Observer SALMON ARM
Wednesday November 7, 2012 www.saobserver.net $1.25 HST INCLUDED PM40008236
Pair face Peace medal can’t be worn Military rules: Vet denied right to include UN honour on his uniform. murder charges J By Barb Brouwer OBSERVER STAFF
Court: Accused were youths at the time of Tyler Myers’ killing. By Martha Wickett & Tracy Hughes OBSERVER STAFF
Four years to the month he was killed, police have charged two people in the murder of 22-year-old Tyler Myers of Salmon Arm. Myers died of a gunshot wound on the evening of Nov. 21, 2008, his body discovered by a passerby about 7:30 p.m. on a trail on the grounds of Bastion Elementary School. On Monday of this week, police arrested a 20-year-old man and a 21-year-old woman, both who were under 18 years at the time of the murder so can’t be named under the Youth Criminal Justice Act. Both are residents of Salmon Arm and both have been charged with first degree murder. The pair apTyler Myers peared briefly MURDER in Salmon Arm VICTIM Court on Tuesday where the charges were read out. They were ordered to be held in custody until their next joint court appearance on Nov. 20. The parents of the accused man and the mother of the accused woman were also present in the courtroom. At a news conference at the Salmon Arm RCMP detachment Tuesday afternoon, Insp. Gary Shinkaruk of the RCMP’s E Division Major Crime Section said the man had been arrested at his home in Salmon Arm while the woman was arrestSee Victim on page A3
ohn Stephen McInnis has every right to be proud of his Nobel Peace Prize medal. He is likely the only Canadian to have one. But he’s not allowed to display it with his other Canadian Forces honours. Known as Steve to family and friends, McInnis was included in the 1988 prize awarded to members of the United Nations Peacekeeping Forces. “It is the considered opinion of the (Norwegian Nobel) committee that the peacekeeping forces through their efforts have made important contributions towards the realization of one of the fundamental tenets of the United Nations,” says the numbered document accompanying McInnis’ medal, which also noted that peacekeeping forces are recruited from among the young people of many nations, who voluntarily take on demanding and hazardous service in the cause of peace. “In the opinion of the committee their efforts contribute in a particularly appropriate way towards the realization of the goals of the United Nations.” The document, signed in Oslo Dec. 10, 1988, acknowledged McInnis as having served with the peacekeeping forces prior to the Norwegian Nobel Committee’s awarding of the peace prize on Dec. 10, 1988 and noted he is entitled to wear the Nobel Commemorative Cross. Not according to Canada’s director of Honours and Recognition, who advised McInnis he would not be allowed to wear the medal because of the way in which he received it. “In order to be recognized by Canada, foreign honours must emanate from a head of state or government,” wrote André M. Levesque, National Defence’s director of honours and recognition, in an Aug. 28, 2012 letter advising McInnis the UN Peacekeeping Forces Nobel Peace Prize 1988 is not considered an official honour and cannot be worn with national honours. “However, please note your efforts were already acknowledged by the Canadian government with the Canadian Peacekeeping Service Medal.” This particular medal recognizes service by Canadians deployed outside Canada with
This week A local company sends crews to help restore power in the wake of Hurricane Sandy. See A4. The action was as hot as the costumes at the Cancer Society’s Funspiel. See A15 for more.
Honours: Steve McInnis reads about the UN peacekeeping medal he received in Finland last summer.
an aggregate 30 days of support in at least one UN international peacekeeping mission. But Royal Canadian Legion Branch #62 past-president Harry Welton does not agree with Ottawa’s position on the UN medal or the general peacekeeping medal struck in 1997. “What I am going to try to do is go through the legion and push for him, I’m almost positive he’s the only one (Canadian) to receive one,” says Welton of the UN medal. “I think it’s an honour, and for Ottawa to push him aside is not right. Some of the people getting the (new) medal have been in safe places while Steve was in the middle of a mess.” The issue has surfaced now because McInnis was awarded the UN medal when he visited Finland last summer. The retired warrant officer served with a
Finnish battalion at Abu Rudeis in the Sinai Peninsula for a six-month period in 1977-78. A week after arriving in Egypt, McInnis was promoted to master corporal and loaned to the Finnish detachment – “way out in the middle of nowhere, with the Gulf of Suez on one side, and desert on the other,” says McInnis. The job of the Finnish infantry was to keep the Israelis and Egyptians apart during an intense period of hostility. “My job was to supply communications between the battalion and UN headquarters in Ismailia,” he says, noting he became See Finland on page A2
Index Opinion ....................... A6 View Point .................. A7 Life & Times ............... A8 Sports............... A15-A19 Arts & Events ... A20-A23 Time Out................... A24 Vol. 105, No. 45, 48 pages