THUNDER BAY – City police chief Darcy Fleury isn't surprised to see Thunder Bay rank highest among Canadian cities for the severity of violent crimes.
The city's 2024 rate on a violent crime severity index was more than double the national average and up more than 7 per cent over the 2023 numbers.
“We know that Thunder Bay is a very busy, very busy place for policing, and the stats kind of represent what we've seen over the year," Fleury told Newswatch in an interview. "And it doesn't catch us by surprise at all.”
“I think we've done some really great work to put some emphasis on some of the more threatening areas of danger to our community. So, I think that's reflective of the work that we've been doing.”
Fleury said the police service recognizes the city has “a fairly big drug problem” that goes hand-in-hand with the city’s “socioeconomic situation.”
“I think the frontline officers are seeing that on a regular basis. I've mentioned this throughout my time in the community, that a lot of times we're seeing our officers being tied up with mental health calls or those types of situations where they take resources away from us doing other things,” Fleury said.
When asked what could be done to lower the city's violent crime rate, he said the police service needs to continue working with the social service agencies and push all levels of government to understand that people with mental health and addiction issues are “not a justice situation. It's not an enforcement situation.”
Police will “concentrate on those people who supply and bring the bad activity to our community. But the other agencies, if they're funded properly and doing the work they're doing, should really help us direct people away from the justice system,” Fleury said.
He said the larger threats to the city are guns, gangs, and drugs activity, “which result in some of the more severe incidents of crime.”
Fleury said the police service is going to “concentrate” on the guns, gangs, and drugs initiative “for the next little while” and “send the message to those people that come here to do harm…that activity is not wanted.”
Although the statistics showed an increase in violent crimes last year, Fleury emphasized that the police service had “a very good clearance rate” in solving crimes around the city.
“The clearance rate, I think it's really significant to point out. That goes right through the entire service from our frontline officers, people on patrol, and the work that they're doing, all the way through our specialty units and being involved in different types of criminal activity or investigations,” Fleury said.
“The work that they do in order to get a satisfactory end to these things is very important, and that's a really a proud thing for the service to have, and the community should be glad that they put that much effort to make sure that we're getting those things done.”
Mayor Ken Boshcoff also praised the enforcement efforts of police, both in the city and throughout the region.
“As a city that's in the centre of a region that's larger than many countries, and we have the port, the airport, all the highways converge here — I think that our police forces ... are doing a great job, particularly in apprehension,” Boshcoff said.
“So, the stats don't really reflect what's really happening here in Thunder Bay, just because it is per capita. I could walk anywhere pretty much like you can in any city without any kind of fear, and I think that we remain the safest cities.”
