N.B. constable unsure how wellness check escalated

Officer who killed Indigenous woman testifies at inquest

The police officer who fatally shot a 26-year-old Indigenous woman during a wellness check in Edmundston, N.B., two years ago says he doesn’t know why things escalated so quickly.

Edmundston police Const. Jeremy Son testified Tuesday at the coroner’s inquest into the death of Chantel Moore, who was shot on the balcony outside her apartment on June 4, 2020.

Son arrived at Moore’s home to check on her after her former boyfriend called 911 and told police he had received disturbing text messages that appeared to be coming from someone who may have been in Moore’s apartment.

The officer told the coroner’s jury that he reached the balcony outside Moore’s third-floor apartment at around 2:30 a.m. and could see through the window that she was sleeping on a couch.

Son, who is testifying in French, told jurors that Moore woke after he knocked on the window and shone a light on himself to show her he was a police officer in uniform. Moore appeared to grab something metallic and headed for the door of the apartment, Son told the fivemember jury.

Moore exited the apartment pointing a knife in the air and had an angry expression on her face, Son testified. She advanced toward him despite his demands that she drop the knife, he said.

“She kept moving toward me,” Son told the inquest.

He said he backed up, adding that once he got to the railing of the balcony, he had nowhere else to go. Son said he shot Moore four times in quick succession and she fell to the floor of the balcony.

“It happened very quickly,” he said, at a loss to explain why.

Edmundston Police Force policy states that officers should use their firearms as “soon as there is risk of serious injury or death.”

Son said the police force only had one working Taser, and on that night, the weapon was with another officer.