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What Happened to Joe Grozelle, While at World Renowned Military College

FknKraze

FknKraze

Well-Known Member
ON A RAINY NIGHT in Kingston in October 2003, third-year Royal Military College cadet Joe Grozelle simply vanished.

After three weeks of exhaustive searching on land and sea, Grozelle's lifeless body was finally spotted floating in the shallow waters of Kingston harbour, just feet from campus. Five years later, what happened that night on the campus of the Royal Military College remains a dark and disturbing mystery.

In Shadows of Doubt, the fifth estate explores the circumstances around the disappearance and death of Joe Grozelle and the initial investigation by the Canadian Forces' own National Investigation Service (NIS).

Seven members of the NIS in Ottawa would be dispatched to the military college in Kingston just 24 hours after Joe Grozelle went missing — a remarkable response for what was, at the time, just an AWOL cadet. The NIS is an elite military investigative unit tasked with probing difficult and sensitive matters within the armed forces that ordinary Military Police can't handle.

As the fifth estate reports, the NIS quickly came to the conclusion that Joe Grozelle had killed himself. But for those closest to Joe suicide just didn't make sense. Joe was a Varsity athlete, a top student, he had a girlfriend, as well as supportive friends and family.

"Having that situation doesn't fit with the guy that I know, the Joe that I know," says Joe's father Ron. "Joe wouldn't have done that."

For the past five years Joe's family has pressed authorities to keep investigating for the elusive information that will finally explain their son's sudden disappearance and death. Did the initial tunnel vision of military investigators cause that information to be lost with Joe forever? Tragically, two autopsies, an OPP investigation and a Coroner's Inquest have all failed to find answers.

Drawing from thousands of pages of investigation documents and interviews with dozens of family, friends and military officials, Shadows of Doubt is the story of the suspicious death of a model cadet and a flawed military investigation that has left family, friends and the military with more questions than answers.
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http://www.cbc.ca/fifth/shadowsofdoubt/

I have followed this since the beginning, my heart breaks for his family, you can watch the full fifth estate (Canada's Version of 48 hours) episode if you follow the link
Interesting fact: Suspected serial killer, Col. Russell Williams, who is on trial for the murder of two women, was at RMC from August 2003 to June 2004 completing a Masters of Defence Studies program. This is the same time Joe went missing
 
Ombudsman Updates Minister on Concerns of Military Families
March 8, 2011

The Honourable Peter MacKay, P.C., Q.C., M.P.
Minister of National Defence
National Defence Headquarters
Major-General George R. Pearkes Building
101 Colonel By Drive
13th Floor, North Tower
Ottawa, ON K1A OK2

Dear Minister MacKay:

This is further to my letter of December 10, 2010, and my commitment to provide you with a status update on the treatment of military families who, as detailed in our previous correspondence to you, have endured the death of a Canadian Forces loved one.

My Office has been briefed on the various initiatives that are being considered by the Canadian Forces, as referred to in your correspondence of December 2, 2010. It was our understanding that these initiatives were proposed but had yet to be approved by Vice Admiral Bruce Donaldson, Vice Chief of the Defence Staff. I had the pleasure to meet with Vice-Admiral Donaldson on February 11, 2011, and ask for a status update.

On February 25, 2011, my Office was informed that Vice-Admiral Donaldson had approved the Chief of Review Services' action plan aimed at streamlining the Board of Inquiry and review process and that they are moving ahead for implementation. We will continue to monitor the developments in the hope that these initiatives will ensure that families are kept informed from the moment they are apprised of the death of their loved one until they receive, in a timely fashion, a copy of the Board of Inquiry report.

My Office was also in contact with each of the military families to confirm the following information:

[...]

The Grozelle family
Mr. Ron Grozelle is the father of Officer Cadet Joe Grozelle who died in October or November 2003 while attending the Royal Military College in Kingston.

Mr. Grozelle was contacted by the Director of Casualty Support Management on February 16, 2011, to share the following information: the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service cannot yet provide specific answers to Mr. Grozelle's questions, no date for a meeting or attendees can be confirmed at this time and "the CFNIS will be in touch as soon as the picture becomes clearer". Mr. Grozelle continues to wait.

[...]
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http://www.ombudsman.forces.gc.ca/e...ters/updates-on-concerns-of-mil-families.page
 
By mid-morning Wednesday, Ron Grozelle had already heard the tragic news that the body of Royal Military College cadet Mathieu LeClair had been discovered in the waters of Lake Ontario.

