Aboriginal leaders expect large-scale inquiry

After learning that the Crown won’t press charges against the Sûreté du Québec officers who were alleged to have abused aboriginal women in Val-d’Or, indigenous chiefs say there might be another way forward.

Aboriginal leaders emerged from a meeting with Premier Philippe Couillard Thursday with a sense of optimism that the government might call a public inquiry into the matter. The inquiry would deal with the Val-d’Or scandal but also the broader question of systemic racism in Quebec’s judicial system.

“We’re moving in the right direction but nothing’s in writing yet,” said Melissa Saganash, the Cree Nation government’s director of Quebec relations. “The meeting was positive and we do see a willingness, on the government’s part, to say the right things. But those are still just words right now.”

Couillard had previously dismissed the idea of such an inquiry, but sources say he seemed to soften his tone during Thursday’s meeting in Montreal.

One chief told reporters he was 95-per-cent certain the government would come through with the broad outlines of an inquiry before the end of December. The leader, Assembly of First Nations regional chief Ghislain Picard, has been calling for the inquiry since news of the Val-d’Or scandal broke 14 months ago.

The public commission would be independently run, could take up to 12 months and its mandate would look at events dating back 15 years, according to a source inside the meeting.

News of the potential commission came on the same day the commissioner of Canada’s inquiry into missing aboriginal women and girls said it would not focus on the Val-d’Or abuse allegations.

Calls for the inquiry intensified in November after the Crown announced it would not pursue criminal charges related to the 32 complaints that Val-d’Or police officers physically and sexually abused indigenous women. Montreal police investigated the claims for months, interviewing dozens of alleged victims and collecting hundreds of hours of testimony.

The three Crown prosecutors who reviewed the file insisted that the absence of criminal charges does not mean the victims’ claims were false.