Durham cop dismissed for assisting crooks

Kramp among several busted during mid 2012 drug trafficking sweep

The long legal and disciplinary odyssey of a Durham police officer charged seven years ago with providing information to known criminals has ended in dismissal.

Tara Kramp, a Durham police officer since 1998, engaged in contact with “several drug dealers in the Oshawa region,” during which she conducted searches of the national Canadian Police Information Centre and the Durham Records Management System, then passed along information, according to an agreed statement of facts entered at a tribunal.

“We all make mistakes. However, this officer has crossed the line on too many occasions,” hearing officer Morris Elbers said Wednesday in delivering judgment.

“She was known on the street as a dirty cop,” Elbers said.

“If Const. Kramp was to remain a member of the Durham Regional Police Service, the damage to the reputation of the service would be very high indeed.”

The decision brings to an end a protracted disciplinary process during which Kramp pleaded guilty to Police Services Act charges. The sentencing hearing, which began in 2016, spanned three years. Kramp’s dismissal is immediate, Elbers, a retired OPP superintendent, indicated.

When Durham police busted several people suspected of drug trafficking in mid-2012, Kramp was among them. The Crown eventually dropped drug charges against Kramp and she pleaded guilty to breach of trust and unsafe storage of a firearm.

Kramp was then charged under the Police Services Act with discreditable conduct and insubordination, based on her conviction and her refusal to speak with professional standards investigators following her arrest.

During the hotly-contested sentencing hearing on the Police Act charges, Kramp’s defence lawyer, Sandip Khehra, urged Elbers to give the officer a second chance, noting that at the time of the offences Kramp was in the depths of severe alcoholism.

Kramp has been sober since her arrest in 2012, he said.

Khehra implored Elbers to consider Kramp’s potential for rehabilitation, a process he asserted she had already begun by pleading guilty to her criminal and Police Act charges, and her pursuit of treatment for substance abuse.

He said Kramp would agree to frequent screening for alcohol use were she to be put back to work by the Durham police.

The prosecution, led by lawyers Ian Johnstone and Alex Sinclair, argued Kramp’s conduct was so egregious and her reputation so tarnished that there is no way she could ever again effectively function as a police officer.

The prosecution cited the nature of Kramp’s offences, which included providing information to an associate of the Hells Angels. At one point she instructed a drug dealer under investigation to “clean up,” the tribunal heard.

Kramp surely knew the seriousness of the behaviour she engaged in, Johnstone said during submissions.

“This has nothing to do with alcoholism,” Johnstone said. “Nothing.”