RCMP CORRUPTION

You are here:FEATURED STORIES > CORRUPTION > RCMP CORRUPTION

RCMP Pass Port Scandel

From the Fathers Canada Archive Files

Political Commentary and Opinion

According to one of the RCMP's websites, they claim to strive to provide enforcement of offenses pertaining to illegal immigration and misuse of Canadian passports and citizenship documents, but W-5 an CBC program dug up corruption and cover-up. This is what their police website say's, while not doing their jobs, and where corruption is at the highest levels. What the RCMP are to be doing as law enforcement officials, and also why crack is being used everywhere in Canada because of RCMP scum who let druglords into canada for pay off's.

Combined Forces Special Enforcement Units (CFSEU)

This unit is made up of officers from the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP), Toronto Police Service (TPS), York Regional Police, Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), Peel Regional Police working in correlation with Citizen and Immigration Canada, Canada Customs and Revenue Agency (CCRA), Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), the Federal Department of Justice and the Criminal Intelligence Service Ontario (CISO).

The CFSEU investigates, prosecutes, exposes and dismantles organized criminal enterprises. Also, they share intelligence with their partners and cooperate and assist other organized crime units at the national and international levels.

CFSEU is operated out of Cornwall, the GTA and the Golden Horseshoe areas.
For more information on the unit visit their web site.

http://web.archive.org/web/20050206133355/http://www.cfseu.org/

Immigration and Passport Sections
The RCMP in partnership with domestic and foreign agencies and the community will strive to provide enforcement of offenses pertaining to illegal immigration and misuse of Canadian passports and citizenship documents.

The following legislation is enforced by the Immigration and Passport Sections:

Immigration Act
Citizenship Act
Passport Offenses Sec 57 Criminal Code
Various Offenses under the Criminal Code, Fraud, Forgery and Uttering
The Toronto West Detachment (Milton) has an Immigration Task Force that assists Citizenship and Immigration in the arrest of individuals and has been very successful in arresting dangerous offenders who are subject to a Deportation Order. These individuals are wanted for or have been convicted of serious crimes. The Toronto West Detachment is also home to an Alien Anti-smuggling Unit.

Undercover Operations
This area is in all avenues of enforcement, conducted towards organized crime and illegal activities

‘O’ Division Drug Enforcement Programs
The aim of the ‘O’ Division Drug Enforcement Program is to prevent the importation, production, traffic and use of illicit drugs. To achieve this objective, investigative resources will focus on high level criminal organizations and individuals involved in the importation of large scale trafficking of drugs, on proceeds of crime and drug prevention. To this end the directorate has maintained a Minimum Priority Enforcement Level (MPEL) that is applicable to all units/sections in the drug program.

RCMP CORRUPTION AND THE HIGH COMMISSION STAFF

RCMP are bringing in drug dealers into Canada to sell meth to your children, and here is the proof..

How is the public supposed to have ANY faith in the RCMP when high ranking "officials" within government and the RCMP are known to be bought off. See W-5's superb video on the story below.

Below will give you a grand scale of the corruption. W-5 Exposes the inside workings of what the RCMP has been up to. While Canadian authorities are supposed to keep those criminal drug lords out of Canada, but one such immigrant was Lee Chau Ping, a notorious drug trafficker who is known as the Ice Queen. In 1992, after police raided her labs and one of her safe houses, the Ice Queen got on a plane headed for Canada. It was puzzling as to how known criminals were able to get into Canada, but a little bit of digging by W-5 turned up connections between the Triad members and government officials working inside the Canadian embassy. In fact, according to a person named McAdam, the High Commission staff was on the receiving end of expensive gifts, cocktail parties, yacht trips and visits to the casinos in Macau. But according to W-5 CBC program goes, the RCMP have been up to other things like, Corruption and cover up

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1080323626556_1/?hub=WFive

And believe this, they the RCMP sure as hell drop the ball on this one aright when high ranking officials are known to be bought off. See W-5's video on the story and were it began.

