Another sad story

Another young officer killed in the line of duty.

In the early hours of April 9, while most of us were home safe in bed, Constable Harvinder Singh Dhami was killed in an auto collision. He was responding to a call to assist fellow officers. He was 32, and leaves his wife, mother, a sister and a brother, as well as many friends and colleagues to mourn his untimely death.

He became an RCMP officer in 2019. Before that he was an OPP Special Constable at Queens Park in Toronto.

In my work as a United Church of Canada pastor I have opportunity to meet many police officers and other first responders- people who on an hourly, daily basis place themselves in harm’s way for the public good. They routinely go towards the danger, when the rest of us have the privilege of protecting ourselves first.

We’ve had an extraordinary, and overwhelming number of officers killed in Canada this year, in the line of duty.

Each time it happens, I take a pause from my light-hearted rambling thoughts about murder mysteries and other crime fiction.

I think about the women and men I know, who serve in law enforcement. They aren’t quirky characters or fictional stereotypes. They are humans with lives and families and friends. They have hopes and dreams and worries and delights, like all of us.

They also have this vocation, this profession, that has never been more under suspicion, or more criticized or despised (and yes, there are legitimate concerns, and reasons for the calls for change), but even so, they still go to work each day knowing that really terrible things could happen to them, and that they might not come home.