In Memory of Constable David Rodney Nicholson, M.B. Badge #589 1966 - 1998
Constable Nicholson joined the Waterloo Regional Police Service in 1989. He later became a member of the Emergency Response Unit, assigned as a police diver with the Underwater Search and Recovery Unit.
On the evening of August 12, 1998, Constable Nicholson was dispatched to the Parkhill Dam in Cambridge, where a young boy went missing after swimming with some friends in the Grand River. Constable Nicholson searched the area behind the dam under the Grand River for the young boy. It is believed Constable Nicholson found the young boy and it was at this point he was sucked and pinned into a sluiceway. The force was so strong that Constable Nicholson's lifeline snapped after more than 50 first responders and bystanders attempted to pull him to safety. The search and rescue operation went tragically wrong and both Constable Nicholson and the young boy drowned.
Constable Nicholson became the first police officer in the history of the Waterloo Regional Police Service to die in the line of duty. For his actions, Constable Nicholson was posthumously awarded the Medal of Bravery and the Ontario Medal for Police Bravery.
Constable Nicholson is survived by his wife and three sons.
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