It cast Grozelle's memory back to 2003, when his own son, Joe, also an RMC cadet, was found in the Cataraqui River after being missing for 22 days.
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Along with Grozelle's condolences come some serious concerns for how this latest death of an RMC cadet will be investigated - and who will do the investigating.

Military police are assuming the lead role, but Grozelle has objections.

"Their uniform comes first, then their job comes second," he said. "Based on my prior dealings with the military, I have concerns about the operations of the NIS and the military (finding) answers to incidents that occur."

He said the Ontario Coroners Act states that the police force with jurisdiction in the locality should assist the coroner, and in this case it's not military police.

LeClair's body was found in Navy Bay, not on National Defence property.

"I don't think they should be leading the investigation, and the coroner shouldn't be allowing them to lead the investigation," Grozelle said.

"I find it interesting that the military indicates they don't suspect any foul play. I find it troublesome when they put that out. How can they say that? Saying that this early in the process is premature, no matter what they have."

Grozelle believes Ontario Provincial Police or Kingston Police should take the lead.
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http://www.thewhig.com/2012/02/29/man-wouldnt-allow-military-to-investigate
 
golanvern said:
Mathieu's death is not unexplained ... and not controversial.
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I was not saying it was, but it got caught up in the Grozelle case here, since it was all the mention I could find of the latter online.

Ron Grozelle does not think the Military Police should have been the ones to investigate either case. He would prefer that it were the local police authority and the coroner. Do you disagree with that?
 
I am in the Canadian military and am in K-Town. I will only say that in the forces, if a (possible) crime occurs on federal property, then the MPs have jurisdiction ... Jurisdiction does not equal the MPs doing the investigating as per Mr. Grozelle. MPs call in the local authorities in serious matters and the locals work with the NIS (Russell Williams is one such case that details this process out intimately).

When a military member dies in Canada, it is up to the family as to whether any info, what info or if any/if any information is released (including the name, manner of death). OCdt Leclair's family has chosen not to release information regarding their son and his manner of death --- despite Mr. Grozelle. OCdt Leclair's death was/is not controversial.

In Mr. Grozelle's case, I believe that he is mistaking a BOI (Board of Inquiry - an official military administrative process into any death of a serving CF member) as a "police investigation"; it is not.

In Mr. Grozelle's case, he does not agree with either a finding of "suicide" or "accidental" because neither the BOI nor the Coronoer's Inquest could "prove" it to him. That is his right and I respect that. I would note however that neither the BOI nor the Coroner's Inquest found any indication of foul play either (ie: a forced "drowning") nor did the autopsy, but they did hear from his son's girlfriend who was actually with him that night who noted that he had been depressed in the past, had spoken of suicide etc. Coupled with the fact that RMC is not like any other university (these kids begin at 0500hrs each day and don't often end until 2200hrs at night and that he was prepping workload in very stressful time of years what led to the most likely a suicide finding by the BOI. Mr. Grozelle does not agree. So be it, but there is evidence of nothing else either --- especially murder --- especially murder by Col Williams (who although RMC campus at the time actually attended in a location in downtown K-Town, not on the actual campus of RMC where the OCdts are. (Senior Officers tend NOT to hang out with OCdts or in their environment if you understand what I mean there).

My heart aches for Mr. Grozelle and the loss of his son far too soon, but it certainly wasn't murder by Col Williams.
 
That won't be the last military coverup. OCdt Thomas Biakpa was found in a pool of his own blood at CFLRS in St Jean by his fellow Cadets.. The Military covered it up because they knew they could. The disclosed nothing to the people who found him ....just ordering them to be quiet. We did not know if he was murdered or what. The only record of his death is in a small newspaper in french from his community.
http://news.ahibo.com/spip.php?article1693

This too is wrong. The military are public servants and should be transparent as such!!!!!
 
SCOTT SUMMERS said:
That won't be the last military coverup. OCdt Thomas Biakpa was found in a pool of his own blood at CFLRS in St Jean by his fellow Cadets.. The Military covered it up because they knew they could. The disclosed nothing to the people who found him ....just ordering them to be quiet. We did not know if he was murdered or what. The only record of his death is in a small newspaper in french from his community.
http://news.ahibo.com/spip.php?article1693

This too is wrong. The military are public servants and should be transparent as such!!!!!
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There was/is no coverup.

