Woman’s family wants it known her death by ex-RCMP officer was intimate partner violence

When Tara Graham’s mother was killed three weeks ago, her death was made public in a police news release.

But what wasn’t made public was her mother’s name, her face or her story.

So Graham says her family is speaking out — because her mother, Brenda Tatlock-Burke, was the victim of intimate partner violence.

“She was just another somebody that nobody knew,” Graham said about the case.

“And my sister and I just felt like she needed to be brought to life in who she was and the means in which she was killed.”

Graham describes her 59-year-old mother as being full of life, always smiling and as outgoing as can be.

She says her mother had been visiting her and her sister in Alberta just days before her death and had flown back to Nova Scotia on Oct. 16.

Her mother had mentioned her plans to leave her husband, whom Graham identifies as Mike Burke, during the weeks-long trip and had assured her daughters she felt safe in doing so.

But on Oct. 18, RCMP were called to a home in Enfield, N.S. — outside Halifax — where the bodies of two adults were found inside.

“Working with the Nova Scotia Medical Examiner Service, it has been determined that a 59-year-old woman died as a result of homicide and the death of a 61-year-old man was due to self-inflicted injuries,” RCMP wrote in an Oct. 22 release, which doesn’t use the term intimate partner violence.

Graham says the wording of the release didn’t sit well with her family.

“The initial communication was it wasn’t labelled as domestic abuse. It was simply just said that they were known to each other and there was no harm to the community,” she said.

“I just felt that was so insulting to her and to the community, because people aren’t just safe, and she didn’t just have a fight that went sideways. This was a long, drawn-out domestic abuse relationship that ended very tragically.”

RCMP responds

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Graham says her family is particularly concerned because her mother’s husband was a former RCMP officer. She criticizes the police force for not being forthcoming about this fact.

She questions what kind of resources were available to her mother, and whether her mother felt comfortable calling police for help.

In response, RCMP confirm to Global News the man involved in Tatlock-Burke’s death is a former officer who retired more than 10 years ago.

A spokesperson also says RCMP had not been called to that address “prior to this incident” and that the firearm involved in the shooting was “legally possessed.”

In an interview, Assistant Commissioner Dennis Daley, commanding officer of the Nova Scotia RCMP, offered his sympathies to the family and apologized for how her death was communicated.

He says RCMP initially didn’t want to reveal Burke’s employment due to the Privacy Act, but “pushed the envelope a little bit more” after internal discussions.

“In order to be transparent, we are obviously willing to (confirm his previous employment) because we recognize that police officers are part of the community and they’re human beings and they’re susceptible to intimate partner violence, no different than anybody else in the community,” he said.

Daley says the force is evolving how it discusses intimate partner violence, and wants to call it “for what it is.”

“Going forward, we will certainly be as transparent as possible, recognizing that it might not be that day or the next day that we can actually communicate that it’s intimate partner violence. But we do want that message to get out there because we do recognize our role in trying to defeat the scourge of intimate partner violence,” he said.

Daley calls intimate partner violence an epidemic and reveals that so far this year, two of the province’s districts have responded to “over 1,100” incidents related to it.

He highlights the work of four domestic violence co-ordinators, who are specially trained and work alongside transition homes and advocates.

He says he’s also glad Tatlock-Burke’s family is speaking out and advocating against intimate partner violence, and that he himself aims to do the same.

“We need to talk about this. And we need together through conversations and through bystanders getting involved, we just need to talk about intimate partner violence more here in Nova Scotia,” he said.

Vocabulary matters

Vocabulary, and how we choose to describe these acts of violence, is important, according to Bre Woligroski, the chair of the Feminist Alliance for International Action.

“Vocabulary really reflects our beliefs about the reality of intimate partner violence,” she said.

“When we sort of downgrade what’s happening, downgrade that violence, sort of minimize the relationship aspect … we’re really missing the point, right?”

Woligroski says statistics have shown an increase in reported cases of intimate partner violence in the country, and it should be a cause of concern.

“(It’s) a 20 per cent increase from 2014 to 2022. And also we know that women and gender-non-binary individuals in rural areas are especially at risk, being three and a half times higher at risk for intimate partner violence,” she said.

Since Tatlock-Burke’s homicide, two more cases with similar characteristics have occurred in the province.

RCMP responded to two sudden deaths in Yarmouth, N.S., on Nov. 1. A 58-year-old man and a 49-year-old woman who were “known to each other” were found at the scene. Those deaths are being treated as suspicious.

Just this Monday in the community of Cole Harbour, officers were called to a home on Poplar Drive, where they found the remains of a 72-year-old man and a 71-year-old woman.

“The two individuals were known to one another and there was no risk to the public,” police said in a Tuesday release, which did refer to the case as an incident of intimate partner violence.

“The woman’s death was a result of homicide and the investigation has determined that the man, who died as a result of self-inflicted wounds, was responsible for the woman’s death.”

All this fuels Graham’s need to speak out and share her mother’s story.

“I just don’t feel like it’s taken seriously until somebody is severely injured or they’re dead,” she said.

“I just want everybody to know that it can happen to anybody. So, to look at the signs, listen to your friends.”

Political leaders agree it’s an ‘epidemic’

On the campaign trail, all three party leaders called intimate partner violence “an epidemic” in the province.

Liberal Leader Zach Churchill, who is from Yarmouth, said he knew the people involved in the case in that community — and called all three recent incidents “horrifying stories.”

“It’s tragic and we have to do better,” he said.

He said his party’s platform will create an office within the Department of Health that will address intimate partner violence and support women. He adds the platform also looks into investing in women’s centres and community-based organizations that provide direct front-line support to victims of violence.

“This is something that is an epidemic in our province, and needs to have a systemic approach to addressing,” he said.

Meanwhile, PC Leader Tim Houston pointed to the Mass Casualty Commission’s findings and recommendations, which were the result of an inquiry into the April 2020 mass shooting in Nova Scotia.

The murders were preceded by a domestic assault against the shooter’s spouse, and the inquiry collected evidence indicating he used tactics of coercive control against her throughout their 19-year relationship, as well as against other women.

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N.S. mass shooting probe told cultural shift needed to address gender-based violence

One of the commission’s recommendations was that “all levels of government in Canada declare gender-based, intimate partner, and family violence to be an epidemic that warrants a meaningful and sustained society-wide response.”

“We are moving forward with recommendations that would include things like additional supports for survivors, including things like counselling and other supports that are available,” Houston said.

“So we’ll continue to move for that — working with non-profits and transitional houses to make sure that we’re supporting them and the important work that they’re doing.”

NDP Leader Claudia Chender agreed the framework laid out by the Mass Casualty Commission needs to be followed because “we have to act to make a difference.”

“We have to have epidemic-level funding to the front-line organizations that are working with women and communities to ensure that this doesn’t happen and that we can change the culture and stem the tide of this kind of violence,” she said.