We are all suing the Mounties…apparently…

Posted on by Pete Cross

On September 20th of this year, the Federal Court “certified” a class action lawsuit against the RCMP, and is asking for $1.1 billion. And you, whether you know it or not are a signatory– with no signature required.

We are with little doubt into a new age, in terms of lawsuits, everyone has a complaint and just as importantly everyone seems to feel the need for compensation. Hundreds of millions of dollars, in fact billions of dollars have been coming out of the Federal coffers; to pay off, or more accurately to “settle”, rather than facing a trial and protracted court cases. These settlements are often cloaked in secrecy, far from the prying eyes of the persons who are in actual fact paying out these monies. The end results or conclusions to these cases, are often just flashes in our mind’s eye, prompted by a headline or two, which makes us briefly flinch. Then we move on, our sanity and possible outrage papered over by our ignorance or our inability to dig deep.

What is somewhat surprising in this most recent lawsuit is the fact that every officer of the RCMP and reserve officer, since 1995 until the present, are automatically included in this particular lawsuit. The nexus of the claim, or your claim, is built around the central contention that we (present and former police officers) were subjected to “bullying” and “harassment”. Furthermore, the Mounties failed to provide a safe and respective “workplace”. One does have the option to “opt out” of being a participant, should you wish to fill out a provided form and send it in to the respective law firm before November 23, 2022.

So I and you (RCMP officers) am now being represented, without any effort, retainer, or affirmation by the firm of Kim Spencer McPhee Barristers PC. Since they are your new barristers it would seem pertinent to learn a little about them. It turns out that this firm is no stranger to the lawsuit game, in fact, their stated “focus” is “complex, high value class actions”. This Bay Street Toronto firm has been involved in many lawsuits and come up against such entities as ManuLife, General Motors, FedEx and Sunlife. RCMP members and ex-members have also been some of their favoured clients having been involved in the RCMP Gender Sexual Harassment and the RCMP Medical Examination suit.

The two principals of this law firm are Megan McPhee, a seemingly rising star in the field of class action suits in Canada and Michael C. Spencer, an American trained lawyer who brought his expertise in the field of securities and class actions from California and New York to Canada. This firm with regard to “our” lawsuit, has negotiated an agreement that will stand to net 1/3 of any awarded damages. That would be 33% of a possible $1.1 billion.

The firm have fronting this suit, two “representative plaintiffs”, Geoffrey Greenwood and Todd Gray, both RCMP members from Alberta. It was in 2019 that these two officers filed a suit alleging that they were the victims of “systemic negligence in the form of non-sexual bullying, intimidation, and general harassment”. The plaintiffs also argue that the RCMP chain of command that was “tasked to deal with internal recourse and harassment claims include those that are responsible for the harassment that is being complained about”. This they argue has led to a “toxic work environment” and is “characterized by abuses of power”.

There have been two other outside developments which seemed to have helped spur the lawsuit. One was the report by Chief Justice Michael Bastarache, “Broken Dreams, Broken Lives” which dealt with the sexual harassments claims of women in the RCMP. This report stated among many other things, that the RCMP can not fix itself “internally”. The lawsuit is also supported by a statement in 2016 when then Commissioner Paulson went on the record stating that the RCMP was guilty of “harassment and intimidation”.

The Federal government has by necessity tried to quash this latest suit, appealing to the Supreme Court of Canada. They argued that the internal systems already in place for grievances, was a sufficient remedy for these types of complaints and allegations. Without any written reason, in March 2022 the Supreme Court rejected that appeal.

If one attempts to amateurishly dissect and analyze the central core of these arguments one could probably come to some relatively easy conclusions. Albeit subjectively, there seems to be some strong arguments to be made in support of this civil case. It would be difficult to argue that even the basic training academy at the earliest point of a police officers career, centres on discipline and uses intimidation and harassment as the basic tools to force compliance and reinforce that “team” mentality. Depot has mellowed significantly since the 1970’s and 1980’s, but let’s face it, it is still there and was definitely there in 1995. Does anyone from the early era forget the Drill hall? There was a large caveat though, it was all intended as part of a game of survival. It was expected. You were challenged to ignore and face the often offensive behaviour, it was part of the indoctrination, it was part of the preparation for facing the abuse on the streets. So if this type of thing is accepted under todays standards as being harassment or intimidation the lawyers for the plaintiffs seem to be in a good position.