Video Passport scandal and the RCMP 1

Video Passport scandal and the RCMP 2

Video Passport scandal and the RCMP 3

Case summary of RCMP External Review Committee's decision on Corporal Robert Read
PDF- U.S. Library of Congress report on Asian organized crime and terrorist activity in Canada (.pdf)

Lineups at the Canadian High Commission in Hong Kong

Lee Chau Ping, a.k.a. the Ice Queen



Brian McAdam



Garry Clement

Happy Valley race track, where Triad members allegedly took staff from the Canadian High Commission

W-FIVE's source who explained the link between organized crime and the Canadian mission

Corruption and cover up
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1080323626556_1/?hub=WFive

CTV.ca News Staff

In the 1990s, before Hong Kong was reverted from British to Chinese control, millions of residents were looking to relocate on the chance that things went bad after the handover. Canada, with its huge expat communities in Vancouver and Toronto, quickly became a desirable destination.

Day after day, people lined up at the Canadian High Commission in Hong Kong, waiting to apply for visas. Many of those seeking landed immigrant status were people looking to come to Canada for the right reasons, but according to former Royal Hong Kong Police Chief Detective Inspector Sandy Boucher, Canada was also gaining a reputation in organized crime circles as a haven for those mixed up in shady dealings.

“We knew that many of our organized crime figures -- people with records, people without records but serious criminals – were looking to move to Canada,” says Boucher.

But while Canadian authorities are supposed to keep those kinds of people out, in Hong Kong, something appeared to be going very wrong. “Some applied (for visas) and were turned back, some applied and got in,” says Boucher. “It was no secret.”

One such immigrant was Lee Chau Ping, a notorious drug trafficker who is known as the Ice Queen. In 1992, after police raided her labs and one of her safe houses, the Ice Queen got on a plane headed for Canada. Not thinking that the Canadian government would let her stay, Boucher assumed the Ice Queen had headed oversees to wait for the heat on her gang to die down a little. So he was shocked when an RCMP officer told him she had been granted landed immigrant status.

“I said, ‘It can’t be – she’s got a criminal record. I know she’s known to Canadian authorities.’”

But apparently, Lee Chau Ping – who posed as a businesswoman ready to invest $170,000 in a Chicken Delight franchise in a tiny town in northern Saskatchewan – had slipped under the radar. And Brian McAdam, the immigration control officer at the High Commission in Hong Kong, soon learned that other criminals had too.

“I discovered that these Triad people (members of secret Chinese organized crime fraternities that have ties to members of the Hong Kong business community) were regulars at getting visas to visit their families or go on holidays as the case may be, and yet clearly on the file was intelligence information identifying who they were.”

McAdam was puzzled as to how known criminals were able to get into Canada, but a little bit of digging turned up connections between the Triad members and officials working inside the Canadian embassy. In fact, according to McAdam, High Commission staff was on the receiving end of expensive gifts, cocktail parties, yacht trips and visits to the casinos in Macau.

According to Garry Clement, who worked at the time as an RCMP officer stationed at the High Commission, the freebies even included cash for betting on the horses at Hong Kong’s Happy Valley racetrack. But he was suspicious that those perks would come with a price.

“At what point do you draw the line? And you’ve got to ask yourself who are the people that are giving, and what do you owe in return? It was a Chinese gentleman that I had met … (who) told me very early on nobody in Chinese culture does anything for nothing. And I never forgot that. And I think that’s where you have to look at – why was the Canadian mission being targeted? Why was the Canadian mission being invited out to all these events?”

McAdam and Clement set out for the answers. Immediately, they found obvious signs of corruption: complaints from a Chinese couple that someone at the embassy had offered to expedite their visa application in exchange for $10,000; fake immigration stamps and a fake visa receipt. In one incident, McAdam actually saw the criminal records of Triad members literally drop off their files after he pulled them up on the computer.

W-FIVE found a man who knows firsthand of the links between Hong Kong’s organized crime circles and the Canadian High Commission. He agreed to be interviewed, but, fearing for his life, only under the condition that his identity be protected.

