Gamètì 'almost begging for support' from RCMP over drug dealers

Senior administrator Sherbaz Muhammad said a recent hand games tournament led to a sudden influx of money – more than 50 players received cash from the prize pot of $100,000 – giving some dealers a reason to visit the Northwest Territories community.

Muhammad says the community government has received at least 15 reports of drug-related crimes.

"Community members have been talking to the council, including our chief, and they've been reporting that an individual has been selling drugs," he said.

"My council made a decision to remove this individual from the community."

Gamètì has no full-time RCMP presence and no road into or out of the community, other than a briefly operational winter road. If something happens and no officers are there, police can be flown in to assist.

For Muhammad, the perception is that while a domestic violence report might trigger the arrival of officers on a chartered aircraft, drugs don't pose such an immediate threat – and dealers get away with it by keeping track of the weekly RCMP travel schedule.

"Five and a half days with no RCMP presence. So, the drug dealers have basically got this licence to do whatever they want to do," he said. (When the winter road is closed, he said dealers use Canada Post to send carefully packaged parcels of their goods.)

According to Muhammad, RCMP spent 13 days in Gamètì during March after receiving a "massive amount of calls and complaints." During last year's wildfires, he recalls police being in the community for seven days. When Yellowknife had to evacuate, he said, police weren't present for the whole month.

"This way of policing is not actually working. Two cops have to be here 24-7," he said.

Gamètì doesn't have a jail. Muhammad describes the RCMP presence in the community as "one small little office."

"They don't have even resources to investigate somebody or put them behind the bars ... Cops are here in the community for a couple of days and then they just leave. With the community, they don't have any options left," he said.

"Are they going to help themselves? Can the community government hire its own security guards or train them? I don't think so."

Chief Doreen Arrowmaker believes a full-time police presence would make drug dealers less comfortable in the community.

"It seems like people who are dealing, they have more rights than people that are vulnerable or dealing with addictions. The RCMP have been informed and notified, and there's a cry for help for them," Chief Arrowmaker said.

"Despite how small a community is, what the population is, or how isolated it is, there should be some adequate services that are provided. But what we're seeing right now is that's not the case. The fact that we're almost begging for support at the community level, and the runarounds we're given with the lack of support, just speaks volumes."

Together with bootlegged alcohol – smuggled in by winter road during windows when the RCMP aren't there – the result is "an endless cycle of falling off the wagon," Muhammad said.

"The lack of support that these people receive and the fact that these illegal substances are readily available? I don't think it's normal. Not only that, what are we doing for our vulnerable society when we can't help them?" Arrowmaker asked.

RCMP spokesperson Cpl Matt Halstead said Gamètì's community government had been in touch with the detachment commander in charge of the local patrol to express "frustration with the court process and some of the drug dealing complaints that are coming in."

How RCMP staff a community depends on call volume and availability of funding, among other factors, Halstead said. Funding decisions are made at the federal and territorial level.

Ngan Trinh, a spokesperson for the N.W.T.'s Department of Justice, said there are no plans to station a full-time officer in the community.

"Gamètì has a successful patrol model with supports from Behchokǫ̀. This patrol model is seen in many other isolated locations in other jurisdictions where the RCMP does not have a permanent presence," Trinh said in an email.

"G Division has implemented a drug strategy targeting the disruption of the drug trade. This strategy is designed to strengthen the current capacity of investigators and use resources to target drugs/firearms trafficking and gangs/organized crime."

Halstead acknowledged that when officers need to fly to Gamètì in a hurry, there can be all sorts of reasons for delays – from acquiring specialist response teams, depending on the type of incident, to finding a plane with the right capacity and a pilot available to fly it.

"Sometimes we have to charter, so it's really hard to say what kind of delays there are, but they can be 40 minutes or half hour to hours," he said.

"Certainly, anywhere you don't have a full-time presence, there's a potential for delays."

Arrowmaker says delays have consequences in her community.

As an example, she said, police took almost eight hours to come when a violent death happened roughly a decade ago.

"I wish that the RCMP would be more supportive. I wish that they were readily available. Obviously, everybody has lives, but at the same time I feel like community safety is on the back burner," she said.

"I can only speak to Gamètì, but I'm sure a lot of other communities in the territories often experience the same thing where they're left on their own, unsupported.

'There is a big gap within the system of providing service. At the end of the day, we want to ensure that our vulnerable community members are safe and the children in our community to be in a safe environment. It's hard when you don't see that often."

Halstead said police are being as responsive as they can.

"Whenever Gamètì calls, we answer. I think the frustration there is what we're seeing in a lot of communities that are struggling with some drug trafficking," he said.

"Everyone knows – or thinks they know – who the drug dealer is in town, but we don't have any information or anyone willing to give us a statement so that we can write warrants or make arrests.

"That frustration exists everywhere, and certainly would probably be compounded by the fact that RCMP aren't fully present in the community at all times."

Aastha Sethi, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Cabin Radio