The Mayerthorpe Story: From Ambush to Aftermath

IT WAS CLOSE TO TWO in the morning when Julie Letal, Clayton Seguin, and Brock Myrol were released from their duties and left the Quonset hut.

And in all likelihood, James Roszko watched them leave. He had a good view of his barn from Range Road 80. From there, he dashed from one stand of brush to another. When he came to open areas, he crawled and crept his way uphill among the dips and hollows of the fields, carefully working his way towards his Quonset hut. He would have seen several uniformed Mounties get in the cars and drive away, but would not have been able to identify them.

It seems clear what his intentions were. He was scorned and laughed at by a lot of people in the area. Some of his own family had turned against him. Now he was going to lose his truck. That’s why the bailiffs had come. But worst of all, as soon as the cops got into his barn and saw the marijuana plants, he knew they were going to send him back to prison for trafficking. And the chop shop would be added on top of that.

He was afraid he would be going to jail for a long stretch this time. He hated it there. And he hated the police.

In his twisted mind, it was all the Mounties’ fault. They had harassed him for years over every little thing . . . speeding tickets, no seat belt, tinted windows on his truck. He’d always wanted to get back at them . . . give some of their own grief right back. This was his time to do it. It was now or never. He had nothing more to lose. He was going to kill as many of them as he could.

All he had to do was get close to them without being seen. But even if the police spotted him, he was ready for them. Even if they came out after him, he had Hennessey’s Winchester rifle loaded and ready. And if they got close to him and tried to jump him, he had the Beretta in his waistband.

It was a long way from the Range Road to his Quonset, but he could cover that distance easily. There was a half moon to guide him, and he knew the terrain very well. And the weather was in his favour. During the day, the temperature had approached double digits and it would barely dip below zero overnight.

For the first part of the trek, he could run and walk upright and never be seen. As he got closer, there were large patches of poplar and willow bush that would hide him. When he darted from one patch to the other, he would have to be more careful. And when he got closer to the Quonset, he knew there were two big patches of brush that would help conceal him.

He would have to creep and crawl from the last stand of brush to the Quonset, but that was a long way off, and he was confident he could do that without being seen.

For now, he had to keep walking and crawling to make sure he arrived at his Quonset before daylight.

When Brock Myrol got home, it was close to two-thirty a.m. Anjila was waiting for him at the door and was relieved to see him.

“God, I can’t stand the smell,” he said, referring to the skunky odour from Roszko’s Quonset hut that clung to his clothes. “I have to take a shower right away.”

Out at Roszko’s farm, Cpl. Jim Martin had put in a phone call to Sgt. Tom Pickard, the NCO in command of the Whitecourt Detachment. The purpose of his call was to explain to Tom that his Mayerthorpe members were exhausted and to ask Tom if he would send one of his constables out to guard the evidence in the Quonset overnight.

Pickard said he would be glad to help and would make the necessary arrangements. He had Cst. Barry Baskerville phone Cst. Tony Gordon at home.

Baskerville told Tony that the Mayerthorpe Detachment needed assistance with a surveillance project on a farm near Rochfort Bridge. He asked Tony if he would be willing to work some overtime on his last day off.

Baskerville told him to get dressed and come to the detachment office and get further instructions about the surveillance job. He could also pick up a cruiser to drive out there.

Tony put on his police gear and, before he left the apartment, looked in on Kim. Seeing that she was sleeping, Anthony flashed the overhead light on and off a few times.

Kim opened her eyes and saw him standing in silhouette, outlined by the hall light behind him.

Anthony put on his bulletproof vest, quietly left the house, and headed for the Whitecourt Detachment.

The image of his silhouette at the door still lingers in Kim’s imagination to this day.

Leo had come to bed after midnight because he had been chatting with his brother Lee in Surrey, British Columbia, for a half hour or so on their MSN Messenger computer service. This was something they did every day — either by phone or on their computers.

Lee recalls, “We didn’t talk about anything special . . . just brother talk . . . like we did all the time.”

Just before three o’clock Thursday morning on March 3, Leo was awakened by a phone call from the detachment office that gave him some detailed instructions about leaving immediately to carry out a surveillance assignment at a farm out in the county near Rochfort Bridge. A member was going to bring over the detachment pickup so that Leo could take the truck and “go sit on this shed for the night.”