The man told W-FIVE that the corruption at the High Commission was a “fairly open secret” among Hong Kong’s middle class. He said Triad members, including “famous businessmen, solicitors, legislators (and) accountants” used to invite embassy staff to the races and lavish parties.

“Some money change hands, some handshake and problem solved,” he said. “They give you a Rolex, fancy car, then when you get hooked, they ask you to do a favour.”

The source told W-FIVE he was never aware of the exact price for a Canadian visa, but he estimated the entry cost for a Triad member’s family would be in the neighbourhood of $500,000 HK. And he said the corruption was far and wide within the embassy. “Without help from insiders it won’t work. … It takes more than one person in the High Commission to get the job done, not just one single person – there must be big, big scandal behind it all.”

In 1992, the Department of Foreign Affairs sent over a computer expert from Ottawa to probe the lapses. The top-secret report prepared by that expert, David Balser, confirmed the existence of some alarming security breaches at the mission, including the fact that unauthorized staff had access to the computer system where visas could be approved with a check mark and criminal records could be scrubbed clean.

But though the report revealed some major problems, it went virtually unnoticed. In 1995, Liberal MP David Kilgour wrote a letter to then-prime minister Jean Chretien warning of the “highly irresponsible and/or illegal practices” at the High Commission and asking for a full public inquiry. It was never acknowledged.

Then, in 1996, RCMP Corporal Robert Read was assigned to review the Hong Kong file. And while he too thought there were clear problems that needed to be investigated, he says he was urged by his superiors to turn a blind eye.

“This is water under the bridge, why go over this again,” Read says he was told. After he encountered more and more roadblocks thrown up by his bosses and government bureaucrats, he says he “arrived at the opinion that the progress I was making was not that pleasing to my superiors.”

And Read wasn’t the only member of the RCMP to be shut down by the force. In 1993, Staff Sergeant Jim Puchniak requested permission to go to Hong Kong to conduct a full investigation, but he was told by the RCMP liason officer at the mission, Inspector Gary Lagamodiere, that doing so would upset the High Commissioner.

“Why would anybody who is the head of a mission fear the RCMP coming in to conduct an investigation if everything is above board?” he recalls wondering. “My instinct then, and still is, if there was nothing to hide, you would welcome a police investigation, so obviously there was something going on.”

But unlike Puchniak, Read wasn’t willing to accept the roadblocks he encountered. In 1999, he made an unthinkable move for a police officer, breaking his oath of secrecy and going public about the scandal. The RCMP reacted quickly, firing the 24-year veteran after finding him guilty of professional misconduct.

But Read appealed his dismissal, and in 2003, the RCMP’s External Review Committee issued a scathing indictment over the handling of the Hong Kong affair. In its decision the committee wrote the “the RCMP was walking on eggshells whenever it conducted an investigation into activities at a Canadian mission abroad and basically restricted to what the Department of Foreign Affairs was willing to allow it to investigate.

“What is at issue was a deliberate choice made by the RCMP not to pursue an investigation into possible wrongdoing even though the numerous examples had been drawn to its attention of incidents that suggested an immigration fraud ring was operating within the very premises of the mission and possibly involved employees of the Government of Canada.”

Scott Newark, the former head of the Canadian Police Association, said the decision makes clear the proper relationship between police and government agencies.

“For me, the larger issue here, the thing that is most problematic is not even all of the clear wrong-doing going on in Hong Kong and the after-effects of that. It’s the fact that the institution and the people involved who we give guns and badges to and swear public oaths and that have the obligation to investigate and enforce the law decided that their duty was not to do that.”

While the report clearly vindicated Read, the RCMP has refused to reinstate him – a decision he is fighting in Federal Court. But because he never got the investigation he wanted into the Canadian High Commission in Hong Kong, questions about the depth of the corruption and political interference there will probably never be answered. Both John Higgenbotham, the Canadian High Commissioner in Hong Kong from 1989 to 1994, and RCMP Superintendent Giuliano Zaccardelli – people who may be able to lend some perspective to the unanswered questions -- refused to be interviewed by W-FIVE.

But regardless of who was responsible, for retired RCMP superintendent Garry Clement, it all comes down to one thing.

