22 Murders: Investigating the Massacres, Cover-up and Obstacles to Justice in Nova Scotia

A shocking exposé of the deadliest killing spree in Canadian history, and how police tragically failed its victims and survivors.

As news broke of a killer rampaging across the tiny community of Portapique, Nova Scotia, late on April 18, 2020, details were oddly hard to come by. Who was the killer? Why was he not apprehended? What were police doing? How many were dead? And why was the gunman still on the loose the next morning and killing again? The RCMP was largely silent then, and continued to obscure the actions of denturist Gabriel Wortman after an officer shot and killed him at a gas station during a chance encounter.

Though retired as an investigative journalist and author, Paul Palango spent much of his career reporting on Canada’s troubled national police force. Watching the RCMP stumble through the Portapique massacre, only a few hours from his Nova Scotia home, Palango knew the story behind the headlines was more complicated and damning than anyone was willing to admit. With the COVID-19 lockdown sealing off the Maritimes, no journalist in the province knew the RCMP better than Palango did. Within a month, he was back in print and on the radio, peeling away the layers of this murderous episode as only he could, and unearthing the collision of failure and malfeasance that cost a quiet community 22 innocent lives.