Pubdate: Wed, 02 May 2001
Source: Ottawa Sun (CN ON)
Copyright: 2001, Canoe Limited Partnership
Contact:  http://www.canoe.ca/OttawaSun/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/329
Author: Caroline Murray

SIU PROBES DEATH DURING DRUG RAID

The province's Special Investigations Unit is looking into how a 
57-year-old man died of a heart attack during a Monday night drug 
bust in Embrun, southeast of Ottawa.

Johannes Speek of Russell was one of three people arrested after the 
OPP drug squad and the Casselman OPP detachment searched a St. 
Augustin St. address at 7:45 p.m.

Inside, police found a half kilo of cocaine, half a gram of crack 
cocaine, and a small amount of marijuana. The OPP estimates the total 
street value of the drugs at $62,000.

The investigation turned into a rescue effort after Speek complained 
of chest pains and dizziness. Police said officers at the scene 
promptly called an ambulance. Speek was pronounced dead when he 
reached Ottawa hospital at 9:20 p.m.

"It all happened very quickly," OPP spokeswoman Const. Diana Hampson 
said yesterday. "The officers at the scene did what they could in the 
circumstances that were in front of them."

An autopsy at the Ottawa Hospital General campus confirmed the cause 
of death was a heart attack. Speek's family told the Sun yesterday 
they were eager to learn more details.

"He was going to retire in two to three years, " said Jonathan Lee 
Speek, the dead man's son. "He was just in the wrong place at the 
wrong time."

He said his father was celebrating his birthday and went to his 
daughter's home to have a beer. Five minutes after he arrived, the 
police showed up and raided the home.

"He just wasn't my dad. He was my best friend," he said. Tragedy also 
struck the family last year when Speek's nephew, Trevor, was shot at 
his Hwy. 31 bachelor pad, just south of Greely. He was killed by 
career criminal Danny Feher who is currently before the courts.

Investigators spent yesterday interviewing witnesses about Monday's 
death. The SIU is required to probe any deaths that occur in police 
custody.

Police still expect to lay charges in connection with the drug bust.
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