Controversies surrounding the Royal Canadian Mounted Police
Political surveillance activities were conducted out of its Criminal Investigation Department until a separate branch, the RCMP Security Service, was established in 1950.
The Mounties were frequently criticized for these activities by labour and the left, including one of its most prominent surveillance targets, Member of Parliament J. S. Woodsworth.
"[8] Staff Sergeant Donald McCleery (1934-2014) was involved in the operation,[6] and following his retirement from the RCMP ran his own "investigation and surveillance" company in Montreal, Quebec.
[13][1] It wasn't until the following year that it was uncovered that the October 6, 1972, break-in at the Agence de Presse Libre du Québec office, had been the work of an RCMP investigation dubbed Operation Bricole, not right-wing militants as previously believed.
A similar break-in occurred at the same time, at the office of the Mouvement pour la Défense des Prisonniers Politiques Québécois.
In 1977, the Quebec provincial government launched the Keable Inquiry into Illegal Police Activities, which resulted in 17 members of the RCMP being charged with 44 offences.
Controversy arose after officers of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police used pepper spray and strip searches against protesters, who were objecting to the presence of several autocratic leaders such as Indonesian president Suharto.
The report also charged that the Canadian government interfered with police operations, possibly in an effort to shield certain leaders from being publicly embarrassed by the protests.
[18] In 1999 RCMP Constable Michael Ferguson fatally shot local resident Darren Varley after being attacked inside the holding cells at a Pincher Creek police station.
[19] On September 26, 2002, during a stopover in New York City en route from a family vacation in Tunisia to Montreal, Maher Arar was detained by the United States Immigration and Naturalization Service, acting upon information supplied by the RCMP.
Arar was sent to Syria where he was imprisoned for more than 10 months, tortured and forced to sign a false confession that he had trained in Al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan.
As in the case of Arar, unnamed Canadian officials used the media to publicly accuse El Maati and Almalki of having ties to al-Qaeda.
When they returned to Canada, they all called for a process which would expose the truth about the role of Canadian agencies in what happened to them, and which would help them clear their names and rebuild their lives.
Ahmad El Maati and Abdullah Almalki, meanwhile, still await answers in their cases from the secretive Iacobucci Inquiry into the RCMP and other Canadian agencies' alleged role in their overseas detention and torture.
In 2004, Andrew McIntosh, an investigative journalist at The National Post, revealed a secret audit that detailed misuse of millions of dollars by the RCMP of its own members' pension fund.
[21] A subsequent investigation conducted by a former head of the Ontario Securities Commission strongly criticized the management style of Zaccardelli, who, he said, was responsible for "a fundamental breach of trust" and called for a major shake-up of the force.
Specifically, RCMP members and employees who attempted to address the pension fund issue suffered "career damage" for doing so, according to the investigators findings.
[22] Interim RCMP Commissioner Beverley Busson concurred with the recommendations and promised that individuals that the upper ranks attempted to silence would be thanked and recognized.
[23] Following the 2002 case of a Prince George judge, David Ramsay, who pleaded guilty to misconduct with young prostitutes, similar allegations were made against Constable Justin Harris and other RCMP officers.
[26] The analyses of the blood spatter evidence by an RCMP forensics officer, Jim Hignell, and Edmonton police constable, Joseph Slemko, differed; the former supporting Koester's account, the latter contradicting it.
[30][31] Testimony from the officers differs regarding whether or not Dziekański's pulse was checked,[32] but when paramedics arrived approximately 15 minutes later he could not be resusciated, and he was declared dead at the scene.
[35][36] In October 2008, it was revealed that the RCMP had used taxpayer money to pay individuals to write negative, politically biased reports about the Vancouver safe injection site, Insite.
[45][46] In 2007 Janet Merlo filed a claim of harassment and misconduct against the RCMP[47] stating that their continual abuse over a decade of service had led to depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.
[49] In 2007, Sherry Lee Benson-Podolchuk wrote and published Women Not Wanted, which detailed her experiences with frequent harassment during her 20-year career as the sole female officer in the Prairie region at the time.
[50][51] In November 2011, Corporal Catherine Galliford, a former spokeswoman for the British Columbia Division, came forward with a claim that she had been the victim of sexual harassment by senior officers as far back as 1991, when she graduated from the RCMP Academy.
[53] They did not however address the matter of SSgt Caroline O’Farrell, who brought a separate suit due to her treatment while part of the iconic Musical Ride in the late 1980s.
The previous similar 2017 Merlo and Davidson Class Action Settlement only compensated female members and a limited number of public servants.
The payouts are only allowed for living officers, with payments denied to the families of Mounties who had committed suicide since coming forward about the harassment.
[61] During early stages of the construction of the controversial Kinder Morgan pipeline which was met by massive protests and physical resistance, the RCMP was brought in to disperse them.
[62] Amongst those arrested were Member of Parliament Elizabeth May[63] and Tamo Campos, grandson of David Suzuki, which the activist made a speech against, and criticized the RCMP's actions.
