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Four young Mounties from the Virden Detachment attempt a routine investigation of an overdue truck rental that had been spotted outside the Countryside Inn, a Motel in Virden, Manitoba.  
 
Inside the motel a desperate, lawless couple, Bruce Donald Archer, 42 who liked to be called Cliff, and his girlfriend Dorothy Mallette, 28 once referred to as Canada's Bonnie & Clyde, hide from the police.  
 
They are fleeing from previous crimes in Vancouver, (Skipping Bail in Surry, charged with writing bad cheques, and in Calgary, suspicion of Murder) and resist the Mounties with sudden and violent force.  
 
Mr. Archer was armed with a rifle, and a shotgun which he admitted to Reporters that he took into the Motel room to save them being stolen from the truck outside.  
 
The Shotgun was beside the door when the Mounties burst in, the couple had only been in the room for 45 minutes and were taken by the 1 a.m. surprise.  
 
Mr. Archer claimed he panicked when he took the 20-guage Shotgun and shot Constable Onofrey, 27 who died instantly.  
 
A shootout in the parking lot ensued where Corporal Russ Hornseth, 30 was shot in the face, and Constable Candice (Candy) Smith, 23 was shot twice at close range, once with a .308, and once with a 20-gaugre shotgun causing such critical injuries that Doctors could not risk moving her from Brandon General hospital to the General Hospital in Winnipeg.  
 
This leads to an extended trail of mayhem & hostage taking that runs through several farms on the back roads of south western Manitoba, and in turn, ignites one of the biggest manhunts in the history of Manitoba.  
 
One hour following the shooting, the fleeing couple entered the Oak Lake home of Dr. Markus Scherz, and quickly made hostages out of the Doctor, his wife Stephanie, and their friend Mark Penny to begin a four-day standoff.  
 
Mr. Archer chose the Doctors Main Street Home seeking aid for his girlfriend who had been wounded in the stomach during the Motel shootout.  
 
The Tribune with some detective work of their own were able to contact Mr. Archer before RCM Police could control the phone lines at the Doctors home.  
 
Through the contact Reporter Mr. Archer demanded $100,000, a flight to a neutral country for himself and his partner, and free legal council.  
 
Two days after the hostage standoff began Dr. Scherz walked out of his house at 11.05 p.m. At this time a spokesman for the Mounties, Superintendent Robert J. Corley said that Mr. Archer, and the two remaining hostages appeared to be developing Stockholm Syndrome, where hostages and captors manifest signs of mutual sympathy.  
 
Two days later Mr. Archer walked out of the house and surrendered to police.  
 
His expectant wife Paula and a one-year-old son survived Constable Dennis Onofrey, a native of Winnipeg. He was in the RCM Police service for four years.  
 
As I remember it, Candy Smith was a rookie police officer that had just graduated from the Regina Police Academy returned to Duty at the Brandon Detachment after she recovered from her injuries.  
 
Mr. Archer was never charged with the Murder of a 65 year old man in Calgary even though the mans wallet had been stolen, and his credit cards were used to rent the room at the Virden Motel.  
 
Ms. Dorothy Mallette and Mr. Bruce Donald Archer attended court at the Brandon Court House, lines of spectators arrived every morning to watch the proceedings. They both received life sentences in prison where Mr. Archer died of Natural Causes.  
 
Source: http://www.odmp.org/canada/officer/22-constable-dennis-anthony-onofrey  
 
Note: Although I have tried to report accurately the facts above there is a book by Robert Knuckle called “Beyond reason”, the Murder of a Mountie, published in March of 1999 by Hushion House Publishing that I have not read but may have a more in-depth description of these horrific events.  
 
http://openlibrary.org/b/OL8558502M/Beyond_Reason