Review of the RCMP's Public Complaint Records

• Previous Page
• Table of Contents
• Next Page

Introduction

The Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP ("the Commission") performs a vital role in Canadian society in that it provides civilian oversight of the conduct of RCMP members in carrying out their policing duties thereby holding the RCMP accountable to the public. This public accountability is not only essential in helping ensure that police officers exercise their authority legally and appropriately, but is also a key element in the checks and balances required to tackle crime in Canada.

The Review of the Record is a unique project undertaken by the Commission to examine all complaint dispositions stemming from public complaints against the RCMP. The Commission's examination of the disposition of complaints analyzes trends in the types of allegations made by the public against the RCMP, how the complaint was disposed of by the RCMP and if the disposition was in keeping with RCMP policy, and provides the Commission and the RCMP with an empirical foundation to assess how effectively the overall public complaint system for the RCMP is functioning. Such empirical analyses will assist Commission and RCMP decision-makers in understanding the extent and nature of complaints against the RCMP in their respective jurisdictions and will provide a national versus regional versus divisional perspective on RCMP performance and service to Canadians through the public complaint system.¹

A member of the public can make a complaint about the RCMP directly to the RCMP, the Commission or a provincial policing authority. When the Commission receives such a complaint, it may attempt to settle the matter informally by facilitating a discussion between the complainant and a representative from the RCMP. When informal resolution fails or is inappropriate (e.g. because of the nature of the allegation), a Complaint Analyst helps the complainant formalize his or her complaint and in most instances forwards it to the RCMP for investigation². The RCMP then reports the findings of its investigation to the complainant, the RCMP member(s) involved and the Commission.

If the complainant is not satisfied with the RCMP's handling of the matter, he or she may request that the Commission review the complaint. In its review, the Commission analyzes all materials relating to the complaint, including the RCMP operational file, the RCMP public complaint investigation, relevant law and policy, and all material provided by the complainant. If the Chair is satisfied with the RCMP's handling of the complaint, he sends a Final Report ³ to all parties involved, including the RCMP Commissioner and the Minister of Public Safety. If the Chair is not satisfied with the RCMP's handling of the complaint, he sends an Interim Report to the RCMP Commissioner and to the Minister of Public Safety setting out his findings and recommendations. The RCMP Commissioner reviews the Chair's findings and recommendations and sends a written notice to the Chair and the Minister of Public Safety outlining any further action that has been or will be taken with respect to the complaint.

The Review of the Record Project's main goal is to identify areas where opportunities exist to effect change and strengthen police accountability. The project consists of two major components: the Review of the Record and the Outstanding Disposition List, which tracks all open Commission-lodged complaint files. These projects serve to enhance civilian oversight of the RCMP through quantitative and qualitative analyses, thereby strengthening the entire public complaint system.

The Review of the Record Project is designed to:

• confirm that the RCMP's statutory mandate and responsibilities related to public complaints provided for in Part VII of the RCMP Act are being met;
• analyze complaints for the purpose of trend analysis;
• identify complaint issues that might form the subject of further examination or action;
• identify systemic issues within the complaint process and within the wider context of Canadian law enforcement; and
• work collaboratively with the RCMP to identify opportunities for change.

To initiate the project, the Commission formally requested that the RCMP, pursuant to paragraph 45.47(b) of the RCMP Act, provide a copy of all completed public complaint records. A completed public complaint record was defined as the record of all complaints received by the RCMP under Part VII of the RCMP Act and included RCMP Form 4110 capturing informal resolutions and withdrawals, Form 4110 and a Notice of Direction as defined by subsection 45.36(6) of the Act, and Form 4110 and the Final Report as defined by section 45.4 of the Act.

This report is divided into two parts: Part One presents the findings related to the analysis of the Review of the Record database and Part Two presents the findings and trends related to the analysis of the findings and recommendations made in the Commission's Interim Reports.

The data collected for this report is for the calendar year 2007 and is based on all completed complaint records received by the Commission before July 1, 2008, with a complaint date between January 1, 2007⁴ and December 31, 2007.⁵ The Commission received 1,440 completed complaint dispositions relating to complaints lodged within the 2007 timeframe. It is estimated, however, that there is close to 2,500 complaints in total that were lodged against the RCMP in 2007.

