Security had no concerns about Boyle

HALIFAX — Justin Trudeau is suggesting that security officials raised no red flags when his office arranged last month for him to meet freed hostage Joshua Boyle and his family.

The prime minister says his office follows all the advice it’s given by security officials and did exactly that in the case of the Boyle family. Trudeau met with Boyle, his American wife and their three children in the prime minister’s Parliament Hill office on Dec. 18. On Dec. 30, Ottawa police laid 15 criminal charges against Boyle, including eight counts of assault, two counts of sexual assault, two counts of unlawful confinement and one count each of misleading police, uttering a death threat and administering a noxious substance. The charges are related to incidents alleged to have occurred between Oct. 14 – one day after the Boyle family arrived back in Canada after five years of captivity in Afghanistan – and Dec. 30, 2017.

In the wake of the charges, questions have been raised about how someone alleged to have committed multiple crimes could have been granted a private meeting with Trudeau in the prime minister’s inner sanctum.

The Prime Minister’s Office has said Boyle requested the meeting. It is not clear if Boyle was under police investigation at that time and Trudeau did not address that issue Tuesday in his first public comments on the meeting.

However, he told a Halifax radio station that the advice of security officials was followed.

“We make sure that we follow all the advice that our security professionals and intelligence agencies give us and that’s exactly what we did in this case,” Trudeau told News 97.5.