RCMP Commissioner William Elliott will be seeking changes to the RCMP Act that will broaden disciplinary options and make it easier to dismiss officers for gross misconduct. Elliott argues that without legislative change, disciplinary options in serious offenses are overly lenient and often take years to resolve.
The BCCLA has witnessed how long it can take for investigations to take place. Most of the complaints the BCCLA makes are unresolved for years. One of the main problems reported to the BCCLA about the police complaint process is that if officers are found at fault, disciplinary measures are inadequate. If Commissioner Elliott can change the process so that discipline does occur when officers are found to have broken their code of conduct, this would be a huge improvement to the system.
Discipline aside, it’s important to note that in many of the most egregious cases, the RCMP has found no fault at all: Ian Bush, Kevin St. Arnaud, Clayton Willey, and Robert Dziekanski, and that in the history of British Columbia, not a single police officer has faced a criminal charge arising from a police-involved death. What good are better sanctions if you can’t see any problems in the first place?
Check out the story in the Vancouver Sun.