THUNDER BAY – OPINION – There was a news story about an increase in police incidents that had been investigated by the provinces Special Investigations Unit. This is the unit mandated to look at cases involving police where a firearm is used, serious injury to a person took place, or allegations of a sexual assault have been made. The SIU director Joseph Martino was concerned over the timeliness of completing the investigations and the stress the number of cases may be causing for his staff.
I understand, given the false narrative over the past two decades, why people think this agency is needed. My personal experience provides a different perspective. This agency was created to tamp down the political price governments were paying by groups who felt targeted by police. I know the vast majority of police interactions are done professionally. I along with others view this organization as just one more anchor around police that prevents them from doing their core function, protecting the citizens of this province.
Two specific cases come to mind, where investigators from the SIU provided misleading/inaccurate/false statements to judges to get charges laid against our officers. Investigators who had never been an officer failed to ask the one critical question that would have exonerated our officers. Without getting into specifics, there was an officer accused of acting in a specific fashion that led to him being charged.
Yet there was another officer who witnessed the entire matter. The SIU investigators did not ask that officer if the officer under investigation took that “alleged action”. They also did not advise the judge that the suspect RECANTED his accusations.
The second case charged our officers of putting out a cigarette onto the hand of a suspect and beating him with their guns, complete with photos and the testimony of the SIU investigators. At trial, the emergency room doctor testified that the suspect had no burn on his hand when he was admitted to hospital. The SIU did not have to explain the alleged burn nor the beating allegation which no one would have likely survived if true.
One officer was convicted of assault. He appealed that conviction. At the appeal the crown attorney presented argued why the conviction should stand. When the defence attorney went to stand, the judge told him to sit down. He overturned the conviction immediately. That is how bad the case was. Older cases but relevant just the same.
The SIU was formed out of the belief that police cannot be trusted to investigate their own. This “blue line”, “brotherhood” falsehood has been allowed to fester without pushback and policies get developed that do nothing to improve public safety. They do however make police officers hesitate in doing their job.
Allegedly we need the SIU because the police could not be trusted, but with the SIU, we created that exact system. No outside accountability for the SIU investigators or director. No ability for a police union or a police officer to complain. Are the police really supposed to trust this system?
Why are the police subjected to this sort of oversight when so many other professions can have even greater impact on society. Doctors investigate themselves. Lawyers who always seem to be able to make new laws while protecting their turf investigate themselves. Teachers and nurses have their own college for complaints.
Anyone know of a judge who has been removed from the bench. How about ethics probes for our elected leaders? Should we not have a special unit to investigate possible criminal wrongdoing by elected leaders?
Our local police service has been heavily scrutinized over some of their investigations. Little to no understanding was given into the workload of these officers, the complexity of the investigation, staffing burnout or sometimes, the reality of their conclusions. One mistake, however unintentional, can be turned into a public spectacle. Officers routinely are accused of acting in a specific fashion because of the race of the individual but we never hear about the other cases where the victim is the same race, and THAT SAME officer conducted those investigations professionally.
Recently an officer was under investigation for an incident involving a repeat customer. The bad guy was injured trying to flee arrest, and SIU launched an investigation. The injury was not serious, but it technically met the mandate of the SIU. That officer was taken off patrol with no opportunity for advancement, restricted from working overtime, and put into a position far beneath their training and experience.
On what should have been a rather simple case, the officer was cleared after a year. Is there any accountability for the SIU dragging their feet? Of course not, because they basically operate autonomously, truly answerable to no one. What do you say about a system that cares nothing about an officer that is shot but investigates that wounded officer for criminal wrongdoing if the suspect who shot him is injured.
For this article I watched an interview with Mr. Martino. The interviewer took the position that police need constant scrutiny including questioning an officer’s right to have the same charter protections as anyone else. Are police no longer Canadian citizens? It will not surprise me, given the “agenda” that those rights become eroded over time.
In the interview, Mr. Martino stated that in 96.4% of all cases, no charges were laid. Those with an “agenda” will conclude that the system is not working. People like me will conclude officers in fractions of seconds almost always choose the correct path. Not many other professions have that track record.
The public didn’t listen when I cautioned everyone about the increasing oversight levelled on police and its impact on recruitment. But it is happening right across north America where recruiting has become a serious challenge. People are still ignoring this reality.
You cannot expect perfection in highly volatile situations and not accept that bad outcomes are going to happen. We have all seen tragedies occur on media reports and most often, police are blamed for the outcome. But most of these cases have one thing in common that is never discussed; the refusal of the person involved to comply with the direction given by the officer. In many of those cases, if the person had not resisted and simply complied, the outcome would have been far different. Let me be clear: THAT DOES NOT justify some of the actions that were taken, it is simply never part of the narrative and needs to be. When things escalate, bad outcomes are more likely.
That is going to anger some people. I will be accused of being blind to racial injustice but that avoids reality. Comply and complain later. Resist and the situation will escalate. The constant narrative against police has only emboldened people to believe they can routinely push back on officers, even if they are not involved. This only increases the likelihood of bad outcomes. A review of some of these situations would confirm this point.
Cops also do not like cops who commit crimes. I saw officers investigated, arrested, charged and convicted because other front-line officers initiated the investigations. How does that square up with the belief that officers routinely cover up for other officers?