Leo clearly understood the details of the assignment: He was to drive out to a farm owned by James Roszko on Range Road 75, secure the scene, and make sure nobody touched or altered the evidence in Roszko’s Quonset hut. He was told that two members from the Edmonton Auto Theft Unit would be out to search the farm around nine a.m.

Leo was also advised he would be joined on this surveillance job by Tony Gordon, a member who was heading out there from the Whitecourt Detachment.

That suited Leo fine. He knew Tony pretty well and looked forward to seeing him again.

Before he went out the door, Kelly gave him a kiss and said to him, “I love you, handsome. Be safe.”

It was about three-thirty a.m. when Leo Johnston and Tony Gordon got to the farm. By then, only Jim Martin and Cindie Dennis were still on the property.

Leo was to replace Cindie for the overnight security watch. He was armed with his 9mm service pistol and had a loaded detachment .308 calibre rifle in his vehicle. Tony was also armed and had a loaded detachment 12-gauge shotgun in his cruiser. Both were wearing their soft body armour and their full RCMP uniforms.

Jim Martin greeted them and gave them a brief summary of what had been found on the property. He told them that Roszko had fled the scene yesterday afternoon, and, although there had been a couple of sightings of him on the nearby roads, as yet he hadn’t been apprehended.

He repeated the information that the Auto Theft specialists from Edmonton would be out first thing in the morning to go over the articles in the Quonset. And Brock Myrol would be out to relieve them at that time, too.

Before Jim left, he told both Leo and Tony to position their vehicles in such a way that they could observe the site in all directions.

“Right now, I’m bushed. I’m going home to get a couple of hours’ sleep. I’ll see you guys tomorrow morning.”

After Martin left, Cindie stayed only a few minutes longer. She was the last member to leave the crime scene that early morning.

Martin got home around four o’clock and kept his PC at his house because he figured he would be going straight back to Roszko’s place around nine in the morning.

Meanwhile, Tony and Leo took up their posts on the farm. They parked their vehicles on the southeast side of the Quonset hut in such a manner that they were able to see both the front doors of the barn and Roszko’s trailer, which was about eighty yards to the south.

Their responsibility was to make sure no one entered the Quonset hut and touched anything inside. In this type of surveillance work, they had been trained to maintain the scene and regularly walk the perimeter.

As they walked around the outside of the Quonset, they would have checked both outside the hut and inside the large, open door at the front of the Quonset.

Kelly Johnston says, “I have no doubt that Leo was diligent and focused on that assignment. When Leo went to work, he went to work. He always had his game face on.”

Both Leo and Tony were aware that this was going to be a long night. One thing they could be thankful for was the fact that it wasn’t horribly cold. Although the temperature hovered around zero, the wind was moderate, which helped make their time out in the open more tolerable. They knew the weather could have been an awful lot worse.

There was a light on inside the Quonset, but outside the building the night was pitch black, with little reflection from the snow in the fields. At that particular time, the land was only lightly covered with a thin layer of snow that mostly gathered in the dips and hollows. On the crest of the hills there was hardly any snow at all.

Radio checks were made with the two members throughout their shift. Occasionally, as the morning wore on, Leo Johnston radioed the telecom centre and let them know that all was quiet at the scene.

An aerial view of Roszko’s farm. Notice the patches of brush and bush and the windbreaks he could have used for cover as he approached the Quonset. (RCMP)

It is fair to assume that some of the time, the two Mounties sat together in a cruiser, and some of the time they got out and moved around, checking inside and outside the building with their flashlights.

But from the time they had arrived on the scene, Roszko was working his way towards them over the frozen fields from the southwest of his farmstead. And as he got closer, he would have been watching carefully, trying to determine how many police were there, looking for any movement he could detect from the light going on and off inside the police cruiser or from the beams of their flashlights as they moved around his property.

Although the path of his final advance is unknown, an examination of his property would seem to indicate he probably approached the Quonset from the rear (the west).

This would mean that the only open space he had to cross was between the last patch of brush to the west and the windbreak behind his Quonset. From there, he could have used the building itself to shield his movement.

In any case, as he continued to move furtively towards his building, he would have been aware that he needed to get into the best possible position before dawn.

When the first glimmer of daylight began to show itself in the east at about seven-twenty, Leo and Tony must have been glad to see the dawn replace the darkness and ease the tension of their lonely vigil.

