Hazardous Pursuit

Anna Leslie is an associate professor of sociology at Sir Wilfred
Grenfell College, Memorial University of Newfoundland.

Hazardous Pursuit has three interwoven themes: policing, Native peoples,
and British Columbia politics. It chronicles the police shootings of two
Native men from British Columbia’s Pinchie Indian Reserve and Bridge
River Indian Reserve, respectively. The first incident, the shooting of
Randy Monk, sets the background for the second incident (involving Rusty
Mitchell), which accounts for a large part of the book. In both
instances, the police claimed self-defence. An inquest into Mitchell’s
death led to recommendations that did little to heal the wounds in the
Native community. Life on the reserves is described as involving “too
much alcohol, too much anger, too much despair, rampant chronic
unemployment, spousal abuse and the poorest of living conditions.”

Hazardous Pursuit should be of interest to the general reader and might
also prove useful as a supplementary text for those taking policing
and/or race-relations courses.