There is also little doubt that the RCMP has always investigated these types of complaints internally, and often it was the immediate supervisors who were tasked with this very unwanted task. If one accepts that this generally inhibits fairness and objectivity, and in fact corrupts, that too would be an easy argument that could be made by many.

Where the argument in favour of this lawsuit seems to fail is when one draws from the specific to the general. Staff Sargent Greenwood, one of the representative plaintiffs, and the most publicly outspoken is now the Staff in charge of GIS in North Red Deer, Alberta. His specifics are what constitutes some of the base for this lawsuit. He began his career in 1990 and was transferred to Yellowknife in 2003. He says that his troubles started in Yellowknife Detachment where he was ostracized for trying to “uncover corruption”. In 2007 he was promoted to Sgt. and had begun an investigation into some criminal organizations. During this investigation, which included wiretaps, there was some audio captured which implicated some RCMP officers allegedly taking “kickbacks” in amounts up to $60,000; destroying evidence, and leaking the locations of undercover operations and drug raids. Clearly very serious allegations. However the officers were not identified in the tapes, but later an “informant” for Greenwood managed to identify an involved officer.

In 2007 a new Superintendent took over the unit. This Supt. for reasons unknown at this time, told him to drop the case, which Greenwood refused to do, or at least that is the between the lines indication. This Supt. would end up filing no less than seven codes of conduct complaints against Greenwood. All but one would be eventually “dropped”. From this point, we can only rely on the public record, but suffice to say the two had some major differences. Greenwood said he was “demoted” to desk duty and filed a harassment complaint against the Supt. as well as another officer who “tried to punch him in the face”. Greenwood further states that he had suffered harassment and intimidation “throughout his career”, but that in all that happened in Yellowknife he “lost my way for numerous years”. He said that “most members struggle daily” and that he suffers from PTSD due to the “reprisals and harassment on the job”.

Todd Gray the other representative for this lawsuit, provides evidence that as a member of the Musical Ride and while performing at equestrian events was “forced to ride in a bunk in the same trailer as the horses” which was “unsafe, dangerous, and illegal”. He was also made to ride his horse “despite a back injury”. Furthermore he was “ostracized and isolated when he accused a detachment commander in Nunavut of mistreating First Nations people”. At first glance, Mr. Gray’s examples seem somewhat more fragile than that of Mr. Greenwood. Riding in the trailers with the horses was common practise according to my recollection, and part of the shared duties in the Musical Ride. It would also be difficult to believe that if presented a medical certificate of a back injury that any supervisor would have forced anyone to ride a horse. Possible for sure, but it seems unlikely. As to his accusations against the Nunavut detachment commander, also possible, but likely mentioned and underlined in the lawsuit to strike at the Federal government sensitivity to anything indigenous.

Not knowing all the details of this civil suit makes it difficult to sort the real from the unreal or the exaggerated. The complaints of the representative plaintiffs may be real and have proven devastating for these two individuals. But I will also admit to a bit of cynicism in terms of the complaints as they feel more “new age” than “old school”. The proof will be uncovered in the civil case should it in fact go to trial. Given the propensity of the Mounties to cover all wrong doing with greenbacks we may never know the truth in these matters. I personally did not feel that I was harassed or intimidated by my bosses over a thirty-four year career, but maybe I was just lucky. Nor do I believe that “most members struggle daily” as stated by Mr. Greenwood. However, I have often argued that a union was needed due to the various member problems that were given short shrift over the years, lost to an inefficient and bureaucratic system which often suffered from a lack of investigation as well as a lack of outcome.

So good luck to you my fellow participants in the Greenwood versus His Majesty the King. The worst result of “our” civil case may be all of us getting cheques for 40 bucks in a settlement with no real public explanation. You know as well as I that the lawyers are the only real winners.

Photo Courtesy of howtostartablogonline.net via Flickr Commons – Some Rights Reserved

Defending the only slightly Indefensible…

Posted on by Pete Cross

In the last few days, politicians, political pundits and radio and television personalities have been sending themselves into a tizzy, into another anti-police feeding frenzy. The water has been chummed this time by a videotape resurrected from a 2012 criminal case which captured an interview between a police officer and a 17 year old female held in an interview room in the West Kelowna RCMP detachment.

It was not dug up by intrepid reporting, Global News had the videotape sent to them. Now, the edited version has been virally shared, with Global News direly warning for those softened listeners, that it is “hard to listen to”; no doubt in an attempt to draw in more viewers as it is like saying “look away there is a car accident”.

