RCMP facing a second claim of discrimination
RETIRED INSPECTOR ALLEGES SYSTEMATIC GENDER-BASED HARASSMENT
The RCMP faces a second potential class-action lawsuit alleging systemic discrimination within its ranks. Linda Davidson, who retired from a 27-year-career with the RCMP in 2012, is the lead plaintiff in a proposed suit alleging systemic gender-based harassment and discrimination in the RCMP. The Bracebridge, Ont., mother said that for most of her career she was subjected to bullying and belittling from male officers that left her mentally anguished and even suicidal. The harassment, she alleges in court papers, took many forms: unwanted grabbing and kissing, crude jokes, and con- stant questioning about her sexual orientation and abilities. “I experienced this treatment irrespective of my detachment, posting, rank or seniority,” she wrote in an affidavit. “I never felt that I could rely on senior officers to protect me.” In her career, Davidson rose to the rank of inspector — the ninth female Mountie to do so — and landed a gig on the PM’s protective detail. Though the lawsuit involving Davidson was filed in Ontario Superior Court last spring, it has gone largely unnoticed. But it is definitely on the radar of police brass.
Linda Davidson “fell in love” with the idea of becoming a cop in the early 1980s.
Over a 27-year career with the RCMP, she rose to the rank of inspector — the ninth female Mountie to do so — and landed a gig on the prime minister’s protective detail.
“I loved every second of being on that detail,” she gushed to a local Ontario newspaper, the Huntsville Forester, shortly after retiring in October 2012. “I loved the excitement, I loved the travel, I loved the life that went on around it, the meeting of new people and visits to new countries.”
But that glowing account masked what she now says was an ugly truth — that for most of her career, she was subjected to bullying and belittling from male officers that left her mentally anguished and even suicidal.
The harassment, she alleges in court papers, took many forms: unwanted grabbing and kissing; crude jokes, including the placement of ketchup-stained tampons in her locker; and constant questioning about her sexual orientation and abilities.
“I experienced this treatment irrespective of my detachment, posting, rank or seniority,” she wrote in an affidavit. “I never felt that I could rely on senior officers to protect me.”
The Bracebridge, Ont., mother, who now runs a security firm, is the lead plaintiff in a proposed classaction lawsuit alleging systemic gender-based harassment and discrimination in the RCMP — the second such lawsuit to hit the force in recent years. Though it was filed in Ontario Superior Court last spring, the lawsuit has gone largely unnoticed.
But it is definitely on the radar of police brass.
In a briefing document sent to the new public safety minister in November and obtained by the National Post under access-to-information laws, RCMP Commissioner Bob Paulson listed “harassment litigation” as one of his top challenges, citing Davidson’s proposed class action, as well as one filed earlier in B.C. by former Const. Janet Merlo.
While the force has implemented a number of respectful- workplace initiatives, recruited more women and promoted more women to senior positions, “the memory of a publicly floundering RCMP, following a succession of very significant shortcomings, is not yet distant enough in the minds of those we serve,” Paulson wrote.
“Therefore, we continue to maintain a sense of urgency in our ongoing efforts toward transforming the force into a modern, professional, national police force.”
The harassment and discrimination that Davidson faced “forced her to leave an organization she loved, and led to the premature end of a distinguished career,” her lawyer Megan McPhee said in an email.
But even in retirement, it still took Davidson awhile before she was comfortable going public with her allegations.
It wasn’t until last year, when her PTSD, anxiety and depression were “sufficiently manageable,” she wrote in an affidavit, that she decided to file the lawsuit.
In court documents, Davidson alleges multiple overt sexual acts from male colleagues.
Early in her career, she says, an officer at the Grand Falls detachment in Newfoundland put his hand down her shirt and grabbed her breast. She said she slapped him across the face.
In the mid-1990s, while working at Toronto’s airport, she says a sergeant without warning began to remove her tie and belt. “I told him to never lay his hands on me again.”
In the early 2000s at the Hamilton-Niagara detachment, she says a chief superintendent put his hands on her waist and tried to kiss her and that a commanding officer sexually propositioned her.
She says she was also subjected to cruel jokes.
The first time she attended a fatal car accident, she alleges a male colleague dropped a victim’s detached finger, with ring still attached, into the palm of her hand, causing her to vomit.
She claims colleagues in Newfoundland put sex toys in her work basket and the same constable who reached down her shirt also tied balloons to her desk to insinuate that he had had sex with her.
From 1979 to 2004, Davidson was married to a man, but she says she faced constant questioning about her sexual orientation.
She says she was called “stud,” “bitch” and “queer.”
In 2008, she married a woman.
She claims colleagues on the prime minister’s security detail spread false rumours she was having sexual relations with women who were not her spouse.
Meanwhile, she was regularly passed over for work on meaningful cases and her skills were constantly questioned and tested, according to her suit.
She was once sent alone into a bar fight involving about 30 people, she says.
As an inspector in Hamilton-Niagara, her male peers did not respond helpfully when she wanted to discuss tactical issues, she claims.
She says a male superintendent on the prime minister’s security team made derogatory remarks about women’s physical abilities.
For the most part, Davidson says she kept quiet. When she did complain, she says she was told if she was “going to swim in the shark tank,” she’d better act like a shark.
Davidson says she turned to alcohol to cope. In 1992, she wrote, “I actually put a gun in my mouth, but I was crying so hard that I could not hold it steady.”
None of her allegations has been tested in court. A statement of defence has not been filed and the RCMP declined to comment.
Davidson’s claim seeks $500 million in damages. Her lawyer says the number is based on the roughly 10,000 women who have been on the force.
An application to certify the B.C. case as a class action was argued last year and awaiting a decision.
A certification hearing in Davidson’s Ontario case is set for May.