An RCMP officer who killed a man at the end of a shooting spree in Langley, B.C., last summer has been cleared of any wrongdoing, according to the province’s police watchdog.
The death of Jordan Daniel Goggin, 28, occurred July 25, 2022, after he had shot four people, leaving two men dead, and another man and woman injured over the course of seven hours.
“Civilians had been shot in different locations throughout Langley. Two people had died, and one had suffered from serious injuries as a result of the shootings,” Ronald H. MacDonald, chief civilian director of the Independent Investigations Office of BC (IIOBC), said in his decision Thursday.
At 5:25 a.m., a call out went to the Lower Mainland Emergency Response Team (ERT): "potential active killer on the loose in Langley.”
Surveillance footage showed a man with a black gun was shooting people and then changing clothes, seemingly to evade detection.
After already shooting three people, Goggin stopped a 26-year-old man riding a bicycle near the Langley Bypass and 200th Street. He allegedly asked for drugs and pointed a Glock pistol at the cyclist's head. The cyclist tried to slap the gun away and the two men ended up on the ground in a fist fight, according to the IIO report.
When an RCMP ERT incident commander arrived, the cyclist had been shot in the leg and was fighting Goggin for the gun, which by then had a bullet jammed in the chamber, MacDonald wrote.
Goggin fled and the police officer drove through a bush to chase him down in a nearby parking lot.
The shooter then turned his head and raised his pistol at the police car, the officer told IIO investigators.
“Fearing for his life,” the RCMP officer shot through the windshield of the police car, “getting glass fragments in his eyes.”
At 5:47 a.m., the officer radioed that shots had been fired and the suspect was down.
“Don’t reach for that gun. Crawl away from the firearm,” he could be heard over the radio, according to the IIO report.
Goggin was later pronounced dead at the scene. An examination later showed the RCMP officer had fired 11 bullets at the man, three of them hitting him. Goggin's gun appeared to have been un-jammed and had been loaded with a magazine full of rounds when he raised it at the police vehicle.
The IIO report said the man’s motives have not yet been determined but that he had some mental health problems. Reporting by Glacier Media and others found many of the victims had or were experiencing homelessness at the time.
Another RCMP officer who followed the incident commander to the parking lot confirmed his version of events.
Because the officer “clearly faced a threat of grievous bodily harm or death,” his actions “were justified and necessary,” MacDonald wrote. “Accordingly, as the Chief Civilian Director of the IIO, I do not consider that there are reasonable grounds to believe that an officer may have committed an offence...”
“The officer should be commended for his actions that day as he put himself in the line of fire to protect the public. His actions that day may have saved many lives, including his own.”
IIO of BC investigates any police incident where a person faces serious injury or death.
