Cop pleads not guilty to disciplinary charges
Hearing will decide whether Toronto officer Theriault loses job over 2016 assault
One month after he was sentenced to jail for assaulting Dafonte Miller, Const. Michael Theriault appeared Tuesday before the Toronto police disciplinary tribunal where his fate as a police officer will ultimately be decided.
In a brief appearance, Theriault pleaded not guilty to one count of discreditable conduct stemming from his offduty assault during a high-profile Dec. 28, 2016 incident that left Miller with serious injuries.
“In so doing, you committed misconduct, in that you were found guilty of a criminal offence,” according to a police document outlining the alleged misconduct.
Immediately after being sentenced to jail last month, Theriault, 28, was suspended without pay by Toronto police. He is currently on bail pending separate appeals by Crown prosecutors and Theriault’s lawyers.
The hearing will eventually decide whether Theriault, 28, remains a police officer. Penalties at the quasi-judicial tribunal, which adjudicates professional misconduct cases, can range from a reprimand to dismissal.
But at Tuesday’s proceeding, the hearing was halted indefinitely to allow the
criminal appeals to proceed, a standard procedure when a misconduct allegation involves a criminal charge or conviction.
“The matter in the tribunal will be put on hold until the criminal matter is complete,” Meaghan Gray, spokesperson for the Toronto police, told reporters outside Toronto police headquarters Tuesday.
Last month, Ontario Superior Court Justice Joseph Di Luca sentenced Theriault to nine months in jail, calling the assault “a gratuitous and violent offence on a vulnerable victim.”
Miller, a young Black man, suffered catastrophic injuries, including the loss of an eye in a violent clash with Theriault that Di Luca found had started when Miller stole pocket change from the Theriaults’ truck.
“The fact that Mr. Theriault committed this offence despite his training and position as a police officer makes the offence all the more serious,” Di Luca wrote in his reasons for sentencing.
In order to cover Tuesday’s hearing, media were told they must come to Toronto police headquarters to watch a livestream of the hearing — amid the City of Toronto’s COVID-19 lockdown, and even though the hearing took place via video.
The arrangement was made after media were initially barred from covering Tuesday’s hearing due to “unprecedented times.”
By law, police misconduct hearings must be open to the public and they are regularly reported on by the media. But while courts and tribunals across Ontario have adapted to enable remote access by phone or video, the Toronto police tribunal has been closed to the public since August, when it resumed after pausing in March amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
The requirement by Toronto police that media physically attend headquarters to cover the hearing prompted a letter Monday from Toronto Star lawyer Emma Carver, and signed by lawyers for CBC/Radio-Canada, the Globe and Mail, Postmedia, CTV and CP24.
“Requiring journalists to attend police headquarters in person when a remote livestream of the proceedings is readily available creates a barrier to openness and access, and needlessly puts the health of our journalists, TPS staff and the public at risk,” the letter stated.
“Given the sacrifices being made by all Torontonians to curb the spread of COVID-19, and the current emergency orders imposing a ‘lockdown’ on the City of Toronto, the refusal to facilitate remote access feels particularly irresponsible,” the letter states.
In a written response, legal counsel for the Toronto police agreed that both the public and the media should have access to hearings and noted that, in response to the media’s request to access the proceedings, Toronto police drafted a protocol in line with public health direction, including deep cleaning that goes beyond what’s required.
“Having made the request of us to open, we have decided to make sure media has access to contemporaneous viewing of the proceedings, in a space that has been deep cleaned, and which is designed for social distancing,” stated the letter sent by Toronto police legal services.
Everyone in attendance was subjected to COVID-19 screening measures and masks had to be worn at all times.
In June, Di Luca’s verdict in the Theriault case was livestreamed on YouTube and watched by 20,000 people, an event that was celebrated as a step forward for court openness.
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