Street Crime Section
Saskatoon Police Service Drug Unit
The Saskatoon Police Service Drug Unit (SPSDU) is responsible for the proactive investigation and enforcement of all provisions under the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act. The primary mandate of the Drug Unit is to gather intelligence, conduct quality investigations for prosecution and take enforcement action on all drug offences within the City of Saskatoon. SPSDU will investigate individuals involved with street-level drug trafficking as well as those persons or organized groups responsible for large scale distribution, importation and manufacturing of illicit drugs in our city.
Drug Unit Investigators take pride and an active role in providing educational lectures to our community partners and stakeholders on current street drug trends and drug awareness. Members work closely and share intelligence with other municipal law enforcement partners, both provincially and nationally, including the RCMP and Canada Border Services Agency.
The Saskatoon Police Service maintains a trained and qualified Clandestine Lab Response Team which is responsible for the investigation, processing and dismantling of any matters or events related to clandestine labs in the city.
Guns & Gangs Unit
The Guns & Gangs Unit is dedicated to disrupting and dismantling gangs, and addressing violence through prevention, intervention and enforcement. The Unit is an expansion of the former Street Gang Unit. It focuses on serious habitual offenders and high-risk offenders, in conjunction with the Saskatoon Integrated Drug Unit and the Saskatoon Integrated Crime Reduction Team (ICRT).
The Serious Habitual Offender Comprehensive Action Program (SHOCAP) involves members of the Guns & Gangs Unit who meet regularly with workers from Corrections and Public Safety and prosecutions in order to deal with the supervision of individuals involved in serious crime within our community. These individuals are generally placed on Court imposed conditions for release within the community. The conditions are monitored and suggestions for other conditions made in order to ensure compliance and crime free lifestyle.
National Weapons Enforcement Support Team
The National Weapons Enforcement Support Team (NWEST) is a unit under the RCMP umbrella that provides specialized officers across the country who are able to guide investigators through complex firearms legislation. NWEST officers are drawn from various municipal and provincial police services across Canada as well as from the RCMP itself. The Saskatoon Police Service has one Sergeant seconded to the RCMP in this capacity.
Integrated Crime Reduction Team
The Saskatoon Integrated Crime Reduction Team (ICRT) consists of investigators from the SPS and RCMP. ICRT is funded and mandated by the provincial government. This team’s focus is to investigate gang violence, illegal firearms, drug trafficking, property crime and rural crime.
Serious Assault Unit
The Serious Assault Unit (SAU) is comprised of a group of investigators who specialize in the investigation of assaults that are serious and often life-threatening in nature. Members are on call 24/7 to investigate these types of assaults. They will often work in conjunction with the Forensic Identification Unit to secure evidence at the scene of a crime. As interviewing both suspects and witnesses is a crucial part of this type of work, investigators receive specialized training in the area of forensic interviewing.