It took hold and it has now been called “abhorrent” by our illustrious Ralph Goodale, the Minister of Public Safety, whose opinion blows in the political wind incessantly, shifting with any voter high pressure system.

My favourite Judge, Marion Buller said that the interview put on display “racist stereotypes of Indigenous women” and it rose out of the “historical tension” due to residential schools. Keep in mind that Buller finds all that ails Canada and the indigenous can be summed up in the residential schools.

Jenna Forbes of the Vancouver Aboriginal Transformative Justice Services Society was “outraged” and asked whether this type of questioning was “part of policy”.

On Simi Sara’s talk show on CKNW, which is affiliated with Global News –in her best holier than thou voice proclaimed that this was “unacceptable” and questioned whether the officer involved had been “fired” for such an atrocious breech of the public standards. Of course she was echoing and re-enforcing the prevailing wisdom spewing forth from the usual go-to for comment “experts”. Thirty second encapsulations bounced around the internet and across Canada, each indignant voice louder than the first, all calling for the head of the officer involved.

The new E Division Commanding Officer finally feeling the pressure weighed in on the video; announcing a “fulsome review”; and throwing a little pre-judgement in for good measure, “on the surface this case doesn’t appear to align with public expectations or the current standards and practises in place”.

Clearly she was making an attempt to say that was the way then, way back in 2012, but now, things are better.

In this more aware year of 2019, the RCMP , according to the Commanding Officer was now “supporting victims”, and members were being exposed to a “course recently updated”. The strategic spin doctors of the RCMP went further commenting that they were advancing “cultural competency training…trauma informed investigations and an advanced course for sexual assault investigation”.

The cultural reference was because all commentators noted in their reporting that the female victim was “indigenous”, intentionally putting a match to spark the gas line of indigenous reconciliation outrage.

Experts ran to the flame, braying about another example of the police being incapable of understanding their culture, just another example of the ill effects of colonialism.

The officer involved no doubt could not have felt more alone.

In viewing the video, nothing will get around the fact that the officer asked inappropriate questions. That is apparent and should never have happened, the questioning of whether she was “turned on by it at all” showed a glaring lack of knowledge of the nature of sexual assault.

However, if you examine the circumstances, it may be in-appropriate and completely unfair to rush to such a harsh judgement. The commentary on this subject comes from those that have never been in that interview room, let alone investigated any sexual assaults.

Some of the questions and the perceptions that arise from this videotape need to be looked at through an investigators lens.

First, this videotape did not surface as a result of a complaint coming forward from the female, or some representative of her about the investigation or the lack of charges. One should always be somewhat suspect about the release of information which may aid someone in their particular cause or pursuit.

It is the result of a civil suit, totally unrelated to the crime of sexual assault.

It is part of the evidence that surfaced as a result of an investigation into a social worker in 2012, Robert Riley Saunders. It was alleged that Saunders stole monies from some teens, including the female in the video; monies that were forwarded to them through the Ministry over a four year period totalling $40,000.00. Basically he was taking monies from vulnerable clients and putting it in his own bank account.

The female youth victim, one of a dozen, was forced, according to the civil claim, to living on the streets and into a life of drug addiction using meth, crack, cocaine, and MDMA.

On March 4, 2012 the female youth then made allegations of a sexual assault. The two defendants in the civil case, (as by now another female social worker was named as a defendant), countered, along with the girl’s foster parents, saying that the female victim was “falsifying the allegations for an excuse for using drugs”.

We also learn that this same female victim alleges that she was sexually assaulted by her grandfather earlier in life. She makes reference to it during the videotape. She says on the tape, “nobody believed me then and nobody believes me now”.

The officer responded, “I have reason to believe what happened in your past, but I do have a lot of concerns about your story here”. Earlier the officer, had said that he wants to probe “inconsistencies in her story”. No doubt some of that concern centred around the fact that the victim said she “didn’t not say no” to the alleged assailant throughout the assault. It should also be pointed out that she was making this allegation against an “acquaintance”.

This of course is possible as she said she was “scared” but some further layering of the explanation was needed.

All this is to say is that regardless of who is telling the truth in this case, what had been raised was a possible alternate story, a possibility that there was some fabrication on the part of the victim. To an investigator tasked with getting to the truth, you are now in a position where one must consider a couple of different narratives. Therefore that has to form part of your questioning of the victim. As a truth seeker any investigator can not have a tunnel version of the truth, one needs to walk the middle road, consider all possibilities.

