Police officer doesn’t deserve jail time: lawyer
Calgary constable slammed handcuffed woman to the floor during 2017 arrest
Jail wasn’t required for a Calgary police officer who slammed a handcuffed woman to the floor during her arrest processing, his lawyer said Friday.
And a counsel for the Calgary Police Association said even if the Alberta Court of Appeal upholds Alex Dunn’s 30-day jail term, it should make it clear custody is not the only option for convicted officers.
Defence lawyer Alias Sanders said the CPA was concerned about comments made by Justice Nancy Dilts in overturning a lower court decision granting Dunn a conditional sentence to be served in the community.
In her decision, Dilts, who ultimately stayed her order that Dunn serve 30 days on weekends because of the passage of time and the fact he had served his community-based sentence, commented on the appropriateness of a conditional term for excessive use of force by police.
The Calgary Court of King’s Bench judge said she was concerned the Ontario case sentencing Judge Michelle Christopher used to justify a conditional sentence for Dunn “no longer reflects society’s values or goals of sentencing in response to a police officer’s use of excessive force.”
Dilts went on to say in the years since the Ontario case in 2013, the concept of sentencing in such cases had evolved “in the context of modern social change and heightened public awareness, particularly as it relates to police use of force against vulnerable persons.”
“By enacting these principles she is, in some way, changing the range of sentences,” Sanders suggested, in saying her client hopes to “neutralize” those comments made by Dilts.
The lawyer said Dilts took notice of “heightened social changes and modern policing” without having evidence before her to do so.
But Justice Peter Martin, one of the three Court of Appeal judges hearing the case, said Dilts’ comments wouldn’t apply in cases where police officers cross the line in the heat of duty.
“We’re not talking about a case where a police officer had to make a split-second decision,” Martin said of Dunn’s assault on Black woman Dalia Kafi on Dec. 13, 2017.
He said Dunn’s conduct was “a matter of unprovoked, excessive violence.”
Defence counsel Alain Hepner, who wants Dilts’ decision overturned in part because it may assist Dunn’s appeal to the Law Enforcement Review Board that he be fired from the force, said the King ’s Bench judge didn’t show deference to Christopher’s ruling.
But Crown prosecutor Troy Couillard argued the decision that jail was required should stand.
“Justice Dilts did not create a new range of sentencing,” Couillard said.
The appeal judges reserved their decision.