The BC Civil Liberties Association is calling on the RCMP in Prince George to move an allegation of sexual assault made by Jennifer Alexander, a local aboriginal woman, against several officers from the Prince George detachment to an external police force or at the very least, a major crimes investigator from a separate RCMP detachment.
“These allegations are among the most serious a person can make,” said Robert Holmes, President of the BCCLA. “To suggest that it is fair and appropriate to ask a new police officer at that detachment to investigate people that she has to work with for months or years afterwards is unfair to her and unfair to the complainant.”
Local media reports suggest that the head of the detachment has already dismissed rumours that off-shift officers were involved as “inaccurate,” before the investigation has been completed, or the allegedly involved officers, presumably, interviewed. In addition the head of the detachment has been quoted as saying that because the investigator is a new hire at the detachment, she is well placed to do the investigation.
“In the best of circumstances, it is difficult if not impossible for a police officer to investigate her colleagues impartially and objectively in serious cases like this,” said Holmes. “At a small detachment, for a new hire, for a sexual assault allegation, for an allegation involving multiple officers, a detachment with a bad history around self investigation, if you add all of these pieces up, there is simply no way that an internal investigation will, or should, have the confidence of the community.”
The RCMP has asked for a representative of a local aboriginal community to oversee portions of the internal investigation on October 7th and 8th. The head of the RCMP in British Columbia, the B.C. Association of Chiefs of Police, the BCCLA, Commissioner Davies from the Frank Paul Inquiry and Commissioner Braidwood from the Dziekanski Inquiry have all called for a civilian body that would be available to conduct investigations of death in custody or other serious alleged wrongdoing. The provincial government is responding, but that system is not yet in place. The only alternative for police forces facing serious allegations are to ask other police forces to complete the investigation. For example, in a recent shooting in Kamloops, RCMP asked Calgary Police Department to complete the investigation.
Read the BCCLA‟s letter to the head of the RCMP in B.C.
MEDIA CONTACTS:
Robert Holmes, President, 604-681-1310
David Eby, Executive Director, 778-865-7997
Backgrounder
Prince George RCMP have a very poor history around self-investigation of serious matters that have taken place at the detachment in recent memory.
Clayton Alvin Willey
The Prince George RCMP investigated and closed their file around the death of Clayton Alvin Willey finding no wrongdoing. When the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs and the BCCLA held a press conference to demand the release of the video in that case, the RCMP reviewed the tape of a hog-tied man being Tasered multiple times and re-opened their code of conduct investigation against the involved officers. The investigation report is due out any day now.
J.A.L.
A man accused of sexual assault said that the RCMP in Prince George Tasered him more than twenty times while he was in jail. Provincial Court Judge Michael Brecknell ultimately made the finding of fact that two officers, including a supervisor, within Prince George RCMP took active steps to destroy or conceal the surveillance footage of the incident. “This was not a
‘simple mistake,’” wrote the Judge. Neither officer involved in destroying this videotape was
reprimanded.
Mr. McDonald
The same police officer in J.A.L. and Willey in 2002 was found by a provincial court judge to have assaulted a Mr. McDonald in Prince George causing bodily harm, namely broken bones in his face and missing teeth. The judge gave the RCMP officer 18 months probation. No internal discipline was brought against him, and his duties with the RCMP were not changed. A remand was, however, put on his file. The case is described in the J.A.L. decision.
