News Release

Chair-Initiated Public Complaint
Police Investigating Police

RCMP Investigations into other RCMP Members in Cases involving Serious Injury or Death

VANCOUVER, B.C., November 29, 2007 – Paul E. Kennedy, Chair of the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP (CPC), has initiated a complaint into the conduct of those unidentified RCMP members who have conducted criminal investigations into the activities of other RCMP members, in cases that involved serious injury or death, which have taken place anywhere in Canada between April 1, 2002 and March 31, 2007.

Various members of the public and the media have expressed concern about the propriety of RCMP members investigating other RCMP members, especially in cases of this nature.

Accordingly, pursuant to subsection 45.37(1) of the RCMP Act, Mr. Kennedy is initiating a complaint into the conduct of the RCMP members involved in such investigations during the time period shown above, specifically:

• whether the RCMP members involved in these investigations conducted the investigations free of actual or perceived conflict of interest, whether they responded appropriately and proportionately to the gravity of the incident, whether they responded in a timely fashion and whether their conduct adhered to the standards set out in section 37 of the RCMP Act;
• whether these same RCMP members complied with all appropriate policies, procedures, guidelines and statutory requirements for such investigations; and
• whether existing RCMP policies, procedures and guidelines are adequate to ensure that fair, effective, thorough and impartial investigations are carried out by RCMP members when investigating fellow RCMP members.

Furthermore, Mr. Kennedy is instituting a public interest investigation into this complaint, pursuant to subsection 45.43 (1) of the RCMP Act.

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For more information, please contact:

Nelson Kalil
Manager, Communications
613-952-2452
nelson.kalil@cpc-cpp.gc.ca

James Lévêque
Media Relations
613-797-5706