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 Suspect Fred Preston (left) and Const. Vu Pham (right) (HO) |
The suspect in Monday’s fatal shooting of a Huron County OPP officer has been charged with first-degree murder and with the attempted murder of another officer.
Meanwhile, the town of Wingham is bracing for a police funeral Friday - expected to draw 2,000 or more officers from across North America - so large it’s likely to double the Huron County town’s population for the day.
Fred Preston of Sundridge, Ont., the shooting suspect, remained in critical condition in a London hospital Wednesday where the 70-year-old was taken with gunshot wounds following Monday’s shootout with the OPP a few kilometres north of Seaforth.
OPP Const. Vu Pham, a 15-year veteran of the force, was shot after stopping a white pickup truck along the rural North Line in Huron East.
Wednesday, the OPP - which until then had said only that Pham was “immediately incapacitated” - revealed a new twist, suggesting Pham never got a shot off himself. “He was shot and fatally wounded as he exited his police cruiser,” the force said in a news release.
The OPP also said - echoing what witnesses have described - that a second OPP officer nearby exchanged fire with the suspect “who was shot during the encounter after firing at the officer.” Monday’s dramatics - witnesses have described a hail of gunfire, as many as 20 shots - brought a heavy police swoopdown on the area, and may have followed a domestic dispute nearby.
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Ontario’s police watchdog agency, the Special Investigations Unit (SIU), is still probing the case, and has released few details.
Still, what’s emerged from sources is that Pham and the suspect, Preston, who remains in critical condition, likely knew each other.
Pham spent about 10 years in Sundridge, where his father, Dan Thompson, served as pastor at a Pentecostal church, which Preston may have attended, although some sources suggested he didin’t.
In media interviews Wednesday, Pham’s adoptive sister, Heather Thompson, who lives in Sundridge, confirmed her family knows the Preston family.
There was an unconfirmed report a member of the Preston family contacted OPP about the domestic dispute and requested Pham be brought to the scene.
Officials said they expect at least 2,000 officers - possibly more - from across North America at Friday’s 1 p.m. funeral at the North Huron Wescast Community Complex in Wingham, a town 3,000 about 150 km north of London.
“We’re expecting a huge turnout, a large show of support . . . especially when an officer is murdered, it makes a big difference,” said OPP Sgt. Dave Rektor.
Pham and other officers went to a North Line home where Preston’s estranged wife lives sometime before 10:30 a.m.
What happened there is unclear, but around 10:30 a.m. Pham was shot moments after pulling over a pickup truck about a kilometre north of the home. Pham later died at London’s Victoria Hospital.
Another officer at the scene exchanged fire with the suspect across the two-lane road, hitting him several times.
Witnesses said the suspect got out of the truck, reached into a back seat, pulled out a rifle and began shooting.
London police Chief Murray Faulkner said he expects several London officers will attend the funeral, but aren’t likely to help with security and street patrols as they did in Windsor to allow its officers to attend the funeral of Const. John Atkinson, 37, who was gunned down in May 2006.
Among the dignitaries at Friday’s funeral will be Premier Dalton McGuinty and OPP Commissioner Julian Fantino.
Faulkner said at least one busload of London officers will make the trip on their own time and cost.
Last July 10, more than 2,000 police officers from across the continent attended the London funeral of Elgin OPP Const. Al Hack, killed in a two-vehicle crash on Furnival Rd. just south of Rodney, when he and partner, Const. Lynn Neale, 35, pursued a speeding suspect who’d fled police. Neale was seriously hurt in the crash.
Wingham police Chief Tim Poole said his seven-officer force will attend the funeral, their duties covered by police from Hanover, east of Walkerton.
Poole said his officers have regular contact with Huron OPP officers, including Pham.
“We’re very close, with all the OPP around here,” said Poole. “The guys have been taking it pretty hard.” Pham’s death brings to 104 the number of OPP officers killed in the line of duty in the force’s 100-year history.
Born in Saigon and adopted by a Canadian family as a child, Pham, 37, is survived by his wife Heather and three boys, his Vietnamese mother, Men Nguyen, of California, and his Canadian parents, Dan and Terry Thompson, of Spring Bay, Manitoulin Island, and several Vietnamese and Canadian brothers and sisters. His father was a South Vietnamese officer killed during the Vietnam war.
Visitations are planned at the McBurney Funeral Home in Wingham Thursday, at
2 p.m. until 4 p.m. and 7 p.m. until 9 p.m.
Pastor Tim Bjorkman, a close friend of the Pham family, will officiate.
In lieu of flowers, well-wishers are asked to make donations to a trust fund for Pham’s children. The donations can be made at any Scotiabank (account number 410120215023), or through the funeral home by cheque payable “In trust for Heather Pham.”
Joe Belanger is a Free Press reporter
joe.belanger@sunmedia.ca