WATCH: On the second anniversary of West Shore RCMP Const. Sarah Beckett’s death, a Wall of Honour is unveiled to remember fallen officers. April Lawrence reports.
Emotions were still raw as West Shore RCMP officers unveiled a wall of honour in the detachment Thursday, two years after the death of their colleague and friend Const. Sarah Beckett.
Beckett’s husband Brad and her two boys Lucas and Emmett were at the ceremony and placed a bouquet of flowers at the memorial.
“She was a fantastic cop, she was a great cop, but she was an even better mom, and that’s probably the thing I’d ask people to remember the most, just how much heart she had and how caring she was,” said colleague and friend West Shore RCMP Const. Matt Baker.
32-year-old Sarah Beckett had been an RCMP officer for 11 years when she was struck and killed by a drunk driver at a Langford intersection on April 5, 2016.
Jake Fenton was sentenced to four years in prison for impaired driving causing death and dangerous driving causing death.
Two years later the entire community continues to grieve, with flowers placed at Beckett’s memorial outside the detachment Thursday. Inside the building officers from police detachments across Greater Victoria, paramedics, firefighters, and politicians came out to remember Sarah and support her family.
“Probably the single biggest tragedy from a community perspective, this is just such a shock when it happened and I think a lot of people have still they have this anxiety about it, it doesn’t leave you,” said Langford Mayor Stewart Young.
West Shore RCMP say the Wall of Honour is in memory of fallen police officers across the country and if any other local members should die in the line of duty, their names will be added as well. But for now it’s a place to remember Sarah.
“If we’re feeling down, if we remember Sarah in our way this is an opportunity for us to do it, so that’s what the wall means to me,” said Baker.
Cst. Sarah Beckett, who died while on duty with West Shore RCMP on April 4, 2016. File photo
April Lawrence
