World

Firefighters Vs Cops in Vancouver... and on YouTube

by Jordan Yerman | March 21, 2007 at 08:39 am

2737 views | 0 Recommendations | 2 comments

That's one brawl I'd not want get caught in the middle of. Evidently, the off-duty firefighters were passengers in the car that had crashed.

Police were called to a car accident near Vancouver's Granville Mall on Saturday night, when, they said, they encountered off-duty firefighter Curtis Mason, 44, and his son Grant, 20.

Vancouver police try to subdue off-duty firefighter on the Granville Mall over the weekend.Vancouver police try to subdue off-duty firefighter on the Granville Mall over the weekend.

(www.youtube.com)

Police allege the Masons were unco-operative. Both have been charged with assaulting a police officer and obstructing police.

The video shows officers struggling with the Masons on the ground. At one point, an officer appears to hit one of the men twice with his baton.

Vancouver police Const. Howard Chow said the video shows how volatile the situation became.

[q
url="http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20070320/bc_fight_070319/20070320?hub=TopStories"]Meanwhile,
two police cruisers called to the scene for back-up ended up crashing
into each other a few blocks away. Four officers ended up in hospital.

The video clip posted on YouTube shows police officers struggling on the ground with two men.

Firefighters in full gear can be seen standing around them. At one
point, a policeman runs over and appears to strike someone with a baton.

Chow confirms the YouTube video is of the Vancouver incident.

"In the image that you see, a number of firefighters are in close
range -- about four or five feet away," Chow told CTV British Columbia.
"Our senior management will look at to see if something could have been
done differently."[/q]