Oscar Arfmann, accused in murder of Abbotsford police officer, was troubled and mean when drunk

Lori Culbert
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Scott Brown
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Published on: November 8, 2017 | Last Updated: November 8, 2017 6:19 AM PST

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The man accused of fatally shooting an Abbotsford police officer could be scary and intimidating when drunk, people in his former hometown of Ashmont, Alberta, told Postmedia News.
And relatives say Oscar Arfmann, 65, had mental-health problems after the death of his wife Patricia in 2013.
“He scared people around the community who knew him,” said Brittany Palmondon, who works in the Ashmont Food and Liquor Store.

“He was kind of friendly, but … he would get angry, aggressive when he drank.”

Oscar Arfmann, 65. HO / THE CANADIAN PRESS

Arfmann lived outside of Ashmont, which is 180 kilometres northeast of Edmonton, for a couple of years but moved away about a year ago, Palmondon said.
Arfmann was charged Tuesday with first-degree murder in the death of Abbotsford Const. John Davidson, who was shot Monday.

Cpl. Frank Jang, spokesman for the Integrated Homicide Investigation Team, said police hope friends and associates — if they haven’t already spoken with police — will come forward.
“We need to know more about Mr. Arfmann,” Jang said at a Tuesday afternoon media conference.
Jang said Arfmann previously held a firearms licence but it had expired in 2015. He also said Arfmann didn’t have a valid driver’s licence.
A search of court records in Edmonton shows that a man whose name was spelled Oscar Ferdinand Arfman pleaded guilty to impaired driving in St. Paul court in 2016. The 65-year-old also had failure to appear charges on his record.
Arfmann was in hospital and was conscious, he said, but Jang wouldn’t disclose what injuries Arfmann suffered when he exchanged gunfire with police after shooting Davidson.
Palmondon described an incident when she and a co-worker tried to help an intoxicated Arfmann catch his dog. “He was angry about it, the dog wouldn’t listen,” she said.
Sister-in-law Pamela Arfmann told Global News that Oscar was a retired truck driver, who was believed to be living in a motor home in B.C.
Last year, he sold his Ashmont property before coming to B.C. to stay with family.

Abbotsford Police Department Const. John Davidson was shot and killed in the line of duty on Nov. 6, 2017. Abbotsford Police Department handout

She said Oscar had been struggling with mental-health issues since the death of his wife.
“He lost his wife about three years ago and he’s just gone off since then,” Pamela said. “He hasn’t been the same since he lost his wife.
“He talked to himself a lot. And he was just not, it’s hard to explain, he was just not the same person. He talked about demons and stuff like that, too, that he was demon-possessed at times.”
A former family member of Arfmann’s, who didn’t want to be named, told Postmedia that she believes “mentally something was wrong” with him.
“You wouldn’t believe the things that he did,” she said from Alberta. “I hope he spends the rest of his life in jail and he will pay for everything.”
Oscar’s former wife Hope, to whom he was married from 1972 to 1975, said his family immigrated from Germany to Canada when Oscar was young. He has several brothers and sisters.

A memorial for Abbotsford Police Const. John Davidson in Abbotsford, B.C., November 7, 2017. Arlen Redekop / PNG

When they were married, she and Oscar lived in Wetaskiwin, Alberta, and he was a bricklayer, and then they moved to the family farm in nearby Millet. They had one son, who was given up for adoption.
Hope Arfmann recalled that her former husband used guns, in particular for target practice and hunting small animals, on the rural property.
Oscar’s mother died, and his father remarried and moved to Vernon, B.C., she said. His father died in 2005.
Linda Arfmann, his sister-in-law, told Postmedia that the family learned of Oscar Arfmann’s arrest through media coverage on Tuesday morning.
“We are preparing a family statement which we will release,” she said from her Edmonton home.
— With files from Lora Grindlay, Patrick Johnston and Edmonton Journal.
lculbert@postmedia.com