Pubdate: Sat, 05 Oct 2002
Source: Ottawa Citizen (CN ON)
Copyright: 2002 The Ottawa Citizen
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/ottawa/ottawacitizen/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/326
Author: Jean-Francois Bertrand, The Ottawa Citizen
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/raids.htm (Drug Raids)

MAN SHOT IN RENFREW DRUG RAID

SIU Investigates OPP Actions

A 28-year-old man was in hospital last night after sustaining a gunshot 
wound in a Renfrew drug raid gone wrong.

Ontario Provincial Police fired on Louis Gia Forte yesterday morning as a 
police tactical unit executed a search warrant at 90 Opeongo Rd., a garage 
converted into an apartment.

Members of the Renfrew OPP detachment and officers from the drug 
enforcement unit were also involved in the search.

Mr. Gia Forte, also known as Louis Laroque, was transported first to 
Renfrew Victoria hospital and then airlifted to the Ottawa Hospital's Civic 
campus, where he was listed in good condition last night.

The province's Special Investigations Unit (SIU), an independent civilian 
agency, was called in to investigate the incident, as it does in every case 
in which a civilian is injured during a police action.

It is unknown if Mr. Gia Forte's girlfriend, Lisa Lavallee, or her 
nine-year-old daughter, Courtney, were in the apartment at the time.

Late yesterday, SIU spokeswoman Kaia Werbus would not say why an officer 
shot at Mr. Gia Forte.

She also declined to release any details about the drug raid or the 
investigation.

The SIU is expected to make its first statement about the incident Monday.

The raid began shortly after 9 a.m. yesterday. Bryan Burns, who lives four 
houses away, saw police officers dressed in black get out of their 
vehicles. Then he heard a very loud noise.

"If it was from a gun, it was a cannon," he said.

The blast was from the tactical team, setting off a charge to distract the 
occupants of the house while other officers entered from the rear.

Two houses away, Dan Vaillancourt heard the explosion. He was startled and 
saw a "big puff of smoke coming from the roof."

Yesterday afternoon, Mr. Vaillancourt's house was still within the OPP 
security perimeter. In a telephone interview, he said he heard a police 
officer with a bullhorn yelling they were executing a search.

"And six to eight rushed the back door, dressed like the army in their 
fatigues," he said.

Both neighbours knew Mr. Gia Forte as Louis Larocque, the name he took 
after his mother remarried. They did not hear a gunshot, only the loud 
disturbance.

Mr. Gia Forte lives in a double garage which was converted into an apartment.

His car, an older, copper-coloured Mustang with tinted windows, was in the 
driveway, the hood popped up. The car has a Quebec licence plate. Until two 
years ago, he lived in Shawville.

Mr. Vaillancourt knows the layout of the apartment, which he has visited 
before the shooting victim moved in a year ago.

"A staircase goes down, you turn right, there's a galley kitchen, maybe 
three feet by 12. It would have been massive confusion if the six to eight 
guys decided to get in there," he said.

"I don't know what happened, but the police officers must have been 
confined, tripping over each other."

"I thought he was normal. He seemed like a nice guy. He seemed nice enough 
to talk over the fence," said Mr. Vaillancourt about his neighbour.

They spoke at length last Monday while waiting to testify in a car accident 
case, at the Renfrew courthouse, he said.

Meanwhile, news of the raid and the injury has shattered the calm in 
Renfrew, a small Ottawa Valley town about 85 kilometres northwest of 
Ottawa. While raids on marijuana grow operations are not uncommon, 
yesterday's raid surprised some residents.

"What we have here is a bit unusual," said John Carter, a reporter with the 
Renfrew Mercury.
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MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager