AWOL officer may still lose job

A Camrose police officer who skipped out of a paid conference to go hiking near Calgary will have to wait longer to see if he’ll lose his job, Alberta’s top court has ruled.

Const. Jeffrey MacDonald was supposed to attend a paid five-day conference in Calgary in September 2011. Instead, on the first and last days, he skipped out to go hiking and check out a vehicle he was interested in buying.

When confronted by a superior officer about his attendance, MacDonald lied about it in person and in writing.

MacDonald was fired in July 2012, following a disciplinary hearing in which he pleaded guilty to deceit and insubordination.

The Law Enforcement Review Board overturned the firing, giving MacDonald an 80-hour suspension and a reduction in seniority instead. The presiding officer who fired MacDonald didn’t believe psychologists who testified that MacDonald’s behaviour could be linked to depression.

That was wrong, the LERB ruled, and MacDonald didn’t deserve “the ultimate penalty” of dismissal, reserved for extreme cases.

“It was not reasonable to conclude that the appellant was unfit to continue as a police officer,” the LERB concluded in March.

But in a written decision posted Friday, Alberta Court of Appeal Justices Connie Hunt, Jack Watson and Myra Bielby quashed the LERB ruling and sent the decision back to the board for consideration.

The LERB overstepped its boundaries by overturning the dismissal, the court ruled. It can only ask whether a decision is reasonable.