For administrative purposes the RCMP is divided into four regions, which are then divided into divisions and further divided into detachments.⁶ The Review of the Record Project captures and tracks data Force-wide, regionally, divisionally, and at the detachment level.

Based on the complaint dispositions received, the Pacific Region had the most complaints (642) representing 45% of the total, while the Atlantic Region had 236 (16%), the Central Region had 53 (4%) and the Northwest Region had 509 (35%).

A total of 3,104 allegations were made against the RCMP and its members. The most common complaint allegations as identified by the RCMP were "Neglect of Duty" (29%), "Improper Attitude" (20%) and "Improper Use of Force" (13%).

In disposing of a complaint the RCMP issued a Final Report (RCMP) in 46% of the cases, issued a Notice of Direction 11% of the time, entered into an informal resolution in 30% of all cases and accepted a complaint withdrawal in 13% of the cases.

During the analysis, the Commission noticed that 8% of the total informal resolutions dealt with allegations of improper use of force and that 14% of all use of force allegations resulted in an informal resolution. Of those dispositions, 48% were deemed by the Commission to be an inappropriate disposition of a public complaint.

In 2007 the RCMP took, on average, 114 days to issue a disposition once a complaint was lodged (range: 0 to 447 days) and an additional 86 days for the Commission to receive a copy of the disposition⁷ (range: 0 to 496 days). It took, on average, 229 days for a complainant to lodge a complaint (range: 0 to 11,927⁸ days) after the incident of concern.

Interestingly, there was a significant gap in the average number of days it took a complainant to initially lodge a complaint with the Commission or the RCMP. On average, complainants waited 271 days after the incident took place before lodging a complaint directly with the Commission (range: 0 to 5,326 days), while complaints lodged with the RCMP averaged only 165 days after the incident (range: 0 to 1,927 days).

It is important to note that the Review of the Record analysis identified a number of possible reasons why complainants allowed so many days to elapse before lodging their complaint:

• 1) the types of allegations that are lodged with the Commission tend to be more serious in nature than those lodged with the RCMP;
• 2) the complainant may not have immediate access to the public complaint system;
• 3) the complaint may be historical in that an incident occurred many years (in some cases decades) before a formal complaint is lodged; and
• 4) alternate ways of resolving the complaint may have been attempted before a formal complaint was lodged.

Further, analyses as to why complainants wait an extended period of time before lodging a complaint will be conducted in future reports. The Commission has already introduced outreach initiatives in an effort to address some of the reasons individuals may wait before lodging a complaint. To that end, the Commission has been actively working to expand awareness to a more diversified set of the Canadian population, which in turn may help complainants come forward with their concerns at an earlier occasion. In addition to producing information and complaint documents in 12 different languages, during 2007-2008 the Commission also established a pilot project with the National Association of Friendship Centres. The pilot project was designed to enhance knowledge of and improve access to the public complaint process by members of the aboriginal community who may encounter obstacles in accessing the public complaint process. Two other areas that will be important to the outreach work of the Commission in the coming year are new Canadians and those suffering from mental health issues.

The second component of the Review of the Record Project, the Outstanding Disposition List Project, is designed to act as an accounting mechanism for all Commission-lodged complaints that are currently being investigated by the RCMP. Information gathered through the Outstanding Disposition List allows the Commission to track how quickly the RCMP is responding to complaints and to identify whether complaints are taking too long to be investigated.

Interestingly, the RCMP reduced the number of pre-2007 outstanding complaints by 69%. The Commission continues to receive complaint dispositions for pre- and post-2007 complaints and many of the divisions have taken to providing the Commission with a written status report of the complaints that are identified on the list. This has proven to be incredibly helpful in tracking and accounting for Commission-lodged complaints. Further, complaints that may have fallen through the "cracks" of the system have been identified and investigations have been ordered. Service to Canadians is improving.

The biggest limitation for the Review of the Record Project has been gathering the completed complaint dispositions. While compliance with the Commission's requests has been good, the Commission is aware that divisions and detachments are not always submitting all of the necessary documents; this has impacted the Commission's ability to provide a complete analysis.

