Province gets failing grade on police investigations
Having one force probe another ‘not credible’
QUEBEC – The head of the body created to enforce Quebec’s human rights charter has given a failing grade to a government proposal to maintain the practice of having one police force investigate killings and serious injuries by another force.
Gaétan Cousineau, president of the Commission des droits de la personne et de la jeunesse, told National Assembly hearings Wednesday that Bill 46 is “far from satisfactory” and “not credible.”
The bill would add a bureau of civilian observers with limited powers to oversee such police investigations.
Cousineau reminded Public Security Minister Robert Dutil and other committee members that the commission had recommended to the government a full civilian review.
He said the commission has been preoccupied by the issue since the 1987 shooting death by Montreal police of Anthony Griffin, an unarmed 19-year-old black man.
In its brief, the commission noted that, from 1999 to 2011, there were
Gaétan Cousineau said Quebers have lost confidence in the existing process because they suspect police are not impartial.
339 investigations by police of police action causing death or serious injury – and criminal charges were laid in only three cases, a situation the commission described as “troubling.” Cousineau said Quebecers have lost confidence in the existing process, because they suspect police are not impartial when investigating each other.
As well, Cousineau said, the specialist police investigators assigned to such inquiries do not reflect Quebec’s gender or ethno-cultural balance and do not meet three key requirements: independence, transparency and accountability.
The hearings on Bill 46, which began this month, have been polarized. Police witnesses have been unanimous in their support of the bill – while human rights, citizen groups and Montreal’s city government and opposition parties have taken the opposite stance.
Quebec Ombudsman Raymonde Saint-germain, like Cousineau, has called on Quebec to adopt the practice in Ontario and four other provinces of civilian review for cases of death and injury at the hands of the police.
After Cousineau presented a summary of the commission brief, Dutil quizzed him on details of his position, asking whether the bureau of observers could include former police officers.
As written, former and active police could not be observers.
Cousineau said he would not object to former officers, noting that in British Columbia officers out of the force for five years can be named to the civilian investigation panel.
Guy Ouellette, a former Sûreté du Québec officer and now Liberal MNA for Chomedey riding in Laval, told Cousineau only police can handle such investigations.
In fact, he said, only 84 officers in the whole province can do so.
“It is very specialized,” Ouellette said, suggesting the real problem with the existing process is poor communications and that civilian observers could correct this situation – a position shared by previous police witnesses.
Cousineau said he and his officials have met four times with Dutil after the commission issued a report on racial profiling – but the minister did not follow their advice.
“A public security minister is surrounded by police officers,” Cousineau said after his presentation.
The advice Dutil got, Cousineau said, was that “only police experts can do police investigations.”