Around that same time, Brock Myrol was getting up again, because he was eager to get out to the crime scene by nine.

Before he left the house, he came into the bedroom to snuggle a little bit with Anjila. But with his full gun belt, his cuffs, and his vest, it was awkward for them to hug.

Brock agreed, and they kidded a little bit about some cartoons that Anjila had been watching the night before.

And he was gone again to meet Clayton Seguin so they could walk over to the detachment office together.

At 8:00 a.m., Cst. Steve Vigor left his home in an unmarked Yukon Suburban to pick up his partner, Garret Hoogestraat, in Sherwood Park, an eastern suburb of Edmonton. They were the two specialists with the Auto Theft Unit who were assigned to attend Roszko’s farm and investigate the stolen vehicles and stolen auto parts that were found on his property.

The other two members of this unit were Cpl. Murray Savage and Cst. Chris Laubman. The unit’s mandate was to investigate the role and function of organized crime in the realm of stolen vehicles. Over the years, stealing cars and trucks had developed into a highly structured and extremely lucrative criminal enterprise that drained millions of dollars from the Canadian economy.

The focus of the Auto Theft Section was on the major players in the stolen car game. The unit didn’t get involved with single automotive thefts or go after joyriding teenagers who stole cars for weekend thrills. They were after the organized network of thieves who made the big money in this illegal venture.

Steve Vigor and Garret Hoogestraat were both accomplished policemen whose individual talents and interests made them effective partners.

Corporal Steve Vigor, the Mountie who shot James Roszko. (RCMP)

Constable Garrett Hoogestraat, the Mountie who shielded Steve Vigor from Roszko’s lethal guns. (RCMP)

Vigor, fifty-two, had twenty-six years’ experience as a Mountie. At five-nine and 175 pounds, he was a slightly built man who wore glasses and looked more like a librarian than the daring policeman he was — one who would eventually be honoured for his bravery by the Governor General of Canada.

Steve graduated from Depot in 1979 and then served in Alberta detachments at Fort McMurray, Fort Chipewan, Jasper, and Sherwood Park. Most recently, he was posted to the Auto Theft Section at Edmonton Headquarters.

Vigor had always harboured an interest in becoming a member of the “K” Division (Alberta) Emergency Response Team. And in May 1992, his potential in this capacity was recognized when he was invited to join them as a probationary “striker.” Six months later, he was sent to Ottawa to take the RCMP’S special ERT training course, which he passed with flying colours.

The five-week ERT course is a physically demanding process offered at the RCMP college in Ottawa. Candidates in the course spend a lot of time on the shooting range firing high-powered weapons. This is Steve’s forté. He is an excellent shot, rated as an RCMP marksman.

Participants in the course also spend time practising their skills in sniper training, fighting in the gym in close-quarter bouts, and driving on the roadways at Depot making high-risk vehicle stops.

When Vigor became a bona fide member of Edmonton’s ERT, he soon learned the hazardous work they do creates a special bond among its members.

“I can’t tell you how much being an ERT member means to me. The bond among us is very strong. The realization that these guys are willing to put their life on the line for you is overpowering. And, of course, you’re going to do the same for them. Their dedication is second to none. When that ERT pager goes off, everybody turns up ready to go.”

In his twelve-plus years with the ERT unit, Steve had participated in his fair share of dangerous assignments. The most perilous occurred in February 2004, when he was involved in a tragic case at Spruce Grove, Alberta, a western suburb of Edmonton. In that incident, one of the RCMP’S best dog masters, Jim Galloway, was shot and killed by a violent and emotionally unstable man named Martin Ostopovich.

Ostopovich, who was known to the police as a troubled personality, had shot the windows out of his neighbour’s car and then holed up in his house most of the day with some high-powered weapons. He had also contacted the media claiming he was going to kill “some cops.”

The Edmonton ERT was called in to handle the situation, and as soon as they came on the scene, Ostopovich declared to them over the phone he was going to get into his pickup truck with his guns and leave the area. The police advised him he could not do that.

When Ostopovich came out of the house armed with two high-powered rifles and climbed into his vehicle, the ERT made their move. Steve Vigor and two other ERT members rushed Ostopovich’s truck on foot while Jim Galloway rammed his GMC Suburban into his vehicle. The idea was for Galloway to tip Ostopovich’s truck over. But because of the snow on the street, the pickup didn’t roll over, it just slid sideways.

