Probe launched into police record leaks
Jays player, PC candidate’s information
Ontario’s privacy watchdog has launched an investigation into the leak of police documents that were used to try to smear a potential Progressive Conservative candidate in the province’s election.
As first reported by the National Post, the confidential records, which deal with the aborted drug arrest of the would-be candidate and two other men in 2016, were mailed out last month to Tories in Brampton.
Just a day before the PCs’ Brampton Centre nomination election in late April, the party disqualified the individual named in the internal police document and removed him from the ballot.
Brian Beamish, the province’s information and privacy commissioner, announced Wednesday he would investigate the release of the Peel Regional Police arrest documents, and the apparent unauthorized divulging of CCTV images by a Toronto police officer.
Beamish’s office does not specify the image-release to be examined, but Toronto police are looking into how a photo of Blue Jays pitcher Roberto Osuna in a holding cell made its way to a media outlet. Osuna was charged with assault this week.
“My office has decided to launch investigations into these two apparent incidents of unauthorized use and disclosure of personal information,” the commissioner said in a statement. “If any reports are produced at the conclusion of our investigations, they will be made available to the public at that time.”
In the documents case, Peel Regional Police are investigating how the arrest document got out to third parties. The report was mailed out along with a cover letter highlighting the name of the would-be candidate — who was among those arrested — and declaring, “let us clean the rot from the roots.” Parts of the report were also emailed to the Post.
Not included in the material sent to the Post was a section of the report outlining that the suspects were released “unconditionally” within half an hour.
The report appears to have been obtained through the Police Information Portal (PIP), a system that gives access to internal records from other departments.
Peel police say the leak did not come from one of their own officers or other employees, but it could have originated from another force.
A Peel spokesman said last week the department is looking at whether the release of the documents constituted a criminal act.