December 15, 2009
By Alison Auld, The Canadian Press
HALIFAX, N.S. - The head of a civil liberties group is accusing the police of using privacy legislation to block public scrutiny of their actions, a day after the RCMP refused to reveal details of a fatal shooting involving one of its officers.
David Eby of the B.C. Civil Liberties Association said he's seeing more police agencies cite the federal privacy law as a reason for not releasing information about investigations into officers' conduct.
"It's really not about privacy rights," he said from Vancouver on Tuesday. "We feel they're using it as a shield to avoid accountability."
His comments come in the aftermath of a decision by Nova Scotia RCMP to not charge an officer who fatally shot a reportedly intoxicated and suicidal man who was in his home alone in Cape Breton.
John Simon died Dec. 8, 2008, after he was shot on the Wagmatcook First Nation reserve. His family argue police didn't need to enter the residence, where Simon was reportedly sitting on the toilet when the officer is believed to have climbed in through a window.
RCMP said at a news conference Monday that a probe by the Halifax police department determined the officer who fired the gun did so in self-defence.
But they refused to answer questions about the incident, including why Simon was considered a threat, who made a 911 call, whether the officer was authorized to enter the house and how many times Simon was shot.
RCMP Chief Supt. Blair McKnight said Monday he wasn't "permitted to release a copy of this investigation or the details" because of the privacy law.
When asked on Tuesday to explain how the law prevents the release of more details, the RCMP issued a news release reiterating its position: "Under the privacy law of Canada, the RCMP cannot disclose the specifics of any criminal investigation."
Eby said there have been other cases in British Columbia where police have cited the federal law to withhold the release of information into cases probing police conduct.
"They're taking a certain interpretation of privacy law that most benefits them in avoiding having to explain difficult circumstances," he said.
Lisa Austin, a law professor at the University of Toronto, said the federal law is so discretionary that it allows forces to use it liberally to decide if personal information needs to be protected.
"That is a huge problem with the federal legislation - there's so much discretion built into it," she said.
"You can exempt things for privacy reasons and then there's a discretion to take into account the public interest. Well who's exercising the discretion? The people who want to keep it hushed up."
Simon's common-law spouse, Patsy MacKay, said police revealed some details of the case to her, but said they were limited by the federal legislation from answering all of her questions.
MacKay said she still has no clear understanding as to why the Halifax police, which investigated the RCMP's conduct, determined that the officer acted appropriately.
MacKay said police told her she could file a request for the report through the federal Access to Information Act, but that it would be largely blacked out.
Supt. Mike Burns of the Halifax police said the officer who entered Simon's home fired his pistol at him "after reasonably perceiving that John Simon posed a threat of grievous bodily harm or death, and believing that he could not otherwise preserve himself from grievous bodily harm other than by using deadly force."
Eby said the case adds to a growing demand for civilian groups to be in charge of investigating police conduct rather than having officers do it themselves.
Halifax police led the investigation into Simon's death, but RCMP spokeswoman Brigdit Leger said RCMP officers were involved in the year-long probe. The RCMP would have no input into the final report or the decision to charge, she said in a news release.
There are several different models in place across the country to investigate the conduct of police, but provincial oversight bodies have no authority over the RCMP.
Ontario created a Special Investigations Unit, made up of civilian investigators, to handle cases involving police that result in death or injury to civilians.
In Alberta, cases are handled by a unit headed by a civilian director and made up of 10 active police officers and six civilians.
Nova Scotia Justice Minister Ross Landry has said he will develop a new arms-length, independent unit to investigate police actions sometime next year.