And, after the collision, as Galloway tried to run for cover, Ostopovich shot him in the back at close range. That’s when Vigor and the two other ERT members charged Ostopovich’s pickup, opened fire, and shot him dead.

In that case, it is of interest to note that Steve Vigor will never be told whether or not it was the shots he fired that killed Martin Ostopovich. That’s because it is ERT policy not to divulge this information to anyone, particularly the ERT members who participated in a fatal incident.

Garret Hoogestraat’s police experience is quite different from Steve Vigor’s, but equally interesting. At six feet and 195 pounds, Garret Hoogestraat was a bigger man than Vigor and eight years younger. The great interest in his life has always been automobiles. Ever since he was a youngster, Garret loved working with them and learning about them. As a teenager he took an apprenticeship in diesel mechanics.

During his fourteen-year police career he served in detachments of varying sizes. His first five years were spent at a small rural unit in Two Hills in northern Alberta. Then he was transferred to Sherwood Park, where he served for six years with its huge sixty-five-member contingent. From there, his application was accepted for him to join the Auto Theft Section at Edmonton Headquarters. And for the last three years this particular type of work had become his passion.

Like his partner, Vigor, Hoogestraat also serves on a dangerous specialty crew. In 2004 he became a part-time member of the Explosives Disposal Unit, which also works out of Edmonton Headquarters. By all accounts, this is the most delicate and dangerous specialty there is in police work.

And so it’s obvious that although these men are quite different in their personalities and their interests, the common trait they share is their intrepid daring.

But that was a quality that didn’t seem to be required as they prepared to go to work at James Roszko’s farm.

When Vigor picked Hoogestraat up that Thursday morning, they both figured that they were going out on another routine call to assist a detachment with a search warrant.

As Vigor says, “As far I could tell, it was just another case of checking out a small part of a bigger picture.”

They didn’t even have an address for the search site. But they knew it was near Mayerthorpe, so Vigor headed west on Highway #16 and then north on Highway #43.

Along the way, Garret got on his cell phone and called the Mayerthorpe Detachment for more specific directions. From what they told him, he figured the drive would take about two hours.

“But we aren’t going to make it going this slow,” he said to Vigor. “My grandmother drives faster than you do.”

Steve says, “I remember it was a beautiful day . . . bright sunshine . . . temperature around zero. Actually it was a lovely drive.”

About this same time in Mayerthorpe, Clayton Seguin and Brock Myrol were in uniform walking toward the detachment office.

Clayton was Brock’s trainer, which meant the two of them would work closely together for the first two months that Brock was on the job. That worked out well because they lived only two blocks from each other.

Clayton says, “We met outside my place just after eight o’clock and we were both kind of drowsy because we’d got to bed so late.”

As they walked along, Clayton remembers he said to Brock, “This is just like being on foot patrol . . . like we’re walking a beat together.”

Just after they got to the office, Peter Schiemann came in. He was dressed in civvies — a dark jacket, blue jeans, and running shoes. Peter told them he was going into Edmonton to buy some camera equipment for the interdiction crew. The reason he was wearing civilian clothes was because detachment policy dictated that no member should wear his or her uniform while shopping.

Jim Martin was up at 8:30 a.m. He had a quick shower and a cup of coffee and was out of the house by nine. “I wanted to get in there early and see who was there . . . get some manpower and head out to Roszko’s.”

He got to the detachment just after nine o’clock and the first thing he did was contact Leo Johnston out at the Roszko’s farm.

“Auto Theft said they were leaving around eight this morning. They’re going directly out there.”

Then Martin phoned the detachments at Barrhead and Evansburg and let them know what was happening in the Roszko investigation.

That morning, Brock Myrol had been assigned to go back out to Roszko’s farm, and Clayton was supposed to drive him out there. But Clayton had to attend a trial with Julie Letal on the Alexis Reserve, a Nakota Sioux reservation located on Lac Ste. Anne 45 kilometres southeast of Mayerthorpe. Alexis is a modest-size reservation with a population of less than 900 Natives. Some of the reservations in Alberta are ten times that size.

For Clayton Seguin, it was very important that he attend this trial, because the case involved a man who had pointed a rifle in his face during a domestic dispute. Consequently, Clayton’s testimony was crucial.