“Did we drop the ball? I have to take as much credit – I was a senior officer in the RCMP. … I don’t think we should try to defend it. The bottom line is, we dropped the ball in this investigation.”

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1080323626556_1/?hub=WFive

Case summary of RCMP External Review Committee's decision on Corporal Robert Read
http://www.erc-cee.gc.ca/all/all-e/d/d-081-e.html

D-081- From August 1999 to June 2000, the Appellant granted numerous media interviews in which he denounced the Force’s handling of an investigation into corruption of the immigration application process at the Commission for Canada in Hong Kong (the “Mission”) during the late 1980s and early 1990s, suggesting that the Force was not taking the matter seriously. The Appellant also provided several journalists with copies of documents from the investigation file, including a report by a security analyst from the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT), David Balser, who had concluded in 1992 that the application process was open to widespread abuse because the Mission had failed to take the appropriate safeguards to prevent immigration fraud by corrupt employees. The Force had initially been called upon to investigate activities at the Mission in 1991-92 as the result of receiving a complaint from two Hong Kong residents who indicated that they had received an offer to expedite the processing of their visa application from two women who identified themselves as employees of the Mission if they were prepared to make a payment of $10,000 through the intermediary of a local immigration consultant. They declined the offer and complained about it in writing to the Mission but received no response and therefore decided to subsequently complain to the RCMP. Reports of other unusual occurrences surfaced, which led to an RCMP investigator travelling to Hong Kong to interview selected employees. Two locally engaged staff (LES) who were suspected of involvement in immigration fraud were not interviewed and a determination made that there was insufficient evidence to implicate them in any wrongdoing because there were no signs of untold wealth on their part. Information was received from the immigration control officer, Brian McAdam, that organized crime groups (known as triads) may have infiltrated the Mission’s computer system and that fake immigration visa stamps had been found in the desk of a former employee. The investigator was apprised at the time of the conclusions reached by Mr. Balser concerning the security vulnerabilities at the Mission but did not address them in his report. The investigation was concluded due to lack of evidence. A new investigation was initiated in 1993 to consider evidence that Canada-based officers (CBOs) had accepted expensive gifts and money from a family of Hong Kong industrialists, who made efforts to ingratiate itself to staff of the Mission’s immigration section. The Force declined a request to send two investigators to Hong Kong to interview witnesses and the investigation was concluded in April 1994 due to lack of evidence.

A third investigation was initiated in May 1995 as the result of a complaint from Mr. McAdam, which reiterated some of the issues that had been raised in the first and second investigations. Mr. McAdam had resigned from DFAIT the previous year on medical grounds, claiming that his illness was brought about by his having been ostracized by DFAIT for lending assistance to the Force in its previous investigations by providing information about dubious associations between Mission employees and Hong Kong residents believed to have links to organized crime. Mr. McAdam also shared his complaint with a Member of Parliament, David Kilgour, who wrote to the Prime Minister to request a public inquiry into the matter. Instead, the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration provided an undertaking that the RCMP would fully investigate the matter. In May 1996, the new Officer in charge of the RCMP’s Immigration and Passport Section, Supt. Jean Dubé, interviewed Mr. McAdam and came to the conclusion that the allegations were vague and unsubstantiated and that Mr. McAdam was motivated by a desire to obtain retribution against his ex-colleagues for the manner in which they had treated him. In September 1996, the Appellant was tasked by Supt. Dubé with reviewing Mr. McAdam’s allegations and recommending a course of action to be pursued for the investigation. Meanwhile, Supt. Dubé wrote to his supervisor that he wanted to close the investigation. The Appellant began meeting weekly with Mr. McAdam and took numerous statements from him. He submitted periodic investigation reports in which he indicated that he was convinced that Mission staff had been corrupted and that immigration fraud had been widespread. Concerns began to arise about the Appellant’s lack of objectivity after he shared a copy of Mr. Balser’s report with Mr. McAdam, met with Mr. Balser and asked him to redraft his report so that it would be less dense with jargon and told one former CBO that he interviewed that he was convinced that criminal charges would be laid as a result of the investigation. Accordingly, in March 1997, he was instructed to cease interviewing witnesses and a decision made to assign the investigation to another member. Over the course of the following months, the Appellant continued to meet with Mr. McAdam and submitted reports in which he suggested that the initial investigation in 1991-92 had been marred by either negligence or corruption on the part of the investigator. He also attempted to illustrate how Mr. Balser’s conclusions demonstrated that corrupt employees of the Mission had likely participated in immigration fraud, with the result that triad members may have been able to secure visas to immigrate to Canada, despite their suspected involvement in criminal activities. In September 1997, Sgt. Sergio Pasin took over the investigation from the Appellant. He met with Mr. McAdam shortly thereafter and concluded that the investigation should be pursued even though the allegations appeared vague to him. Over the course of the following year, efforts were made to obtain information from Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) about unusual transactions on the Mission’s computer system to determine whether they constituted a possible indication of immigration fraud. This included an analysis of visa applications that had been processed in a time-frame of four months or less, well below the average of 18 months. No witnesses were interviewed during this period because Sgt. Pasin was assigned to another investigation that was considered to have a higher priority.

