B.C. police officer stable after being shot by colleague
Last Updated: Friday, December 15, 2006 | 2:15 AM PT
The Canadian Press
A police officer is in stable condition Thursday after being shot by another officer during a drug raid on a well-known crack house in New Westminster, B.C.
The officer who was shot was wearing a bullet-proof vest, said Staff-Sgt. Casey Dehaas, a spokesman for the New Westminster police.
"It's like somebody having a huge baseball bat and hitting you full force," Dehaas said. "He suffered some serious bruising. The round did not penetrate his body. The vest stopped the round from going in."
A police unit called the Integrated Emergency Response Team, which is comprised of several Vancouver-area police forces, was executing a search warrant at the apartment where the raid occurred.
Police won't say what happened, but revealed late Thursday that the single shot fired came from a police weapon. They would not say which police department the officer who fired is from.
"He's traumatized," Dehaas said of the officer who discharged his weapon. "You're shooting a fellow police officer. We've got support for him."
No confirmation on number arrested
Dehaas said all the occupants of the apartment were taken into custody, but would not confirm how many people were arrested. One news report said there were three people arrested.
The injured officer was wearing plain clothes when he and other members of the team entered a first-floor apartment in the Vancouver suburb to execute the drug warrant, around 3 p.m. local time.
The shooting comes on the heels of the shooting of three police officers in Winnipeg last week during a late-night drug raid. A suspect was injured as well.
Two of the Winnipeg officers remain in hospital this week.
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