Early Career
Originally from Ontario and of Scottish descent, after high school Campbell's grandfather found him a job digging ditches for coaxial cable. Later he was a steel worker as a hand riveter in a boxcar plant in Hamilton. He joined the RCMP on a bet with a Hamilton municipal police officer. He spent about three years in uniform, but did not like to issue traffic tickets. He was transferred to the drug squad in Vancouver where he worked in street enforcement mainly regarding heroin, including undercover work. He started a drug squad in Langley. Throughout his RCMP tenure, he never laid a single marijuana charge.
After serving in the RCMP for 12 years, the provincial chief coroner told him that the new Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms would negatively impact his drug enforcement efforts and convinced him to become Vancouver's coroner. During the emerging AIDS pandemic, he became a strong advocate for progressive harm reduction policies, quipping that needle exchanges causing drug addiction "is like flies causing garbage." He served for 20 years, retiring as chief coroner for the province.
Read more about this topic: Larry Campbell
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