“Peter,” Clayton said, “I’ve got this trial on the Alexis reserve. Do you mind taking Brock out to Roszko’s place?”

It was just an insignificant little change of plans that happen all the time among colleagues, but for both Peter Schiemann and Clayton Seguin, the consequences of that change would soon prove to be monumental.

As Seguin and Letal were preparing to leave for their trial, Peter and Brock approached Jim Martin about feeding Roszko’s dogs some sedated meat to keep them docile for the day.

Coincidentally, it was at that time that Cpl. Jeff Whipple was on the phone to Roszko’s mother, Stephanie Fifield, about the dogs.

Jeff says, “I phoned her at her home and told her we were having trouble with his two dogs. I asked her if she would come over to his property and take the dogs away . . . take them over to her place.”

Stephanie said no. She claimed they were vicious animals and she didn’t want anything to do with them.

Jeff continued, “Well, do you know anybody who can come over there and look after these dogs . . . a neighbour, a friend, a member of your family?”

Jeff remembers, “She wasn’t angry or anything. She just wasn’t helpful at all. She didn’t want to get involved.

“So on that basis, it was a good thing that Peter and Brock were going to sedate those dogs with the meat. If those two dogs ever got loose, they could have been a real handful.”

At 9:05 a.m., Jim Martin radioed Leo Johnston and Tony Gordon at the farm. They advised there had not been any sightings of Roszko during their shift.

Martin was just about to go out the door when the office manager, Pat Lakeman, called Jim back. She advised him that the Green Team needed some information off the search warrant.

So Martin came back in and phoned Lorne Adamitz in Edmonton and spoke to him for about twenty minutes about the warrant.

By this time, Peter Schiemann and Brock Myrol had bought the meat and were now pulling up to the local veterinary clinic on 42nd Avenue. They went inside and explained to Dr. John Kyle that they wanted a sedative they could inject into the meat to calm Roszko’s savage beasts.

“I knew Peter Schiemann. He was a real nice guy. But I knew Leo Johnston and Kelly better, because I tended to their black lab when he had a lesion on his tail.

“I also knew Roszko’s dogs. They were vicious. One time I had to go out there and pull some porcupine quills out of their faces. And the only way I could work on them was to put them to sleep.

“I know James Roszko had a bad reputation around town, but he was all right with me. That’s because he used to have a herd of cattle . . . maybe fifty head or more, and I serviced them . . . so he needed me.

“Anyway, they wanted to sedate the dogs, so I gave them a sedative in a syringe so they could inject it into the meat.

There is a slight quiver in the doctor’s voice as he adds, “That’s the last time I saw those guys.”

Out at the farm, Leo and Tony were waiting to be relieved. As the clock reached 9:25 a.m., they knew that a bunch of their members would be out there soon. Jim Martin and Brock Myrol were on their way, and the Auto Theft guys from Edmonton would be there soon, too.

They were unaware that sometime during the night or early morning, Roszko had managed to sneak by them and get into the Quonset hut.

Thinking about it in retrospect, that would not have been a difficult thing for him to do. As he got closer, he could see most of the moves they made.

In the dark, he would have been able to see flashes of them when they went past the lighted open end of the Quonset. He could detect their movements around the yard from the beam of their flashlights or tell when they were in their vehicles by the lights going on and off inside their PCs.

Conversely, in the dark, he would have been almost impossible to see. The patches of brush would have concealed him completely. When he crossed an open space, he had a white sheet to camouflage him. And, when necessary, with the sheet over him he could lie low and hide in the irregular depressions in the open field. As he got very close to the Quonset, the socks he had pulled over his shoes would have muffled the sound of his feet crunching in the snow.

As Roszko advanced closer to the Quonset, there were lots of places for him to hide: behind his trailer south of his barn, behind the pine windbreak to the west of the trailer, behind the tall wooden windbreak at the back of the Quonset, or behind the evergreen hedge at the back of his steel barn. And he could use the huge bulk of the Quonset hut to his advantage. When Leo and Tony were on one side of the structure, he could be hiding on the other.

No matter when he crept into the Quonset or how he managed to do it, by the time Peter Schiemann and Brock Myrol arrived that Thursday morning, Roszko was in there, hiding.

