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Nigel Stuckey first started noticing a big difference in 2019.
The veteran London police sergeant saw more overdose calls, mostly involving the synthetic opioid fentanyl, and more people living on the street.
After retiring two years ago, Stuckey continued walking the same streets he once patrolled during his 32-year career. But instead of a gun and badge, he carried a camera to interview homeless people for his debut documentary Atrocity, an 85-minute exploration of homelessness in London.
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“It’s going to be difficult to watch,” Stuckey said of his film that debuts Sunday at the Forest City Film Festival. “It’s an uncomfortable reality. You can choose not to see (it), but at the end of the day, it’s still there.”
Atrocity differs from other homelessness documentaries that feature mostly experts and a few “chosen” unhoused people, said Stuckey, whose film hass only unhoused people and one expert, addictions specialist Dr. Sharon Koivu.
“As this evolved, it really became clear to me that when I would speak to people on the street, they really wanted to be heard,” Stuckey said. “And so that is sort of when I changed my emphasis and I decided I wanted to give them a voice, let them be heard.”
The biggest takeaway from the documentary is that most of London’s homeless people are “medically compromised” – a term Stuckey uses for those facing addiction, physical disabilities and mental health issues. One subject of his film is a former landscaper who suffered a stroke; another is a blind woman living in a tent.
While shooting the documentary, Stuckey also encountered Cheryl Sheldon, an illiterate woman in her 60s who was pushing a shopping cart.
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“At that point, she was living in a stairwell at the market,” said Stuckey, who interviewed Sheldon several times.
Sheldon had been staying at a shelter until she was seriously hurt in an assault and no longer felt safe there, Stuckey said. She became addicted to methamphetamine as a way to cope with life on the street.
Sheldon finally escaped homelessness in December when she moved into an public-housing apartment. But she died in hospital after being found critically injured in her apartment June 22. Sheldon’s boyfriend, George Curtis, 44, is charged with second-degree murder.
After Sheldon’s death, Stuckey reached out to her brother Mark, who lives in Quebec, and showed him the footage he shot during several meetings with Sheldon.
Mark Sheldon came to London this week for the unveiling of a memorial bench dedicated to his sister. Stuckey was there to film the event.
The retired police officer has no formal training in filmmaking and did all of the shooting, writing and editing himself.
“It was basically my film school,” he said of the self-funded project. “I learned everything on YouTube and trial and error.”
Sunday’s screening will be followed by a question-and-answer segment with Stuckey and Koivu, moderated by Free Press reporter Randy Richmond.
IF YOU GO
What: Screening of Atrocity
When: Sunday at 4:30 p.m.
Where: Wolf Performance Hall, 251 Dundas St.
Tickets: Available at fcff.ca or at Wolf Performance Hall box office
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