With respect to the second part of the Review of the Record report, the objective of the Findings and Recommendations Trends Analysis was to determine existing trends in the findings and recommendations submitted to the RCMP Commissioner and to establish if there were any discernable trends in the Commissioner's response to the Interim Reports. For the 2007 calendar year, the Commission issued 24 Interim Reports, but only received 15 Commissioner's responses. A preliminary analysis of the 2007 Interim Reports identified several trends in the Commission's findings and recommendations, three of which are most significant.

The most common complaint for which a review was requested was a perceived neglect of duty; complainants articulated that an RCMP member failed to fully carry out his/her duties. The next most common complaint related to improper use of force, specifically excessive force, which often flowed from arrests. The third most common complaint related to allegations that RCMP members displayed an improper attitude in their interactions with the public.

The Commission has found that these projects have exceptional value in that they have increased cooperation between the Commission and the RCMP; have assisted in reducing the large number of outstanding complaint dispositions; and through quantitative and qualitative analyses have identified trends that can be utilized to improve the quality of the overall public complaint system and enhance service to the public.

In the future, the Commission will post, on its website, the results of the Quality Assessment of Dispositions Project, which will include an analysis of the complaint dispositions included in the Review of the Record database, Force-wide and by Division.

Future Review of the Record reports will address complaint trends over time and chronic complainants, further examine regional and divisional differences, and provide an update on the report from the previous year.

Recommendations

Recognizing the importance of Force-wide consistency and based on the findings of the analyses within the Review of the Record Project, the Commission recommends the following:

1. That the Professional Standards and External Review Directorate at RCMP Headquarters organize a Force-wide meeting of divisional Professional Standards Units and the Commission in order to discuss best practices and ways of improving efficiency and effectiveness in the public complaint process.
2. That the Professional Standards and External Review Directorate at RCMP Headquarters send out a directive clearly articulating:
   1. when it is appropriate to informally resolve improper use of force complaints and when it is not;
   2. how public complaints defined under Part VII of the RCMP Act are to be processed when the complainant raises statutory offence allegations; and
   3. when it is appropriate to terminate a public complaint under the RCMP Act and what information must be included in a Notice of Direction.
3. That the RCMP implement a more efficient means of tracking public complaints and that divisions and detachments provide the Commission with a copy of all of the outstanding complaint dispositions.
4. That the RCMP ensure that those tasked with capturing public complaints and writing complaint dispositions be appropriately trained and that manuals related to the public complaint process be immediately updated to ensure a standardized national approach.
5. That the RCMP commit to improving its service standards by implementing ways to reduce wait times and increase processing times for complaint dispositions.
6. That the RCMP ensure that all of the complaint dispositions be provided to the Commission concurrent to being provided to the member and the complainant.

Next Steps

Building on the findings of the first Review of the Record Project Report, the Commission plans on embarking on:

• Collaborating with the RCMP in communicating best practices with respect to the proper use of the termination provisions;
• Collaborating with the RCMP in implementing a standardized approach to the RCMP public complaint process to ensure Force-wide consistency and enhance service to the public;
• Further analyses of the concerns raised in this report, specifically into chronic complainants, statistical anomalies and improper informal resolutions and terminations of public complaints;
• A quality assessment of all RCMP public complaint dispositions; and
• Annual reporting on the findings of the Review of the Record Project.

1 Please see Appendix D for an overview of the RCMP public complaint process.

2 There are provisions in the RCMP Act for the Commission to conduct an investigation if it is in the public interest to do so.

3 Please see Appendix A for terminology commonly utilized in the RCMP public complaint process.

4 This project does not include complaint dispositions that were provided to the Commission before January 1, 2007.

5 As of September 16, 2008, the Commission had received 2,086 completed complaint dispositions.

6 A list of the Regions and their associated Divisions can be found in Appendix C.

7 These averages do not mean that it took the RCMP a particular amount of time to provide the complainant with the disposition; the timelines are specific to the RCMP providing the Commission with a copy of the dispositions.

8 The public complaint that took 11,927 days to be lodged had an initial incident start date of January 1975 and made allegations against the conduct of RCMP members that spanned many years. The complaint was lodged in August 2007. The Commission is only empowered by statute to look at complaints lodged after 1988; however, some complainants have incident data that span from before this timeframe to well after 1988.

• Previous Page
• Table of Contents
• Next Page