Report on right track for policing police

Ontario Justice Michael Tulloch has produced a thoughtful, well-researched report for the Ontario government on how to improve civilian oversight of the police.

The issue is actually whether his 129 recommendations will be taken seriously, or put on the shelf as so many previous reports have.

Tulloch reviewed the three civilian agencies that oversee police conduct but the key one is Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit, which investigates when a civilian is killed by police.

Tulloch wisely rejected calls to have the SIU name police officers while they are investigating them, unless they are charged with a criminal offence, the same procedure as applies to civilians.

But he also called for the SIU to release the results of all future (and past) investigations in cases where it doesn’t lay charges, including the evidence that led to that decision, within 120 days, with the names of subject officers removed.

Tulloch recommends inquests be held in all cases where police use of force results in the death of a civilian, a non-criminal inquiry to determine how the death occurred and how such deaths can be prevented in future, where officers can be called as witnesses.

This is a sensible idea, although the weakness of inquests is that their recommendations aren’t binding and are often ignored.

In recommendations sure to be opposed by police unions, Tulloch says the SIU should have the power to charge witness police officers who refuse to co-operate with its investigations with a provincial offence and subject officers must hand over their notes to the SIU.

Tulloch wisely resisted calls from police critics that SIU investigators shouldn’t be former police officers but reasonably suggested it should hire more investigators with non-police backgrounds.

We support Tulloch’s recommendation that all civilian police oversight agencies gather so called “race-crime” statistics (along with data on age, gender, religion, ethnicity and the mental health status) of people who come into contact with the police. This is common practice in the US. The issue is how the data is used. The wrong way, for example, is to use it only to “prove” the police are racist, without looking at why the police interact with the people they do and how policing can be improved as a result.