A North Vancouver police officer told a coroner's inquest he thought Matthew Wilcox might kill him in the moments before he shot Wilcox on Jan. 9, 2010.
The constable - who cannot be named under a publication ban granted by presiding coroner Liana Wright - told the five-person jury, "I thought he was going to pull out a gun and shoot me on the street."
The officer described Monday how he'd responded to a dispatch of a hit-and-run accident that day, and managed to catch up with Wilcox's vehicle in Deep Cove after a brief police chase. Once out of the cruiser, the officer said he'd come face to face with Wilcox while coming around the back of his police car.
The officer said he drew his service pistol and told Wilcox to get down on the ground. Wilcox initially got down on all fours, said the officer. But then something seemed to cross his mind. "He looked me right in the eyes, this piercing intent stare . . . I'll never forget that image in my mind," he said.
Then Wilcox stood up, he said. "He jammed his right hand into his pocket and began to come across the road towards me," said the officer.
The constable said he started backing up, continuing to yell commands, as Wilcox advanced towards him.
"I cannot put into words the feeling that I felt," he said. "I've never felt so frightened in my entire life."
The officer told the jury he'd been warned by dispatchers and other officers Wilcox might be a "violent, dangerous individual" who had "threatened to shoot police in the past."
He added he'd recently attended a police funeral in the United States and the thought of his fiancée having to attend his own police funeral flashed through his mind in that instant.
"The last thing I saw was something black in his hand," said the officer. "I fired one round from my service pistol."
Wilcox grasped at his right side, spun around and fell to the ground, said the officer. On the ground, Wilcox grabbed the phone. "He told me he was texting his girlfriend," said the officer. "He asked me why I didn't kill him. He said I should have killed him."
The police officer - whose identity is shielded because he works in a plainclothes unit of the RCMP - had only been with the force about four years at the time of the shooting.
The coroner's inquest - being held in a Burnaby coroner's court - is hearing evidence into Wilcox's death to determine how he died and whether that death should be ruled natural, accidental, suicide or homicide. The jury can also make recommendations aimed at preventing future deaths.
Wilcox, who had a history of mental illness, died in Lions Gate Hospital the day after he was shot.
But Dr. Charles Lee, a forensic pathologist who did an autopsy on Wilcox, told jurors on Tuesday Wilcox didn't die of the gunshot wound.
He said one of Wilcox's main arteries to the heart was 75 per cent blocked and he died of heart disease.
"The gunshot wound itself wasn't fatal," said Lee, although he added it probably contributed to the stress on Wilcox's heart.
"It's my opinion if he did not have the coronary artery disease he would have survived the gunshot wound," he said.
Lee said Wilcox had been alert just 10 minutes before he was found unresponsive in his hospital bed.
Wilcox died alone, after family members were prevented from seeing him by hospital staff.
The officer who shot Wilcox said he had been told Wilcox was considered possibly dangerous, suicidal and emotionally disturbed based on previous interactions with police.
He said he'd been previously called to help two other officers when they ended up in a physical fight with Wilcox after being called to a domestic disturbance.
"Mr. Wilcox had threatened to shoot them with a firearm," during that incident, he said, although he agreed under questioning that no guns had been found.
Both the officer who shot Wilcox and Cpl. Jason Pole, a second officer who arrived on the scene of the shooting, were questioned about how much training they had in dealing with people with mental illness. The two officers said they didn't have specific training to deal with that, although they encountered people with mental illness almost daily.
Since this shooting, the RCMP has introduced a course in crisis intervention for people with mental illness, said one of the officers.
Earlier Monday, Shelley Beaudet, Wilcox's common law wife at the time, gave emotional testimony about Wilcox's struggles with bipolar mental illness and his dealings with police.
Beaudet said Wilcox was a talented animator and "a joy to be around" when he was healthy. "He wasn't always healthy," she said.
"He wasn't valued by society because he had a mental illness. He went off the rails sometimes."
She said when police had previously been called to deal with Wilcox, officers had "riled him up and roughed him up."
"I would never ever go to the police for help," she said. "They absolutely 100 per cent make things worse."
Beaudet said Wilcox had been tasered and dragged out of the house by police in the past.
"They go in with a poker stick" she said. "That's just the wrong approach for someone like Matt."
Beaudet said when he became manic, Wilcox would get paranoid and begin making "crazy talk." She said he sometimes talked about guns when he was in that state, but did not actually possess any.
Beaudet said on the day he was shot, Wilcox had been drinking and had missed taking his regular medication.
Beaudet described her anguish at not being able to visit Wilcox in hospital after he was shot. "No one in the family was allowed to go and visit him," she said.
At the time Wilcox died, police had lifted the ban on family visits but that message somehow did not get communicated to hospital staff.
"He died alone in the hospital with no one who loved him able to go and say goodbye. It's outrageous," she said.
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