Man to sue over arrest, alleges assault

Criminal charges against a Siksika man who intends to sue police over his arrest were stayed Thursday by the Crown.

Defence lawyer Dale Fedorchuk said the allegations against Christian Duckchief were dropped in Siksika provincial court.

Fedorchuk declined to speculate on why Crown prosecutor Ron Pedersen stayed the allegations, but noted they occurred in the face of several Charter applications he was intending on making.

Duckchief, 24, faced charges of assaulting a peace officer, resisting arrest and breach of release conditions in connection with an April 1, 2016, incident at his Siksika home.

“We had filed a Charter notice alleging a number of breaches of Mr. Duckchief’s constitutional rights,” Fedorchuk said.

Among the alleged breaches were an unlawful search and seizure, and a warrantless entry into Duckchief’s home the day of his arrest.

“The police officers entered into the home without a warrant and after entering the home … they proceeded to attempt to arrest Mr. Duckchief and assaulted him quite severely,” Fedorchuk alleged.

“After arresting him, they took him out of his home naked, put him in the back of the police cruiser naked, then took him through the detachment nude in the presence of a female civilian personnel at the guard desk.

“So there have been some fairly egregious violations of Mr. Duckchief’s rights in our view,” he said.

Duckchief suffered an orbital fracture under his left eye and other injuries to his face, which required plastic surgery.

“He now suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder, for which he is receiving treatment,” Fedorchuk said.

Despite his injuries and ongoing psychological problems because of the incident, Duckchief is relived he can put the criminal prosecution behind him, the lawyer said.

“He is very happy that this matter is now over,” he said.

But Fedorchuk said this won’t end the court proceedings in the case.

“He has instructed Guardian Law Group, my law firm, to bring a civil lawsuit against the RCMP and we’re in the process of drafting that claim.”

Fedorchuk said, in his view, the conduct of the police was improper.

“We live in a society where violence upon civilian people by police officers is simply unacceptable … clearly there was excessive force used in this circumstance,” he said.

Quoting from a Supreme Court decision, Fedorchuk said the incident is precisely what shouldn’t happen in a democracy such as Canada’s.

“The midnight knock on the door is the nightmare image of the police state,” he said.