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Break-in fears at Cote First Nation after elder’s home broken into
An elderly couple from the Cote First Nation has been living in fear after their home was broken into while the 
pair slept.
“It’s been scary,” said Sadie Cote.
The 79-year-old has lived on reserve for most of her life, but said, this year has the worst it has ever been.
“It feels like I’m living in an area where nobody cares,” said Sadie.
She said in the early morning hours of Nov. 1., she woke to discover her door open and her laptop missing.
“I woke up at 2:05 a.m. and it was cold,” said Sadie. “I looked and the door was open. I was thinking, ‘What happened?’ ”
She shut the door and then tried to make a call, only to discover her land line was not working.
Sadie woke her daughter and the pair called the RCMP and they waited until 4 a.m.
Her son Robert, who calls his mom every morning, became concerned when he was not able to reach her.
He eventually tracked down his mother down and after learning about the break in, it has been on his mind.
“I have a hard time wrapping my mind around this because it could have been much more tragic,” said Robert. “It’s like a bad nightmare. I don’t even want to think about what could have happened.”
He was concerned about the RCMP response time.
Sgt. Craig Cleary, RCMP spokesman, said members of the Kamsack Detachment were on scene and taking statements by 4:21 a.m.
“What had happened is that someone had left a call on the message manager initially,” he said. “The thing is that the lines are forwarded. There is a message on there that says ‘If this is an emergency, dial 9-1-1 or press 0 for assistance after hours.”
Cleary said a second call was made to 9-1-1 at around 3:34 a.m.
“We were under the impression that the burglars or whoever was in the house had left and that the lady was fine,” he said. “Then there was another call that was a little more emergent that they needed to respond to and then they were (on scene) shortly after 4 a.m.”
Robert believes something more needs to be done on the reserve for the safety of its members especially the elders.
“We are looking for programs, for not only her, but for other elders like a security system — put some cameras in place or anything we can do to keep them safe,” said Robert. “For First Nations’ people, our elders are supposed to be really respected. The people who are doing this to them, well what is our community coming to?”
Although he lives in another community, he still wants to do something to protect elders in his mother’s community.
Cleary said based on statistics, the rate of break and enters in the Kamsack area are down from last year.
According to RCMP, from Jan. 1 to Nov. 9 there have been 79 incidents in total compared to the same time period last year there were 97.
Cleary said there are no specific statistics on the number of break and enter incidents on the Cote First Nation.
He added the RCMP does have safety awareness programs available for any community interested in learning more about them.
Source: http://westcoastnativenews.com/break-in-fears-at-cote-first-nation-after-elders-home-broken-into/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=break-in-fears-at-cote-first-nation-after-elders-home-broken-into
