Chief Constable Jim Chu of the Vancouver Police Department issued today (December 17) this statement in response to the report of the missing women commission of inquiry:

It is our sincere wish and hope that today’s report will offer the families of the victims of Robert Pickton some measure of consolation and closure.

We know that nothing can ever truly heal the wounds of grief and loss but if we can, we want to assure the families that the Vancouver Police Department deeply regrets anything we did that may have delayed the eventual solving of these murders.

It may also come as small consolation to those who still grieve that we are committed to learning from our mistakes and have taken and will continue to take steps in the future to ensure that the same type of errors are never made again.  We are very pleased that this report also offers suggestions to augment measures already implemented in the VPD to further safeguard the most vulnerable in our community. These measures include the complete restructuring of our Missing Persons Unit and our outreach programs, such as our fulltime Sex Trade Liaison Officer and the joint VPD-Community Sister Watch committee. 

We greatly appreciate the work of Commissioner Wally Oppal and his team. We will study this report in its entirety and give great weight to its findings and recommendations. 

As we take the time this undertaking deserves, we hope that today the focus is truly on the families; their reactions and responses need to heard and listened to carefully. With the greatest of respect for the families, we do not want to make any further statements today that would detract in any way from that focus.