Do you really think we are brainwashed automatons? Sigh ... [insert banging my head against a brick wall smiley here]

Yes, we are to remain silent ("no comment") on any incidents until ALL family has been notified and our evidence is given to the Board of Inquiry that WILL be convened about ANY significant incident. Quite like on civvie street where witnesses are not to talk about pending/underway investigations and/or court cases. ZERO difference. Now, give your head a shake. We may be public servants but we are subject to the exact same witness/evidence standards and rules as every other Canadian is --- why the hell wouldn't we be?

Edit: Si nécessaire, je peux mettre cette réponse en français pour vous monsieur.
 
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SCOTT SUMMERS said:
...We did not know if he was murdered or what. The only record of his death is in a small newspaper in french from his community.
http://news.ahibo.com/spip.php?article1693

This too is wrong. The military are public servants and should be transparent as such!!!!!
Click to expand...

Obviously it wasn't a murder else it would be in the papers. Given that there is only a small article in his community newspaper, I suspect his death was a suicide (we have lots of those - watched the news lately ... sigh).

It is NOT up to the military to "be transparent" and release his cause of death; as I have written in this thread already ... it is the family's CHOICE whether or not to release such. He was their child - not yours. You have NO right to know the details if they don't want you to - period.
 
golanvern, did you see the scene? were you there at the time? do you know his family? did you live with this man day in and day out?

It was NOT his family's choice for things to not appear and it was NOT suicide.
 
It IS indeed his familys choice to release his cause of death ... or to not release it. Their choice; not the CF's. And, to be CLEAR, I did not say it was a suicide - read what I wrote again. I stated only that it was NOT murder because if it were indeed murder, then it would be published.
 
There was a cover up at Cflrs of Thomas Biakpa, I know who fucking killed him, I was one of the ones who found him along with ocdt grey, and ocdt MacDonald. Ocdt now stimpson was there as well but didn’t see because she was preparing, There was a 5th guy who went down to the green desk with me and we got the commissionaire to come unlock his door. The reason he was killed, because he refused to tow the line and refused help from any one of us. The killer was a Russian major who came to Canada and at that time had enlisted as a mars officer in the navy. We were fed up with Thomas not doing his shit and getting us into trouble and we wrote to staff about him being a special case. We had an inspection on Friday and we were going to get into shit if Thomas didn’t get it together. The killer just said don’t worry guys he will be dead on Friday. Friday morning came around and Sara said hey Thomas didnt answer his door or come down for breakfast, I said well if he wants to get in shit that’s his problem not ours and carried on. As the morning went on, he didn’t answer his door and we got worried because he had epilepsy. Me and the other guy went down as I said and got staff. The rest is as discribed. He was face down in a pool of his own blood at the foot of the bed tucked in…. Friday morning comes and he is dead. Coincidence? I think not. That fucked me up for years. I had a guilt because we didn’t bring that comment to staff. This guy had a history of trying to hurt people. I had to take him off one of the ncms in the mess because he had his thump pressed into his neck threatening to kill him because he didn’t trust him..this was a murder.
golanvern said:
There was/is no coverup.

Do you really think we are brainwashed automatons? Sigh ... [insert banging my head against a brick wall smiley here]

Yes, we are to remain silent ("no comment") on any incidents until ALL family has been notified and our evidence is given to the Board of Inquiry that WILL be convened about ANY significant incident. Quite like on civvie street where witnesses are not to talk about pending/underway investigations and/or court cases. ZERO difference. Now, give your head a shake. We may be public servants but we are subject to the exact same witness/evidence standards and rules as every other Canadian is --- why the hell wouldn't we be?

Edit: Si nécessaire, je peux mettre cette réponse en français pour vous monsieur.
Click to expand...
 
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SCOTT SUMMERS said:
That won't be the last military coverup. OCdt Thomas Biakpa was found in a pool of his own blood at CFLRS in St Jean by his fellow Cadets.. The Military covered it up because they knew they could. The disclosed nothing to the people who found him ....just ordering them to be quiet. We did not know if he was murdered or what. The only record of his death is in a small newspaper in french from his community.
http://news.ahibo.com/spip.php?article1693

This too is wrong. The military are public servants and should be transparent as such!!!!!
Click to expand...
I was there, I was one of the ones who found him
 
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