In the meantime, the Appellant wrote to his Commanding Officer to complain that Supt. Dubé had obstructed his investigation. After being told that his complaint had been dismissed, the Appellant submitted it to the Commission for Public Complaints against the RCMP (CPC) in January 1998. This led to an investigation by the Internal Affairs Branch of the RCMP which, based on an interview with Supt. Dubé, concluded that the complaint was without merit. The CPC itself informed the Appellant in January 1999 that it had concluded that it did not have jurisdiction to address the complaint. The Appellant then contacted the Office of the Auditor General which agreed to initiate an investigation.

The same month, Supt. Dubé became aware of a paper drafted by Mr. McAdam in which he explained the basis for his concerns that triads having infiltrated the Mission and expressed disappointment with the Force’s lack of progress in investigating his complaint. The paper also described Mr. Balser’s conclusions regarding the security vulnerabilities at the Mission. It was learned that Mr. McAdam had shared this paper with a reporter from the television program The Fifth Estate which then contacted the Force for information as to how the investigation was progressing. Shortly thereafter, Supt. Dubé wrote to his supervisor to recommend that the investigation be revived although he continued to maintain that he did not consider that there was any merit to Mr. McAdam’s complaint. One week later, Supt. Dubé wrote to the Appellant to alert him to the possibility that he might be contacted by the media and instructed him not to discuss the investigation. He also enquired about a missing box of documents that the Appellant had retrieved from the Criminal Intelligence Directorate (CID) in November 1996. That box consisted of newspaper and magazine clippings about triads which had been compiled by Mr. McAdam when he was in Hong Kong as part of a research project that he was working on at the time. It had been left with the RCMP Assistant Liaison Officer in Hong Kong at the end of Mr. McAdam’s tour of duty on the understanding that its contents would be catalogued by CID and then returned to Mr. McAdam. However, there was some miscommunication in that regard and CID neither catalogued the box’s contents, nor returned it to Mr. McAdam. It was at Mr. McAdam’s request that the Appellant retrieved the box from CID without indicating, however, that he intended to return it to Mr. McAdam. Supt. Dubé and Sgt. Pasin maintained that they were interested in the box because they wanted to determine if any of the material might be useful to their investigation. However, the Appellant suspected that they were attempting to determine if there had been any wrongdoing on his part in the manner in which he had handled the box. Sgt. Pasin learned from Mr. McAdam that he had discovered one document in the box returned to him that consisted in criminal intelligence about suspected triad members. He had immediately returned that document to the Appellant because he assumed that it had been included in the box in error. In August 1999, the Appellant was questioned about the box by Sgt. Pasin and asked how he could be certain that it did not contain classified documents since he had not made an inventory of its contents before returning it to Mr. McAdam. That question prompted him to end the interview and to make the decision to tell the media about his concern that the Force was not taking the investigation seriously. In the interval, Supt. Dubé attempted to initiate a Code of Conduct investigation against the Appellant, based in part on an allegation that he had shared confidential documents with Mr. McAdam. His request was denied. However, a Code of Conduct investigation was initiated several days later after several newspaper articles were published which reported the Appellant’s concerns about the Force’s investigation of Mr. McAdam’s complaint.

