The provincial fatality inquiry, which was created five years ago, investigated why the Afghanistan war veteran killed three members of his family and himself in their rural Nova Scotia home in January 2017.
Zimmer was set to retire as a provincial court judge in March 2022, a month before the inquiry’s hearings concluded, but his term was extended four times over the past 18 months to allow him to complete the report.
After the most recent extension expired on Friday, provincial Attorney General Brad Johns decided to call in a replacement.
Houston says his government took action because it wasn’t clear if the report would ever be finished.
The premier says the government could not go on granting extensions.
“How many times do you say, ‘another extension, another extension, another extension,' before you accept the reality maybe you need to take another course to get it finished,” Houston told reporters after an unrelated announcement.
“So we wish Justice Zimmer well, but our interest is getting a completed report and that’s why we took the action we took.”
