The parents of a 27-year-old man who was killed after Calgary police officers shot him four times in 2015 challenged Chief Mark Neufeld’s decision to dismiss the possibility that officers colluded to claim their son lunged at them. 

Image a screenshot from video tribute by the Heffernan Family. 

Anthony Heffernan was killed in his room at a Super 8 hotel near the Calgary airport in March 2015 after five police officers who were called for a wellness check broke down the room’s door and shot him four times within 72 seconds. 

The cops said they felt threatened by Heffernan, who was holding a syringe with no needle in it and a lighter, which he didn’t drop when officers told him to. 

After tasing him twice, the officers claimed that Heffernan engaged in a “lunging maneuver” at them, resulting in one officer shooting him four times, including three shots to the head and neck. 

“They were terrified of this syringe without a needle tip and a Bic lighter,” Pat Heffernan, Anthony’s father, told an Oct. 28 Law Enforcement Review Board (LERB) hearing, calling the cops’ claim “incredulous.” 

Pat Heffernan, a retired principal, said he’s had to deal with students with knives many times and never feared for his life. 

The LERB hearing centered on Calgary Police Service Chief Mark Neufeld refusing to entertain the possibility that the officers colluded on their testimony to investigators when he ordered disciplinary hearings under the Police Act against the officers involved in Anthony Heffernan’s killing. 

The Police Act charges came a few years after an investigation from the Alberta Serious Incident Response Team (ASIRT) found evidence that Const. Maurice McLoughlin, the officer who shot Heffernan, committed a criminal offence, but the Crown declined to press charges. 

"We couldn't disprove that the use of force was reasonable," explained Eric Tolppanen, assistant deputy minister of the Alberta Crown Prosecution Service in a justification ASIRT accepted. 

At the LERB hearing, Pat Heffernan said there’s a “buddy situation” that precluded the Crown from recommending charges. 

“With any organization, there’s a bias towards your organization,” he said, arguing that just as he has a bias towards other educators, members of law enforcement have a bias towards each other. 

Heffernan’s family filed Police Act complaints against the officers involved in Anthony’s killing, which resulted in Chief Neufeld, who wasn’t police chief at the time of the shooting, initiating disciplinary proceedings in late 2020. 

McLouchlin, who was involved in another fatal shooting less than a year after he killed Heffernan, resigned prior to Neufeld’s decision and two other officers—constables Carl Johns and Robert Brauer—followed suit after the disciplinary proceedings were initiated, leaving Const. Sandeep Shergill and Sgt. Lon Brewster to face the prospect of discipline. 

Brewster, who didn’t discharge his weapon at the scene of Anthony Heffernan’s killing, was promoted to staff sergeant six weeks after Neufeld announced Police Act charges against him. 

Pat Heffernan noted that he and his wife, Irene, were representing themselves at the Oct. 28 hearing because they couldn’t afford to continue paying a lawyer. 

“Everyone is lawyered up except the appellant,” he said, noting a power imbalance between the victim’s family and three lawyers present to represent two of the officers and the police chief. 

Chief Neufeld’s lawyer, Derek Cranna, noted that Neufeld initiated the Police Act investigation, just as the Heffernans requested. 

He said it would be “inappropriate and unfortunate” if the Heffernans’ appeal delayed the Police Act hearings against Shergill and Brewster. 

Pat Heffernan said that while Anthony’s cell phone was taken from him, even though he had been declared dead, the officers were allowed to keep their phones throughout the entire course of investigation, allowing them to discuss the case with each other. 

Heffernan noted inconsistencies in the officers’ testimony that call into question their honesty when speaking to investigators. 

“They were so terribly fearful of the syringe, yet they don’t know whether it was [in his] left hand or right hand,” said Pat Heffernan.  

Paul Brunnen, who represented Brewster at the hearing, didn’t dispute that the officers had the ability to discuss the case against them. 

“That doesn’t mean there’s evidence of anything incorrect happening here,” Brunnen said. 

Shamsher Kothari, Shergill’s lawyer, said that it’s not “within the LERB’s purview” to determine whether police officers’ phones should be confiscated as part of a Police Act investigation. 

“What is being sought here by the appellants is changes to the system,” said Kothari. 

Pat Heffernan agreed. “We want changes done so this doesn’t happen to other people,” he said. “We’re not looking for blood or anything.” 

Almost a decade after the fact, a fatality inquiry into Heffernan’s killing is listed by the province under, “Pending Resolution of Investigations and Criminal Matters,” and has therefore yet to be scheduled.