The RCMP adjudication board that conducted a hearing into the allegations of misconduct against the Appellant concluded that the Appellant’s actions were disgraceful because they violated the oath of secrecy that he had taken upon joining the Force. It also found that he had provided false information to the media, in that there was “not a shred of evidence of cover-up, wrongdoing or of illegal conduct that required public scrutiny”. The Board also concluded that “[t]here is no evidence that suggests Supt. Dubé intended this particular investigation to die”, conceding only that he “struggled with competing priorities, lack of resources and how to best deal with the Hong Kong investigation”. The fact that the Appellant had disclosed confidential information concerning an ongoing criminal investigation, including the names of suspects in that investigation, was described by the Board as potentially having compromised the investigation and damaged the reputation of the persons named as suspects, which included Canadian diplomats occupying high ranking positions. The Board rejected the Appellant’s contention that he had acted out of concern for the public interest, finding instead that he had been merely attempting to prevent the Force from investigating his own conduct in the handling of the box that was returned to Mr. McAdam. Addressing the implications of the Charter’s guarantee of freedom of expression, the Board stated that because that guarantee was subject to “such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society”, pursuant to s. 1 of the Charter, the Force was still entitled to discipline members for violating their oath of secrecy and that the only circumstances where it might be otherwise was for the purpose of denouncing “serious illegal acts or policies that put at risk the life, health or safety of the public”. As a result, the Board ordered the Appellant to resign from the Force, failing which he would be dismissed. It found that the Appellant had “a character flaw which impairs his usefulness as a peace officer and member of the RCMP”.

The arguments in support of the appeal focus primarily on the Board’s analysis of the Charter. It is submitted that the circumstances where members may speak out publicly against the Force are much broader than those recognized by the Board and would include such matters as obstruction of a criminal investigation.

Committee’s Findings: An RCMP member’s intentional violation of the oath of secrecy is, prima facie, disgraceful conduct that could bring discredit upon the Force and therefore something for which it is appropriate that the member be disciplined, unless the member acted to disclose a matter of legitimate public concern requiring a public debate. The fact that the Appellant honestly believed that the Force had engaged in serious wrongdoing is not a particularly relevant consideration. He had the onus of presenting evidence before the Board which would establish that there was at least a reasonable basis to his assertions. While there is no evidence of a cover-up on the part of the Force, there were important shortcomings in the investigative process followed by the Force since 1991, with the result that it remains possible that employees of the Mission were able to engage in immigration fraud on a widespread basis and that such activities have remained undetected to date. The record discloses a series of suspicious and disconcerting events that the Force failed to investigate in a timely and thorough manner. The RCMP oath of secrecy can undoubtedly be considered a reasonable limit to an RCMP member’s freedom of expression if it is enforced in a manner that is designed to protect legitimate interests but it cannot serve to prevent public scrutiny of wrongdoing on the part of the Force. The Force has consistently demonstrated a reluctance to investigate the activities of LES at the Mission. The 1999 investigation did not succeed in making up for the shortcomings in previous investigations. It constituted an exhaustive review of the interaction between CBOs and the Hong Kong residents and did reveal that the extent to which gifts, money and other benefits had traded hands was far more widespread than the Force had previously been led to believe by DFAIT and CIC. However, there are several important issues that had first surfaced during the initial investigation which Sgt. Pasin opted not to pursue or examine in only a cursory fashion, such as the activities of LES. From the outset of his involvement with this investigation, Supt. Dubé made no secret of the fact that he did not believe that there was any merit to Mr. McAdam’s complaint and that continued to be the case as late as January 1999 when the investigation was revived. The result of the investigation was preordained. Supt. Dubé appeared unprepared to envisage an outcome that would be seen as vindicating Mr. McAdam. The close working relationship that the Immigration and Passport Section had with DFAIT and CIC appears to have influenced the approach taken towards this investigation. It considered DFAIT and CIC to be its clients, which was problematic because a thorough and timely investigation could have produced results that would have been detrimental to DFAIT and CIC, especially if it were found that lax security procedures at the Mission had enabled corrupt employees to engage in immigration fraud on a widespread basis and over a prolonged period. At the time that the Appellant revealed his concerns to the media in August 1999, it was reasonable for him to believe that Supt. Dubé was endeavouring to initiate a Code of Conduct investigation against him. As well, the Appellant continued to be motivated by a desire to have the Force conduct a thorough investigation into activities at the Mission. Regardless, the disclosure would still have to be regarded as a matter of legitimate public concern because it exposed the fact that the Force had, for seven years, failed to take appropriate action to determine if employees of the Mission had engaged in immigration fraud.

