Mounties need help in policing themselves
The allegations have become sadly familiar. They’ve spoiled the RCMP’s once- proud legacy and tarnished its brass.
One woman after another has come forward, and now hundreds are claiming to have experienced gender- based harassment and discrimination while working for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, an institution that doesn’t seem capable of policing itself.
The harassment complaints are outlined in legal documents and have filled pages of newspapers, for years in some cases. It’s time those long- standing claims were tested in court.
Several cases alleging RCMP harassment have already been tried, while others are still inching their way through the justice system, including a giant, proposed class- action case that could involve 282 or more women, should it proceed.
Monday, government lawyers and counsel for the lawsuit’s original plaintiff, a former RCMP constable, appeared in B. C. Supreme Court chambers for a long- awaited application hearing. A judge will determine whether the matter can go to trial.
The proposed class action was initiated by veteran RCMP officer Janet Merlo, a Newfoundland native who spent her entire 18- year career as a Mountie on Vancouver Island before retiring in 2010.
She anticipated none of this: the alleged behaviours directed at her; the illnesses that beset her; her husband’s reactions, an attempted suicide and the breakup of their marriage; going public with her claims; the notoriety; and writing a book.
Merlo told a CBC radio host Monday the class action is “probably not the best way” to manage the specific allegations she makes, and which at least 280 other former and current female RCMP members have indicated they support. “But it’s the only way,” she added.
She is right. While the RCMP has taken steps to address harassment issues in its ranks, it hasn’t — and likely can’t — tackle on its own the enormity of the problem, or every concern raised by hundreds of its female members, past and present.
There is, according to Merlo’s lawyer, “a systemic failure within the institution.” It continues to plague the police force, and the allegations keep coming.
All of them require close, impartial scrutiny. Some are more alarming and go further than others.
A lawsuit filed in British Columbia by Atoya Montague, a former civilian worker, alleges deplorable sexual behaviour by RCMP members, some of whom have climbed up the ranks; it also describes an outlandish threat allegedly made by a Canadian reporter during a 2007 RCMP mission to Guatemala.
“After one heated and uncomfortable dinner, the reporter approached the plaintiff and, in a low voice, whispered, ‘ You know I could kill you right here and nothing would ever happen to me, I would get away with it scot free and that would be that,’ ” reads Montoya’s lawsuit.
Merlo filed her civil claim three years ago in B. C. Supreme Court. Most of her accusations involve two of her former senior officers in the RCMP’s Nanaimo, B. C. detachment. They are not named in the lawsuit.
She accuses her former watch sergeant of aggressive, demeaning behaviour directed at her.
“On one occasion,” reads her statement of claim, “the sergeant brandished a dildo that had been seized as evidence in a criminal investigation and yelled across the Nanaimo detachment office words to the effect: ‘ Merlo, what the hell happened? This thing was brand new yesterday. Now it’s almost worn out. Did you take it home last night?’ “
A supervisor corporal would “position an inflatable naked doll next to his desk at the detachment while on duty,” she also alleged. “On more than one occasion, the supervising corporal invited Ms. Merlo to stand next to the doll.”
Merlo has claimed he did this “to see who was taller and to compare statures.”
Similar incidents are alleged in her claim, which now forms the basis of the class action being considered for certification in British Columbia. The attorney general of Canada and the province’s justice minister are named as sole defendants. The certification hearing will continue for several days.
It’s been a long time coming. After Merlo retired, she returned to her native Newfoundland, where she works with troubled youth. In 2013, a year after filing her claim, she published a memoir, No One to Tell: Breaking My Silence in the RCMP.
The book repeats the allegations contained in her documents filed in court; bear in mind, none have been proven one bit.
Some observers might find fault in Merlo and other women for bringing their allegations to court. They should not.
Are the courts the best place to address what even the RCMP has acknowledged, in general terms, to be a problem? As Merlo noted, “probably not.” Is a lawsuit the only route left? Things have come to that, yes.