politician who served as the 16th premier of Alberta from 2014 to 2015. In the 2004 federal election he was elected to the House of Commons of Canada as a candidate ...

. The service was held at

Servus Credit Union Place Servus Credit Union Place (or Servus Place for short) is a $43-million multipurpose leisure centre that opened on September 30, 2006 in St. Albert, Alberta. At , Servus Place includes three NHL-sized arenas, an aquatic centre, fitness centre, indo ...

, and was broadcast across the country.

Wynn's Law

Wynn's Law was a proposed piece of legislation that ultimately was not passed. Bill S-217 was defeated in the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...

on June 14, 2017 under

Justin Trudeau Justin Pierre James Trudeau ( , ; born December 25, 1971) is a Canadian politician who is the 23rd and current prime minister of Canada. He has served as the prime minister of Canada since 2015 and as the leader of the Liberal Party since 2 ...

's government. The bill was introduced by Senator

Bob Runciman Robert William "Bob" Runciman (born August 10, 1942) is a veteran Canadian politician and former provincial Leader of the Opposition in the Ontario Legislature. First elected to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario in 1981, he held the seat cont ...

on February 3, 2016, and was sponsored by MP

Michael Cooper Michael Jerome Cooper (born April 15, 1956) is an American basketball coach and former player who is the boys varsity coach at Culver City High School. He played for the Los Angeles Lakers in the National Basketball Association (NBA), winning ...

. The bill was to make changes to the

Criminal Code A criminal code (or penal code) is a document that compiles all, or a significant amount of a particular jurisdiction's criminal law. Typically a criminal code will contain offences that are recognised in the jurisdiction, penalties that migh ...

that would have made it mandatory to disclose a suspect's criminal history during a bail hearing. It was named after Wynn because his killer Shawn Rehn had been out on bail at the time of the shootings, despite having many previous charges. It was argued that these previous charges should have been disclosed at Rehn's bail hearing, and that such a change may have prevented Wynn's death. The bill was championed by Wynn's wife Shelly, who at times through the process voiced her displeasure at the

Liberal Liberal or liberalism may refer to: Politics * a supporter of liberalism ** Liberalism by country * an adherent of a Liberal Party * Liberalism (international relations) * Sexually liberal feminism * Social liberalism Arts, entertainment and m ...

government, who were accused of opposing the bill on political grounds. The liberal government had previously stated that they would not support the law.

Awards

Bravery award

Const. David Wynn was posthumously given a bravery award by the RCMP Commissioner in March, 2019. The award recognized both him and Auxiliary Const. Derek Bond for engaging an armed suspect after being fired upon. Two of Wynn's sons, Nathan and Matthew, accepted the award on his behalf.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wynn, David Matthew 1972 births 2015 deaths Deaths by firearm in Alberta Male murder victims Canadian police officers People from Miramichi, New Brunswick People from St. Albert, Alberta People murdered in Alberta 2015 murders in Canada