Quebec police refusing to co-operate in investigations on civilian deaths
www.theglobeandmail.com
Many police are refusing to answer questions from the oversight body on civilian deaths following a court ruling last year that said officers must meet with investigators

Quebec police are refusing to answer questions from the oversight body investigating civilian deaths and serious injuries during police interventions. This is after

[Police] unions also challenged the obligation for officers to meet with … investigators. They argued that those rules infringed on their members’ constitutional rights to stay silent and not incriminate themselves.

It’s part of a national trend:

in British Columbia, police officers rarely co-operate with the Independent Investigations Office …, while they often only partly co-operate with independent oversight bodies in other provinces.

  • corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca
    102·
    1 year ago

    Our section 11c allows for the defendant’s right not to give testimony directly against oneself,

    11 Any person charged with an offence has the right

    (c) not to be compelled to be a witness in proceedings against that person in respect of the offence;

    but it doesn’t allow for one defendant not to give testimony against another – just, via section 13, indemnification against that witness in a separate proceeding when previous testimony is compelled (via lack of a right to silence when potentially incriminating others).

    13 A witness who testifies in any proceedings has the right not to have any incriminating evidence so given used to incriminate that witness in any other proceedings, except in a prosecution for perjury or for the giving of contradictory evidence.

    So, cops don’t have to testify against themselves, but they don’t get to be silent. And they get indemnification if they do speak up, so it seems a dumb move not to say “yeah, me and Bobby totally beat the hell outta that guy” and use that section-13 clause to skate.

    Hmm. But they’d be bounced out of the force on Ethics, but I guess at that point they’re no longer cops anyway; just thugs (and if you’re all ACAB about it, you need to know why that’s toxic).

    • Ilikepornaddict@lemmynsfw.com
      9·
      1 year ago

      But they wouldn’t be removed from the force, that’s the issue. They’d just be moved to a different jurisdiction where they can continue sucking. It’s not really that ACAB, but the police institution is a bastard, and until that changes ACAB will continue to be the norm.

    • sbv@sh.itjust.worksOP
      4·
      1 year ago

      I don’t know enough about law to say whether those excepts are the only rules that would be relevant in this scenario.

      It is clear that police officers and unions are systematically undermining public safety through legal appeals and non-compliance.