The Rochfort Bridge massacre occurred on March 3, 2005 on the property of James Roszko in Rochfort Bridge, Alberta northwest of Edmonton. With a rapid-fire auto carbine rifle, Roszko shot and killed Royal Canadian Mounted Police Constables Peter Schiemann , Anthony Gordon , Lionide Johnston , and Brock Myrol as the officers were executing a property seizure on the farm. This was the largest casualty toll for the RCMP in a single operation since the Northwest Rebellion in 1885, where three constables were killed.
The slain officers had been ambushed inside a Quonset shed on the farm. They were only armed with handguns and were wearing soft body armour that would have provided no protection against Roszko's rifle. The officers apparently had not been expecting an armed confrontation, believing that Roszko was not on the property.
After fatally shooting the four officers, Roszko emerged from the shed and fired on two other officers who had heard the initial gunfire. The officers were not hit, and returned fire. Roszko, wounded by the response team, then retreated into the shed.
After losing radio contact with the officers in the shed, emergency response teams from the RCMP, Edmonton and Calgary city police and the military's Edmonton Garrison were called in, and the airspace over the property was closed. The four officers and Roszko were all found fatally shot; it has since been confirmed that Roszko killed all four officers, and then turned his weapon on himself.
One of the deceased officers, Constable Brock Warren Myrol, had graduated a month before from the RCMP Training Academy. He had been on duty only 17 days.
James Roszko
James Roszko (1959? - March 3, 2005) was a Canadian man who at the time of the massacre was believed to be operating a hydroponic marijuana grow-op in Rochfort Bridge, Alberta.
Roszko was said to have had a history of criminal and drug-related offences, and members of the nearby Mayerthorpe community interviewed in a CBC story the day following the incident described him as a 'dangerous recluse'.
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