The Prince Albert Police Service are raising awareness about Intimate Partner Violence (IPV).
In a statement, the Prince Albert Police Service define intimate partner violence as an occurrence “between people who are currently in a relationship or individuals who were previously in a relationship. IPV can take many forms, including physical violence, threats, emotional or psychological abuse, coercive control, financial abuse, stalking, and other behaviours intended to intimidate, control, or harm a partner.”
“We knew for some time now that in the Prairie provinces, we’ve been experiencing some higher rates and trends of intimate partner violence,” said Prince Albert Police Service Chief Patrick Nogier. “Trying to get a better appreciation and a better understanding of what we’ve been seeing over the last little while is going to help the way that we respond to those situations.”
According to the Saskatchewan RCMP’s annual crime statistics and yearly trends report, 26 per cent of violent crimes were categorized as intimate partner violence in 2025.
“In 2025, we were averaging 27 calls a month and that’s concerning. Now let’s go into 2026, and these comparisons are up until the end of July. The first six months of the year and this year we’ve experienced 31 calls per month up until this point,” Nogier said.
Due to the lack of a specialized unit to respond to IPV-related cases, Nogier said that they “rely on our frontline officers responding to those calls to make sure that we respond in a way that the community can find reassuring.”
“There’s things we need to consider from a trauma-informed lens. We know that sometimes getting victims and witnesses to provide information in those situations is very challenging,” he said. “We know that getting them furthermore, not only to provide us with the initial information, but to be willing to continue down the path if charges are warranted. All those things really become kind of an essential part of the process when we first respond.”
Nogier added that a specific trend police are noticing is that out of the 31 calls made per month, 4 per cent involve youth victims.
“That’s concerning for us because we know that in those impressionable years, individuals that are being traumatized, repeatedly—we say that things that can happen is that they go down one or two roads—either they’re victimized and traumatized as they continue through that adolescent journey, or they start going into patterns of criminal behaviour or dealing with substance abuse issues,” he explained.
To combat the lack of a specialized unit, Nogier said they are experiencing a policy review.
“I can tell you that our existing policy just touches the surface of IPV situations. We didn’t have the ability to do an in-depth analysis of our policy and procedures,” Nogier said. “But things like emergency intervention orders, do we know that our officers are aware of that mechanism to provide a safe environment for an individual that has stepped forward to indicate that they’ve been a victim to IPV? We haven’t been using those emergency intervention orders, so we need to do a deeper dive as an organization to understand why.”
He added that they are aware of the city’s issue regarding intimate partner violence.
“When you compare what’s going on from province to province, Prairie provinces, primarily between Saskatchewan and Manitoba, the IPV tastes, they’re not equal. We know that we have an issue here,” said Nogier. “We need to ensure that we’re now engaging and providing some information that we have in data sets and maybe better awareness of who’s being involved and then engaging with some of our external partners to try and come up with new awareness campaigns.”
Nogier said there is sometimes a lack of trust between victims and officials that is a large barrier for those in need of help, as well as accessibility to policing resources.
“There’s many barriers that are involved. Just identifying which one is in each specific circumstance allows us to be a little more flexible,” he said.
The Prince Albert Police Service said they “continue to respond to reports of intimate partner violence and recognizes the importance of encouraging victims and survivors to come forward. The number of IPV incidents recorded by police remains a concern, and the Service is encouraging members of the public to report incidents of violence and abuse.”
Nogier said, “In Saskatchewan, IPV cannot be treated simply as another domestic call. It’s a recurring and potentially escalating public safety issue and our ability to recognize that pattern, not just response, the incident, is critical.”
The Prince Albert Police Service stated they are “dedicated in working with community partners to increase awareness, support victims and survivors, and help prevent intimate partner violence in the community.”
“No piece of information is too small. If you see something, say something and be willing to provide us, that allows us to do that intervention and potentially save an individual from further trauma,” said Nogier.
