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| NEWS > 07 December 2009 |
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In pursuit of justice
This week brought closure to some of the most controversial cases in Grady County history. The corruption cases of Sheriff Kieran McMullen, Police Officer Helen McMullen, Deputy Robert Cacy, Deputy Bill Swanson, Deputy Delmar Barthelme and Police Officer Jerry Tyler have finally come to an end with their guilty pleas to the charges of Willful Neglect of Duty. These individuals were indicted by a Grand Jury in October 2006. Through legal maneuvering they were able to delay the court process for two years. Thousands of dollars in legal fees, court room time and State resources later, the res... Read more
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CTV.ca
07 December 2009
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Surete du Quebec Police, Canad
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Ex-Montreal police chief criti
A former Montreal police chief says the Surete du Quebec did not follow proper procedure during its probe into the shooting death of a Montreal teenager, but Jacques Duchesneau insists police officers as a whole are qualified to investigate their own.
Duchesneau, in a recent interview with ctvmontreal.ca, criticized the investigation led by SQ Sgt.-Det. Bruno Duchesne following the shooting death of Fredy Villanueva in Montreal North in August 2008.
The shooting triggered a riot as well as a coroner's inquest that revealed the SQ investigator never spoke to Montreal officer Jean-Loup Lapointe, who fired the fatal shots. The inquest will resume Tuesday at the Montreal courthouse.
Sgt.-Det. Duchesne told the inquiry last month that he relied on written statements from Lapointe and Lapointe's partner. The investigator also said he did not take any steps to ensure the two officers refrained from communicating with each other following the shooting.
"He didn't follow procedures," Duchesneau said from his home on the south shore. "I think that there were some missteps. In a case like that you need to play ball and you need to cover all angles. And obviously it was not done."
Defends system
But Duchesneau, who was Montreal's police chief from 1994 to 1998, rejected the views of critics who say that the Quebec practice of police officers investigating each other should be scrapped.
He says Sgt.-Det. Duchesne might simply have been overwhelmed by the complexity of the case.
"Supervision is a main issue," he said. "It's a team approach. If he was by himself then obviously he will make mistakes. Here, according to the testimony, they were just a couple of detectives.
"Good old detectives who were supervising me when I was a young cop ... they were the quarterback. If you only give that to a team of two there's too many things to be done."
The system
An outside police force takes over investigations whenever a civilian is injured or killed in a police operation in Quebec. The probes are officially called "independent investigations," but a CTV analysis this fall revealed that such probes rarely lead to criminal charges.
A Public Security Department summary obtained though Access to Information showed that outside forces only recommended criminal charges in one out of 97 cases of civilian injury or death between 2003 and this year.
The Villanueva case was among several high-profile shootings that have been dismissed without charges.
A number of observers, including a former head of the province's police ethics commission, have called for a separate civilian agency to investigate police actions and recommend criminal charges when warranted.
Ontario is currently the only province with such an agency.
Cops must play a role
Duchesneau echoes the prevailing view of Quebec law enforcement that nothing can replace the expertise of active police officers during complex investigations such as the Villanueva case.
"In order to be good, you need to do it regularly," said Duchesneau.
He says he has personal experience investigating colleagues - in 1983 he arrested his own boss, the head of the Montreal drug squad who was caught on camera stealing drugs from a police lockup.
"I'm the one who put the handcuffs on him," said Duchesneau, recalling the difficult assignment.
"People thought that we would give him a break, well we did not give him a break because that's not the way it works."
Change coming
Despite his reservations about civilian oversight of police conduct, Duchesneau says recent events might inevitably lead to changes.
But Duchesneau says experienced, active officers must remain part of the process.
"There might be things that could be adjusted," he said.
"Looking at the other (civilian) solution as being the panacea to me is ... being blinded in a way."
"A lot of people watch TV too much. They think it's CSI or whatever, but it's not like that. It's much more complicated."
Inquest
On Wednesday, the Villanueva inquest will hear from Montreal police officer Stephanie Pilotte, whose partner Lapointe shot Villanueva and two other youths during the altercation.
A ballistics expert and two paramedics will testify on Tuesday.
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