There has been a major decision in a high-profile shooting resulting in the death of a baby in the City of Kawartha Lakes.
On Monday, manslaughter charges were withdrawn against three Ontario Provincial Police officers in the 2020 shooting death of 18-month-old Jameson Shapiro. The decision came after the Crown prosecutor said there was ‘no reasonable prospect of conviction’.
The officers, Nathan Vanderheyden, Kenneth Pengelly and Grayson Cappus, had been charged by the province’s SIU in 2022 with one count each of manslaughter and criminal negligence causing death.
According to the SIU, say the boy was abducted by his father in Trent Lakes, and the fathers pickup truck was found travelling on Sturgeon Road on November 26th, 2020. The pickup truck collided with an OPP cruiser, and a civilian vehicle and the three officers fired their guns at the pickup truck resulting in the deaths of the boy and his 33-year-old father William Shapiro.
Accounts from the officers say William was holding a gun at the time of the shooting.
