Attack on boy at Energy Centre prompts call to city council to enhance security

A Cold Lake woman called on the city council to ensure security will be present at teen events at the Energy Centre after detailing a brutal attack her son received.

Ashley Shibata made a delegation to Cold Lake city council last Tuesday and described an incident a couple of weeks prior where her junior high-aged son was brutally beaten up by a group of other boys at the Energy Centre, who used racial epithets towards him and broke his arm.

The incident, reported to the RCMP, has been devastating for her and her son, as he does not feel comfortable returning to Art Smith Aviation Academy to finish school, knowing one of the attackers is in his class.

Shibata pleaded with the city council to add security for events aimed at teenagers, as they do for adult events. If not, she asked them to at least notify parents if there won’t be security, or if safety can’t be ensured, then not to host the events at all.

“My son almost got tossed over a railing. He could have died,” she said in council chambers. “I don’t want to wait for my son or any other child in this town to be injured. And I heard that this is not an isolated incident — that there have been other incidents.

“There needs to be more done. Either you don’t hold any more events if you can’t provide the security, or when you’re advertising for these events, inform parents there is no security so that we have the option of going in and protecting our children. But something needs to be done.”

In response, Mayor Craig Copeland said there have been incidents during the day at the Energy Centre.

Currently, they have a roving peace officer who will come through the school, but not a dedicated person.

He said the request for security at teen events was very reasonable.

“Our hearts go out to the young fellow who got hurt and beat up pretty badly,” said Copeland on The Morning After.

“It was caught on a video camera, and the RCMP will be involved in looking at the case. This isn’t the first instance we’ve had at the Energy Centre. It’s unfortunate. The parent raised a good point about hosting teen events and where the security is. I’m sure staff will look at building that into the cost of putting on events.”

Copeland said that in the past, the City has looked into dedicated 24-hour security at the facility, but it would carry a cost of hundreds of thousands of dollars. The focus on troubled areas has been in the downtown core.

“At Imperial Place, we don’t have dedicated security. There’s roving security, but we’ve had people break into the Energy Centre and get caught due to the diligence of the users who phone it in. In this case, the youths ran off after beating up the young fellow. We don’t wish that on anybody. We want safe places, but we really feel for the mom. Her story was tragic.”