There are some in this current political environment who believe that there is no such thing as a made up sexual allegation. This blogger is not one of them and has been involved in a number of investigations where some allegations were clearly false and were eventually proven to be in fact pure fiction. This goes counter to the #metoo movement and the left leaning liberals which constantly assert that no woman is capable of lying under these circumstances. That is just factually incorrect, regardless of how acceptable that dogma has become.

So this particular investigator, under these circumstances, has to consider that this particular female, who was living a street level existence and addicted to drugs, could possibly have an alternate reason for coming forward with this story.

One should also note that this female, in the days or months following this interview, wrote a letter of apology to the accused and the RCMP for making this sexual assault investigation.

Of course, it is now being claimed that she was “allegedly forced by her social worker to write letters of apology to the accused man and the RCMP for wasting their time”.

The female victim, now no doubt re-enforced with a lawyer and a civil claim now says that she has been “re-traumatized after watching the video”.

Again, this too could be true, but there is a great deal of evidence which this investigator could not ignore in terms of the line of questioning.

Secondly. The interview and the way it was conducted had absolutely nothing to do with this female victim being indigenous. Listen to the videotape and if anyone can find anything suggesting that this interviewer was being racist, or that some line of questioning would lead one to this conclusion, they need to step forward and point to it.

What critiques are doing is implying that the line of questioning is the result of her being indigenous, not understanding that this line of questioning would occur, and should occur if an investigator is divining the truth no matter who the witness may be. The wording of some of his questions can be criticized, the intent of his questioning should not be characterized as racist.

If a victim or witness or suspect has raised a different set of facts than that has to be explored. An investigator or an interviewer should be criticized for not exploring these and all venues, but the exploring or questioning easily leads to criticism in the techniques used by the arm chair quarterbacks.

Hopefully the police have not reached a stage in this country during an investigation when they can be told that there must be wholesale acceptance of everything being put forward. Remember, it has been said, “it is a basic truth of the human condition that everybody lies. The only variable is about what.”

There are also some questions that need to be explored about the time leading up to the conduct of this interview and of the logistics surrounding the taking of this statement.

For instance, was there someone monitoring this interview as is the usual protocol?

Was this investigator ever given instruction on interviewing techniques?

How many interviews of this ilk had he ever done? What level of supervision was given with regard to the conduct of the interview?

The RCMP management can talk about sexual assault investigator courses. But was this particular officer ever on one? Quite often those types of courses go to the specialized units, and the general duty cop is the last on the list for such specialization.

There has been a lot of questioning of why there was no female present acting on behalf or as support? One must remember that this person is a witness, a victim witness, she is not a suspect. Her story could be suspect, but she is not being treated as a victim in these circumstances, therefore there is no legal need for someone to be present.

Police also try to avoid having more than one person in a room for a witness interview, for fear of interference, or coaching. If she wanted someone there and had asked for it, it is likely that she would have had that choice if it would help her in feeling secure. But this would not be likely at the age of 17. If she had been under investigation for possible charges, then the rules would be entirely different.

So should the officer have worded his questions differently? Of course, the questions showed a lack of knowledge, not evil intent.

The ability to talk to people, to interview, is an art, learned over time and through repetition. You need to go “into the room” to get proficient. It takes years to be both a listener and a talker– especially when that person may be trying to deceive. Some say the skill is being lost in the millennial generation, dominated by the land of laptops, a growing perception that interviewing is a specialized skill that warrants specialists and special training. That is not the case, it requires a willingness to enter the interview room and run the risk of being fooled, maybe hundreds of times, and those that do should not be chastised by the 20/20 hindsights of the courts and the academics. Some would argue that it is the greatest skill needed by a police officer.

No doubt this officer will get some sort of discipline letter, but if that is the case, let’s give one to his Supervisor and on up the line.

To debase and libel this investigator as being racist is completely unfair and one would hope that it would be actionable.

And while you’re at it let’s give the likes of Marion Buller, and Jenna Forbes a ride in a police car for a couple of shifts, and let them do some interviews.

And as they enter that drab room at 2 o’clock in the morning, tired, and having to perform on camera for later court scrutiny– give them a hint…. not everybody tells the truth to the police.

Photo Courtesy of James Cridland via Flickr Commons – Some Rights Reserved