Committee’s Recommendation dated September 10, 2003: The appeal of the Board’s finding on the allegations of misconduct should be allowed.

Commissioner’s Decision dated November 26, 2003 (Appearance of Bias) - The Appellant argued that the Commissioner could not make the decision on appeal, because there was bias, or an appearance of bias. In September 1999, the Commissioner, then D/Commr, had requested an administrative file review of all RCMP investigations of wrongdoing at the Hong Kong Mission. The Commissioner as D/Commr accepted the findings of the administrative review that the Appellant’s allegations were essentially unfounded; he then reported these results in a briefing note dated December 6, 1999, to the Commissioner.

The Committee concluded that there was probably some justification to the Appellant's concern that the present Commissioner was not perceived as impartial given the role that he played in the administrative file review in 1999. However, the Committee found that the RCMP Act precludes the Commissioner from assigning the responsibility to hear appeals to anyone else [s. 5(2)]. Also, because Parliament assigns decision-making authority in discipline appeals to the same person to whom it entrusted “control and management of the Force and all matters connected therewith” [s. 5(1)], it recognized that the adjudicator would not always be impartial and independent. Instead, Parliament ensured fairness in the process by creating the Committee and requiring that all appeals be referred to it before they are adjudicated by the Commissioner.

In a decision dated November 2003, the Commissioner ruled that while no evidence was presented to support a finding of actual bias on his part, the Appellant could perceive a lack of impartiality. For that reason, he made the decision to not adjudicate the appeal. In his view, “the fact that I approved the briefing note reporting the administrative review findings that the allegations were not substantiated may raise doubt about my ability to remain open-minded with respect to the appeal”. The Commissioner relied on section s.15(1) of the Act, which provides that the Deputy Commissioner at headquarters may exercise all the powers of the Commissioner in the event that he or she is absent or unable to act or the office is vacant. In this case, s.15 applied because the Commissioner was unable to act because of the apprehension of bias.

Assistant Commissioner’s Decision dated January 15, 2004 - The A/Commr agreed with the findings of the Adjudication Board and dismissed the appeal against the Board’s findings on the allegations. He found that given the nature of the duties of RCMP officers, a higher standard should apply with respect to the duty of loyalty. Also, there must be a qualification on public interest when disclosure involved sensitive classified information such as criminal intelligence and details about witnesses, suspects and innocent parties. In his view, there was no reasonable basis for the Appellant’s criticism of the Force, and the matters disclosed by the Appellant to the media were not of legitimate public concern. The Appellant’s reaction was one of personal interest.

The A/Commr also upheld the sanction imposed. He found that the Arbitration Board had considered the positive as well as negative factors. He did not agree with the Appellant that his action represented a single mistake made in the context of a very difficult and unique file. The A/Commr found that the Appellant had displayed poor judgment in a continuous series of decisions throughout the investigation of the Hong Kong matter. According to the A/Commr the sanction is appropriate, , because the Appellant did not demonstrate the level of trustworthiness necessary to continue the employment relationship.

U.S. Library of Congress report on Asian organized crime and terrorist activity in Canada (.pdf)
http://www.loc.gov/rr/frd/pdf-files/AsianOrgCrime_Canada.pdf

Fathers Canada

for justice

RCMP Pass Port Scandel