INUVIK
At 9:50 p.m. Nov. 4, two police trucks responded to a call about a woman threatening to commit suicide. The call came from a family member and was relayed to the detachment over the phone.

"The whole town doesn't need to hear that over the scanner," said Const. Yannick Gagnon as he followed a vehicle to where the woman lives.

Const. Yannick Gagnon floods the ice on the rink he built on Camsell Crescent just past midnight on Nov. 4. While Gagnon said the detachment here is less officially involved in outreach programs than in other places, officers still like to do what they can for the community. - Sarah Ladik/NNSL photo

In the end, police decided the woman wasn't an imminent threat to herself and took her to a relative's home.

"Just to be on the safe side, we're not going to let her be alone," said Gagnon. "If she didn't have family to go to, we would bring her to the hospital to get her cleared, and if she was imminently suicidal she would be taken to the hospital right away. Better safe than sorry."

He said this way if there are more concerns over the course of the night, at least the officers know the situation.

Gagnon arrived at the RCMP detachment shortly before 7 p.m. on Nov. 4 to get ready for night shift. It was "superconstable" night, something that happens once every two weeks or so when shifts overlap and nearly all officers work on a given day. It means they can get caught up on paperwork and share important events with the next crew to come on.

Gagnon's regular partner, Const. Mackenzie McGuffin, spent the shift preparing for a case going to court the next morning.

"It's what ties everything together," he said. "You can respond to a call, but if you don't follow up with the paperwork, there's no chance those charges will go through."

Gagnon said he was a few weeks into Depot, where all RCMP members go to be trained, before he realized the job was 90 per cent pencil-pushing and 10 per cent "fun stuff."

"I wanted to quit right there," he joked.

The fun stuff, as it turns out, is more about helping people than it is about apprehending criminals. Over the course of the shift, Gagnon helped a prisoner find a lawyer, attempted to convince a woman to testify against a man who had beaten her, and spent an hour flooding a hockey rink. There was only one call for service - a report of mischief involving two young men breaking a road sign near the library and leaving it in the street.

"This job is a lot more about people than it is about crime," Gagnon said. "If you get 15 calls in a night, you'll maybe get a charge from one. If you charge two, that's a very busy night."

While on patrol around 8:45, Gagnon drives by the home of a woman who had been a victim of domestic assault earlier in the week to try to convince her to testify. But there are no lights on and no sign the woman is home. He said the situation is familiar.

"It happens so often," he said.

Other communities, including Yellowknife and Hay River, have separate court sittings for domestic violence cases that allow low-risk offenders - generally first time offenders - to be diverted to counselling programs instead of jail. The aim is to stop the cycle of violence before it becomes entrenched by treating the underlying issues.

"It would be so much better if we could send them to diversion and get them help," said Gagnon.

He drove around for about an hour, pulling over vehicles with burned-out headlights, noting quiet nights are good for that kind of patrolling.

"In other places, there's one night of the month or something when things are busy," he said. "In Inuvik you never know. Things can just erupt."

At 10:15 he went to the hotel where the Crown prosecutor is staying in an attempt to find contact information for a defence lawyer in Yellowknife on behalf of a man in cells. After getting the prosecutor out of bed, she promised she would contact the lawyer and let him know about the request.

There were three men in cells for the night before two others arrive following an investigation into the sign incident.

At 11:30, Gagnon and McGuffin left their paperwork to supervise showers for prisoners in remand. People in short-term cells don't typically get such treatment but these three are on remand awaiting bail arrangements for several days. While midnight might not seem like the best time to attend to personal hygiene, Gagnon said that's when the officers have time to supervise.

Back on patrol just past midnight, Gagnon performed a curfew check on a man awaiting a preliminary hearing and released on conditions. The man was home and, after a brief chat, Gagnon gets in his truck and headed across town to work on his pet project - a skating rink on Camsell Crescent where he and a few other officers live.

Watching him slowly flood the rink with a garden hose is oddly hypnotic, despite the cold and the distraction of the Northern lights filling most of the sky. Gagnon said the rink is a way for him to give back to the community but also something he does for himself.

"I do it because it relaxes me," he said. "It's not as stressful here as other detachments, but it's still a stressful job."

Whatever the motivation, the rink has proven popular with children and families in the neighbourhood. Gagnon hoped people heed his request to stay off the ice for a day while he perfects the surface.

There was one other call, answered by another officer, to deal with an inebriated man in a hotel lobby but otherwise things quieted down. Back at the detachment, Gagnon said the job isn't always what people think it is - even beyond his own surprise at how much time there is spent behind a desk.

"The people we arrest, the ones you see in court, they obviously don't always see what we're doing to help people," he said.

We welcome your opinions. Click here to e-mail a letter to the editor.