I do not believe this type of oversight provides better policing. Do you honestly believe that police officers are okay with this oversight where in volatile situations, their actions get to be scrutinized by Monday morning quarterbacks. If you shoot someone holding what looks like a gun, are you supposed to wait and confirm it is not a gun. Anyone out there want to try that scenario in the dark, with a suspect who is running away, while being alone. Any volunteers?
None of this oversight is going to enhance an officer’s willingness to expose themselves to this sort of scrutiny. They have little faith in this unaccountable system, a system designed on the belief they cannot be trusted.
To those that want more oversight, I do not believe you represent most people. I believe most appreciate what police officers do and recognize that by and large almost all serve honourably and with good intentions. I think people want those committing crimes arrested and recognize that things are not going to go smoothly every time police try to arrest someone. They believe that coddling criminals is not the answer to crime. But the critics have been driving policy while the majority stay silent.
To the reporter who interviewed Mr. Martino and asked why no stats were being kept on minority groups and mental health issues related to police interaction I would like to say this: police are not mental health experts. Police officers have minimal training in this area, and 2 days or 5 are not going to guarantee these incidents are free from risk. These are mental health issues and people train for years in these fields. But our system asks police to respond, and then investigates officers when things do not go well. When things do not go well, is the psychiatrist, social worker, or mental health expert investigated?
And if this offends those sensitive folks, I don’t care but there was no way I was going to risk my safety or the safety of those I worked with because someone was having a mental health crisis.
Did I try to solve it without force. Always. Did it work most of the time, yes but a few times force was needed, and it could have easily gotten worse. When I talked people into surrendering peacefully during standoffs, one after three days with little sleep, should I be investigated had it not turned out well? Stop demanding the police be experts at everything and that they go to jail when they are not.
For over two decades I have believed there is a better way, one that would keep the publics trust, but potentially earn the trust of police officers. Make the SIU a true oversight body, one that oversees the investigation, but does not conduct it.
Have Windsor investigate incidents in Thunder Bay. Have Thunder Bay investigate Kingston. Have Kingston investigate an incident in Sudbury. No officer will risk his job, his freedom or his family’s future to cover up for another officer simply because they do the same job. Regardless, the SIU would still be there, making sure all evidence is considered, no interview is slanted while the police are assured that the investigation will be done properly.
A report by the independent SIU to ensure the public has confidence in whatever decision may come. No politics, no agenda, better trust that everyone can possibly get behind, not just the minority of people who do the yelling and are never satisfied until an officer goes to jail.
There is limited information on police calls for service in Canada, but one site did provide a snapshot. I will provide Ontario numbers below but, in those numbers, approximately 35 other police services, plus RCMP, and agencies that protect reserves, including large forces like Halton Region, Hamilton, Durham Region, York Region, Peel Region, Barrie ARE NOT included.
In March of 2022, there were 29,644 calls for service to these police agencies: Ottawa, Halton Region, London, Waterloo Region, Toronto, and the OPP. The chart did not include every category of call, so the call numbers would likely be substantially higher (break and enters, murders, warrants, traffic stops to name some were not included). The OPP had 2,545 domestic calls that month with 2,256 for mental health/suicide, while Toronto had 4,384 just for mental health/possible suicide and1,730 for domestics.
Thousands of calls every day are answered by officers in this province without incident. So why create a huge oversight body to investigate those that do not go perfectly. Is this necessary or is it more about appeasing a small segment of society that wants to flex political muscle to handcuff police, and governments that instead of dealing with reality want to appease those critics.
In 2022, the SIU were involved in 335 cases. That is total for the year. Those six police agencies listed above had 29,644 calls for service (really higher), in one month. So, if we extrapolate that number to a year, that is 355,728 calls for service, just for those 6 police agencies.
So, even assuming that is the total calls for service in Ontario for 2022, a ridiculous assumption, Mr. Martino and his team investigated, .0009 percent of those calls. It is likely lower by at least half that amount. In those 335 cases, 13 officers were charged in 11 cases. And for this amount, we fund an oversight agency that does what exactly to make Ontario safer? All of this for $12 million dollars, not counting a state-of-the-art forensic facility paid for by Ontario taxpayers, while each city pays for their own to catch serious criminals. Almost makes you wonder if the priority is stopping/solving crime or putting cops in jail to appease the critics.
We do not put a police officer on every corner because we accept that we cannot stop every crime without greatly expanding the number of officers beyond a city’s ability to fund. Yet, the government has no problem funding an agency to look at the one in a hundred thousand that does not go well, without any consideration for what it may do to overall public safety.
More and more officers will resist putting themselves in these situations. I have asked this previously: a man has a gun pointed at your child. Do you want the officer to shoot? And if you do, are you fine that now, that officer is investigated to see if he committed a crime, and it takes a year for that investigation to complete, who cares about promotions, or overtime for that officer. Do you consider the risk of going to jail for doing a job that very few are considering today, may cause some officers to hesitate in saving your child. If you disregard these concerns, then in my view you are either blindly ignorant, or intentionally unconcerned and have your own agenda.
In this writer’s opinion, none of this increasing oversight will help to recruit new officers to a profession that has been under attack for decades. For certain, none of this will make any community safer. Just a thought.
James Mauro
