Pubdate: Sat, 03 Mar 2007
Source: Montreal Gazette (CN QU)
Copyright: 2007 The Gazette, a division of Southam Inc.
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/montreal/montrealgazette/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/274
Author: David Johnston, Kazi Stastna, Elizabeth Thompson and Rene Bruemmer
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/raids.htm (Drug Raids)

SLAIN POLICE OFFICER 'A GOOD FAMILY MAN'

When Constable Daniel Tessier was declared dead yesterday at Charles 
LeMoyne Hospital in Greenfield Park, Laval police chief Jean-Pierre 
Gariepy knew the impact on staff morale was going to be considerable.

Just 15 months ago, another Laval police officer, Constable Valerie 
Gignac, was shot dead in the line of duty.

So before Laval police would confirm they lost one of their own in a 
pre-dawn drug raid in Brossard, Gariepy personally delivered the bad 
news to detectives' headquarters on Le Corbusier Blvd., where Tessier 
was based.

Then Gariepy made a second visit - to the building on St. Martin 
Blvd. that houses the uniformed branch. The building was renamed 
Edifice Valerie Gignac last December.

"Our people are in deep shock, very heavy shock," explained a 
composed and eloquent Gariepy at a noon news conference at Laval 
police headquarters.

Tessier, 42, the husband of Repentigny police Constable Dominique 
Lapointe, and father of two daughters, age 10 and 12, will probably 
be honoured at a civic funeral in Laval next Thursday or Friday.

Flags at Laval's city hall will fly at half-staff until Tessier is 
buried, city officials said.

Tessier was shot during a pre-dawn police raid on Rimouski Cres. in 
Brossard, on the South Shore. Laval Constable Stephane Forbes, 46, 
one of at least 13 other officers involved in the raid, was shot in 
the arm and was in good condition yesterday in a hospital.

One of two adults who were inside the Brossard home was arrested.

Simultaneous raids in Laval resulted in six arrests. The seven 
arrests are related to a nine-month investigation into a cocaine and 
crack-cocaine trafficking gang that was based mainly out of the 
Chomedey district of Laval.

By last night, one of those six arrested in Laval had been released 
without charge.

The others are: Nikolaos Xanthis, 26, charged with possession with 
intent to traffic, and possession of a prohibited weapon; Constantine 
Xanthis, 23, charged with nine counts of trafficking; Kosta 
Katsiouleris, 29, charged with nine counts of trafficking; Hari 
Katsiousleris, 25, charged with one count of trafficking; and 
Emmanuel Mavroudis, 21, charged with 12 counts of trafficking.

Bail hearings are to be held next week.

As is required when a police force is involved in an exchange of 
gunfire in which there is a fatality, the investigation has been 
handed to another force - in this case, the Surete du Quebec.

The SQ have identified the man and woman who were in the Brossard 
house at the time of the fatal raid, Lt. Francois Dore said last 
night, but would not make their names public.

However, according to land records and neighbours, the spacious, 
two-storey Brossard home has been owned since 2004 by Billy Basil 
Parasiris and his spouse, Penny Panagiota Gounis.

The woman was shot during the exchange of fire and transported to a 
hospital, where she remained last night, the SQ said.

The man was arrested by Laval police and later turned over to the SQ. 
He was being questioned by SQ investigators and was to be transferred 
to the Riviere des Prairies detention centre last night. He will 
probably appear in the Longueuil courthouse Monday morning, the SQ 
said, but the police would not specify what charges he would face.

A 6-year-old girl and a 15-year-old boy - who are believed to be the 
children of the man and woman - were also in the house, Dore said.

Yesterday's raid came only a week after Tessier's appointment to the 
Laval force's drug and morality squad, although the constable had 17 
years of experience with the force.

Gariepy said Tessier had undergone specialized training and was 
qualified to handle a situation like the one that unfolded tragically 
in Brossard around

5 a.m. "Sometimes when we deal with these kinds of people (i.e., 
suspected drug dealers), it's like if you flip a coin. You get lucky 
- - or it turns out to be the other way. This morning, it turned out 
the other way."

Gariepy later returned to the gambling theme.

"We have dangerous work," he said. "And when you do dangerous work, 
there are risks. You have the training, you have all the equipment 
necessary - but still, you're left with an extremely dangerous grey 
zone. There's always that thin line that when you cross it, it's 
risky, it's dangerous. "

Gariepy struggled to keep his composure when he described opening 
Tessier's employment file yesterday and discovering he had dropped 
out of civil engineering studies to become a police officer.

Gilles Lemieux, president of the Laval police union, said of 
Tessier's death: "For us, this is really, really hard. But we will 
work hard on morale."

Premier Jean Charest offered his condolences to the family of the 
slain officer.

Exactly what happened on Rimouski Cres. yesterday is not clear. The 
SQ began their probe by sequestering 12 officers who took part in the 
Brossard operation, other than Tessier and Forbes, inside a Longueuil 
police facility. The Surete then questioned them one by one.

Only after the questioning was completed were senior Laval officers 
allowed access to do their own debriefing.

At a news conference late yesterday, the SQ said their investigation 
will deal strictly with details related to the shooting.

"The aim of the SQ investigation is to establish the circumstances 
and sequence of events that led to the death of Mr. Tessier," Dore said.

It will not be up to the provincial police force to determine whether 
proper police procedure was followed during the operation, for example.

"Each police department is responsible for its own procedures and 
ways of doing things. It's not the aim of the SQ to judge this," Dore said.

Quebec's workplace health and safety board has launched its own probe 
into the shooting.

SQ investigators were meeting with witnesses and officers late 
yesterday afternoon and awaiting the results of ballistic analysis 
and an autopsy to determine details such as the number of shots 
fired, who fired them and the location of the roughly dozen Laval 
officers who were on site during the Rimouski Cres. operation, Dore said.

"At this point, it's impossible to draw any conclusions."

An SQ tactical group had assisted Laval police in the execution of 
other search warrants on Laval territory that were part of the series 
of raids carried out yesterday morning, but it was not involved in 
the Brossard operation.

In December 2005, Constable Valerie Gignac was killed while 
responding to a complaint concerning a man making too much noise in 
his apartment.

Francois Pepin was charged with first-degree murder and remains in 
custody pending court proceedings.

Gignac's death was "a wound that still hasn't healed," Gariepy said.

"And now we are faced with another death."

Messages of condolence: Information on Tessier's funeral arrangements will be posted on the 
city of Laval website: www.ville.laval.qc.ca/
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman