MMIW probe asking for more time
An independent watchdog launched an investigation Tuesday into how the RCMP handled the fatal shooting of Colten Boushie, promising to look at whether the officers’ conduct after the 22-year-old Cree man was killed “amounted to discrimination.”
A lawyer for the Boushie family applauded the development, expecting the probe to fundamentally change how Canadian police officers do their jobs.
“When you dig right into the details of this case and you look at the policies that are currently in place,” Chris Murphy said, “I think that there’s going to have to be a seismic shift in how policing is done, especially in relation to the Indigenous community.”
The announcement comes almost a month after 56-year-old farmer Gerald Stanley was acquitted of second-degree murder in Boushie’s death on an August afternoon in 2016. Boushie was shot in the back of the head after an SUV he was riding in pulled into Stanley’s farm.
Stanley told the jury he fired two shots to scare off the five youth in the SUV and believed his gun was empty when it misfired and killed Boushie. The verdict, from a jury without an Indigenous member, set off nationwide protests and prompted the prime minister and the justice minister to pledge to change the way juries are selected.
Boushie’s family, including his mother Debbie Baptiste, have been critical of the RCMP’s actions in the case. On the evening of her son’s death, Baptiste said officers were insensitive when they showed up to notify her, subsequently searching her house without permission and asking her if she had been drinking.
The family filed a complaint with the RCMP and was unsatisfied with the internal investigation that cleared the force. They asked the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission for the RCMP to review how their complaint was handled.
After monitoring the case, acting commission chairman Guy Bujold filed a complaint of his own and launched the public interest review announced Tuesday.
“It has become apparent that additional matters related to the conduct of RCMP members involved need to be examined,” Bujold said.
By initiating the complaint himself, Bujold can look at the issues raised in the family’s complaint while also considering broader aspects of the case, a commission spokeswoman said.
Part of the investigation will look at how Boushie’s mother was notified of her son’s death as well as the search of her home and the RCMP news releases put out after the shooting.
It will also look more broadly at the RCMP’s investigation, its overall policies and procedures and whether or not officers’ conduct “amounted to discrimination on the basis of race or perceived race.”