CALGARY — The RCMP is investigating whether criminal charges should be laid in a deadly avalanche near Revelstoke, B.C., that they say was triggered by snowmobilers.

A 10-person team from the major-crimes unit is looking into the events surrounding the slide on Boulder Mountain and trying to determine who organized the unsanctioned Big Iron Shoot-Out.

Shay Snortland, 33, of Lacombe, and his business partner Kurtis Reynolds, 33, of Strathmore — were killed and 31 others hurt Saturday when a wall of snow came down on about 200 people.

An avalanche warning had been in effect for the area when three daredevil sledders apparently began competing to see who could race highest up the mountain in a competition called high-marking.

“The aim of the investigation is to look at all the current information and gather up all information related to the incident,” RCMP Cpl. Dan Moskaluk said Tuesday.

“There’s deaths involved ... now they (investigators) have the responsibility to see if there are any elements of any offences.”

Moskaluk says police will recommend criminal charges to Crown counsel if they have enough evidence.

“It’s too early to speculate if there are any criminal charges to be laid or what they would be.”

Given the unique circumstances, Moskaluk expects the investigation to be long and complex.

“We’re looking to speak with a variety of persons ranging from witnesses, participants to if there was an organizing body to this.”

The most probable charges in the case would be criminal negligence causing death and criminal negligence causing bodily harm, said Sanjeev Anand, a former senior Crown prosecutor, who now teaches law at the University of Alberta in Edmonton.

But making a criminal case wouldn’t be easy, he said.

“It is not enough to show that the organizers of the event, for example, failed to take the kinds of precautions that a reasonable person would.

“The Crown would have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the standard fell so far below that of the reasonable person that it constituted gross negligence,” he said.

“It’s much easier to prove, in many respects, a civil action in negligence because the standard there is simply a departure from the standard of a reasonable person and a civil action only needs to be proven on the balance of probabilities.”

He said the Crown could lay a manslaughter charge, but criminal negligence causing death is essentially the same thing and the penalty is the same.

“They would take into account quite a bit of the background circumstances. For example, where the accident happened, the avalanche conditions, any steps taken by the organizers to pre-empt an avalanche, by the use of explosives. Any warnings given would also be taken into account.”

The fact that people had a choice to attend would not necessarily matter in a criminal case, Anand said.

“In criminal law, we are not about apportioning blame between different actors,” he said.

“It’s one thing to take a risk on your own. It’s another thing to create an event in a dangerous area and not to take appropriate precautions.”

The search-and-recovery effort ended Monday after rescue teams and trained dogs found no signs that any other people were trapped under the snow.

Survivors and experts have said the situation could have been much worse if those left above the snow hadn’t been prepared with safety gear and technology to find others who were buried.