Furthermore, he was waiting with the Heckler and Koch semi-automatic assault rifle in his hands.

Did he have that gun hidden somewhere in the Quonset and retrieve it from its hiding place when he crept in? Or did he keep that gun somewhere else and retrieve it before he ever got to the Quonset?

What we do know is that James Roszko did not have the Heckler and Koch rifle with him when Shawn Hennessey let him off some seven hours earlier on Range Road 80.

At 9:30 a.m., Schiemann and Myrol pulled into Roszko’s yard and parked their car beside Leo’s and Tony’s vehicles at the southeast end of the Quonset hut.

After a brief exchange of hellos, Peter told Leo and Tony he had brought some sedated meat to give to the dogs.

The two curs were still trapped in the old granary shed at the west end of the Quonset. Part of the roof on the shed had some boards missing and it was through that gap that they intended to feed the meat to the animals.

They got a ladder, propped it up against the shed, and threw the meat down to the two snarling beasts below who tore into the flesh like ravenous predators.

Out on Highway#18, Vigor and Hoogestraat were having a little trouble finding Range Road 75.

“We missed the sign and drove a little ways past it before Garret told me to stop and back up.”

When they got squared around, it was a short trip down the Range Road to Roszko’s lane.

While the four Mounties were tending to the dogs, Roszko had taken up a position in the Quonset behind some large white plastic casks that had been used to water the marijuana plants. These casks were just inside the southeast corner of the hut a few feet inside the human door.

The four at the dog shed had just finished feeding the dogs when Vigor and Hoogestraat pulled into Roszko’s laneway. Steve could see all four standing beside the old shed as he steered his way through the yard towards them. He ended up parking his Yukon parallel to the Quonset at its southwest corner. The dog’s granary shed was only a few yards away.

Hoogestraat climbed out of the vehicle and went behind it to get his coveralls out of the back section. Vigor remained behind the wheel making some investigation notes. His first annotation indicated their arrival time was 9:56 a.m.

As Hoogestraat was pulling on his coveralls, the four Mounties left the dogs and came towards him. Hoogestraat chatted briefly with all of them, but the one he knew best was Tony Gordon. They had worked on a previous project together. Garret asked him about the crime scene. He wanted to know how big the property was and asked for a layout of the search site.

Tony pointed out the property lines and told him the main search area was in the Quonset, but there was a piece of a vehicle under a blue tarp behind the steel hut.

Garret walked with Tony about halfway along the length of the Quonset and had every intention of going inside the building with the other four, but at the last minute changed his mind.

“I have to go back and get a couple of tools,” Garret said to Tony. “I’ll be with you shortly.”

And with that the two parted. Tony joined the other three as they headed for the front of the hut; Garret went back to the Yukon to get his tools.

In reflection, Hoogestraat says, “I guess that was the luckiest decision of my life.”

As the four disappeared around the corner of the hut, Garret was gathering a scraper and a couple of other tools from the back of the Yukon. Steve was still behind the wheel, writing.

Garret says, “Then I heard two loud cracking sounds like metal hitting on metal.”

Steve says, “Initially, I didn’t realize what the loud bangs were. It sounded like someone had hit the inside of the Quonset wall with something heavy. Then, in a very brief period of time following those two bangs, there was a series of more bangs . . . between twelve and fifteen that I recollect. And I heard someone screaming in pain.”

When Vigor and Hoogestraat heard the multiple bangs, they both realized the sounds were gunshots. They immediately began to run the length of the building toward the big main door.

On the run, Vigor pulled out his weapon and when he got about halfway along the building, he yelled, “Garret, get back to the car and call in backup. We probably have officers down. “

Hoogestraat turned and ran back to the Yukon Suburban, grabbed his cell phone, and dialed 911. When he got Edmonton telecom, he yelled, “Officer down! Officer down! Request backup. Shots fired. Officer down!”

As Vigor ran past the three police vehicles (Gordon’s, Johnston’s, and Schiemann’s) parked at the east end of the Quonset, he saw a small man emerge from the building with some articles in his hands.

“A male suspect exited the Quonset hut. He was about thirty-five feet away. He was carrying a long-barrelled weapon in his hands, a semi-automatic rifle. There was another long-barrelled weapon over his shoulder.

“He turned and had a surprised look on his face. He obviously didn’t think there were more officers outside.”