DYSFUNCTIONAL POLICING IS A REAL ISSUE
Cautionary tale should give commissioner of money laundering inquiry the willies
Phil Tawtel, director of the B.C. Civil Forfeiture Office, sounded like he was boasting to the provincial inquiry into money laundering.
But what I heard was a cautionary tale that should give commissioner Austin Cullen the willies, if only because of the irony: The Civil Forfeiture Office was set up by former cop-turned-cabinet minister Rich Coleman to seize criminal profits at the same time Coleman was overseeing casinos in such a way as to precipitate a money laundering crisis.
Tawtel said his office, over 15 years, has managed to confiscate roughly $115 million — about $10 million a year — distributed $55 million in “crime prevention grants” (which includes money to police), and $1.7 million in victim compensation.
The rest, 50 cents on the dollar, went to expenses, salaries, legal costs, paper, “you name it.”
In a province where the underground marijuana and illicit drug market remains a multibillion-dollar business, $10 million is not even a proverbial drop in the bucket.
The Vancouver Police Department's annual budget is $314 million.
So much for Coleman's gleeful predictions back in 2005 that the law supported by both major parties would be a game-changer.
Forfeiture can and often is a part of criminal sentencing, but civil forfeiture allows the government to demand you prove you are not guilty of using dirty money even if you've been acquitted criminally.
One of Tawtel's deputies is seconded to the RCMP and one to the VPD. Both are former cops.
“They work alongside other police officers who are assigned to the asset forfeiture unit, and ... their role is to, first and foremost, facilitate a referral to our office,” explained Tawtel, a retired Mountie.
As for the big marlin that civil forfeiture was going to reel in, well, they've turned out to be mostly sardines.
As feared, the law has ended up overwhelmingly being used against the little guy while the big players continue dancing down the yellow brick road.
The Civil Forfeiture Office has demanded a pensioner fight to recover his coin collection, a former volunteer fireman his pickup truck, and a crippled electrician his house. Of the so-called “low-value files” that account for 80 per cent of the office's work, many were for less than $1,000, one amounted to only $80.80.
“But that may be an offender who has been a consistent problem in the community that may be tied to 12 other files, $1,000, $1,000, $800 and then this $80 ... you're dealing often with perpetual offenders,” Tawtel insisted.
His staff also have targeted “nuisance houses.”
“It's happened more than a handful of times — would be the nuisance house in the community where there's a high volume of attendance of calls by the police, there's been serious crime, there's been drug trafficking, there's been assaults, there's been a number of very bad crimes taking place on the property, and those properties are frequently underwater.
“We know from the outset that there is going to be either no equity or a very small amount of equity to be taken from the property, and the legal costs will far exceed that. That said, we consider that a tremendous win for the community and the anecdotal feedback we've had from the community is that was important to do.”
Tawtel estimated eight of 10 forfeitures don't even generate a response, and there have been fewer than 15 trials over the years.
He rejected suggestions that the vast majority of forfeitures were unopposed because those involved were often homeless and could not afford the legal costs.
It was wrong to think people didn't fight back because the deck was stacked against them, Tawtel maintained.
Instead it was because they considered the seizure of their assets to be the cost of doing business. In the biggest case, the government is appealing a B.C. Supreme Court ruling last year that sided with the Hells Angels saying sections of the law were unconstitutional.
Judges and civil libertarians worry about these relatively new laws because they were borrowed from the U.S., where they have a checkered reputation.
They blur the distinction between police powers of investigation for law enforcement (with attendant constitutional protections) and civil property rights.
Still, the government not so long ago gave Tawtel broader power to snoop through private bank accounts and demand financial information.
He and the Finance Ministry are now working on a new direction, Unexplained Wealth Orders — when old-fashioned police work respecting rights won't do, do it by fiat!
In a 1994 report, ex-judge and Liberal attorney general Wally Oppal concluded the fragmented provincial policing system was dysfunctional and should be replaced.
It has been obvious for decades that the RCMP cannot provide municipal, provincial and federal law enforcement with proper oversight because of the tangle of jurisdictional and legal issues involved in these constitutionally separate bailiwicks.
In terms of casinos alone, the commission has confronted a regulatory thicket involving police, the gaming policy and enforcement branch, the B.C. Lottery Corp., and other agencies — a panoply that provides an astounding number of bureaucratic and enforcement jobs for pensioned police officers, but seemingly little accountability.
Civil forfeiture has not lived up to promises nor has law enforcement in terms of making inroads against organized crime.
There has never been an audit or a cost-benefit analysis of the self-funded Civil Forfeiture Office.
“I can only speak to what we've taken off the street. Is $114 million in potential future drug purchases, weapon purchases, does that make a difference? I would say yes. To what degree, I'm not clear. ... What the macro impact is, I don't know.”
Tawtel acknowledged the forfeiture office hadn't managed to seize anything from apparently the only money launderer it tackled.
“The target was not the drug trafficker but the person facilitating the transfer of wealth from Canada into the U.S. ... He's the financial arm of the pyramid that sits to the side and doesn't get his hands dirty with the drug trafficking ... ( but) when we went looking for that person's assets ... (they) weren't there.”
So the elephant in the room for Cullen is the province's dysfunctional policing system.