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| NEWS > 05 March 2009 |
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Police face theft and weapons
THREE Melbourne policemen have been charged with stealing power tools, a television and DVDs after investigators secretly tempted them to steal in the course of their work.
Detective senior constables Kenneth Ian Taylor, Mark Herbert Ziemann and Ross Andrew Colley were charged yesterday with offences including theft, handling stolen goods and possessing prohibited weapons.
The charges flowed from a probe by the Office of Police Integrity and the Victoria Police Ethical Standards Department.
The Age reported this month that the investigation had uncovered a cult... Read more
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Vancouver Sun - British Columb
05 March 2009
This article appeared in the above title/site.
To view it in its entirity click this link.
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Ethics in Policing
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Government to make changes to
The B.C. government introduced legislation Wednesday to bring broad changes to the way public complaints against municipal police forces are handled, including measures that make it impossible for officers to avoid a disciplinary process by retiring.
But a civil liberties advocate said it does not address the key problem: police, not civilians, will continue to investigate the police.
“Today, I have introduced legislation that focuses on strengthening the broad independent oversight of the office of the police complaints commissioner,” Solicitor-General John van Dongen said.
Van Dongen said the legislation addresses all recommendations put forward in a 2007 report on the police complaint process by Judge Josiah Wood.
If passed, it will apply only to B.C.’s 11 municipal forces, not to RCMP detachments that serve many communities, which are covered by a separate federal process. The government says it hopes to debate and pass the bill before the coming election campaign.
Almost 100 pages long, the bill calls for a number of changes, including:
— Making it mandatory for external police forces to investigate any in-custody death or serious injury.
— Empowering the complaints commissioner, not the police force facing allegations, to decide how to proceed with a complaint.
— Allowing the commissioner to track all investigations in real time.
— Compelling police officers to provide statements within five days of a request.
— Increasing the maximum-allowable suspension for misconduct to 30 days from five.
The bill follows controversy involving former Vancouver police chief Jamie Graham, who avoided a disciplinary procedure by retiring in 2007.
An investigation last year concluded Graham was guilty of “discreditable conduct” for failing to cooperate with an investigation into allegations of police misconduct in the Downtown Eastside.
Graham, who is now chief of the Victoria Police Department, faced no disciplinary action because he was no longer with the Vancouver force.
The new rules would have forced Graham to face disciplinary action, and the outcome would have been on his record when he was considered for the Victoria job.
NDP public safety critic Mike Farnworth said he had not yet reviewed the lengthy bill, but said his party would support the measures if they truly follow the recommendations suggested by Wood.
He was critical, however, that it took so long for the government to act on the February 2007 report.
He also said the legislation should cover RCMP detachments.
David Eby, executive director of the B.C. Civil Liberties Association, said he thinks the bill has good elements, as well as some that are “really bad.”
Eby said he liked the extra powers given to the commissioner, such as those on deciding how to proceed with an investigation.
But, he said, the new bill does not act on some of the key changes his organization wants to see.
“The act doesn’t make the one change we’ve been pushing for for years, which is that police don’t investigate themselves, particularly in cases of in-custody deaths,” he said.
“We have an ongoing concern about that,” Eby said, adding that the commissioner should be allowed to conduct his own investigations as a civilian.
Eby said he also has concerns about other issues, such as an amendment that could limit the involvement of third-party advocacy organizations during a complaint.
Van Dongen introduced a second piece of legislation that extends the police complaint commissioner’s term to six years from five, and allows a commissioner to serve a second term.
Farnworth agreed with that, but questioned why it was introduced just after the replacement of outgoing commissioner Dirk Ryneveld, who had requested a second term but was denied because rules did not allow it.
“He was a sharp-toothed, independent watchdog,” Farnworth said. “The government clearly didn’t like the way his teeth sometimes bit.”
Van Dongen disputed the claim, saying he “never had any problems with Dirk Ryneveld” and pointing out that commissioners are not selected directly by him or his government.
“Decisions around the appointment of the police complaint commissioner are by a legislative committee,” he said. “They are not by the government or the minister of public safety and solicitor-general.”
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