The towel is burning between the Bureau of Independent Investigations (BEI) and the Federation of Municipal Police Officers of Quebec (FPMQ), following the publication by the Globe and Mail data provided by the BEI on the refusal of municipal police officers to answer questions from its investigators.
The Toronto daily reported earlier this week that the overwhelming majority of municipal police officers involved in an event where the BEI is called upon to investigate refuse to answer the investigators’ questions.
The dispute stems from a legal battle in which police unions are contesting their members’ obligation to provide a report to the BEI and to meet with its investigators at events where the Bureau must intervene.
The BEI was created to investigate when a police intervention causes death or injury to a citizen. The police officers involved and the police officers who witnessed the event, who have different statuses according to the regulations governing these investigations, are obliged to “write independently, in particular without consultation and without influence, an accurate, detailed and exhaustive report relating in particular to the facts that occurred during the event” and to “meet the investigators of the Bureau”.
Union victory suspended
The Municipal Police Federation and the Montreal Police Brotherhood won their case in June 2022 before the Superior Court, Judge Marc St-Pierre declaring in particular that the police officers who are involved in an event that leads to an investigation by the BEI do not have to submit a report to it and that they have the right to remain silent. In both cases, this decision is based on the constitutional right of police officers not to incriminate themselves.
However, this decision has been appealed by the Government of Quebec, so its effects are suspended and the police must still submit their report to the BEI and meet with its investigators until the dispute is decided on the merits. Except that, as the BEI reports, they massively refuse to answer the questions of the latter during the meetings.
No guidelines
The Municipal Police Federation, however, denies having given any directive or watchword to its members. In an email to The Canadian Press, its spokesperson, Annick Charest, specifies that “the only advice that the FPMQ gave to its members during an investigation by the BEI is to contact their lawyer without delay. Subsequently, it is up to the strategy between the police officer involved and his lawyer to see whether or not he answers the BEI’s questions. »
On the other hand, the Federation finds it very difficult to digest that the Office of Independent Investigations has begun to collect statistics on the refusals to answer by its members, while the latter continue to provide reports. “We are surprised by the reaction of the BEI knowing that all police officers are required to provide a detailed report of their interventions at each investigation. Following the meeting between the police officers involved and their attorneys, it is at this time that it will be determined whether they need to clarify things by answering the BEI’s questions or whether everything seems complete and they have nothing else to add. »
“EIB relentlessness”
The Federation and its largest Fraternity, that of the Montreal police officers, are at the origin of the legal challenge. And the issue in dispute, according to Mr.me Charest, is not trivial. “All police officers from other provinces in Canada during an investigation of this kind have the right to silence and we do not understand the relentlessness of the BEI – which is a police force, let us remember – in wanting to deprive our Quebec police officers of this fundamental right granted by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. »
Although the FPMQ denies having launched a watchword, the BEI’s data is eloquent: between the time of the St-Pierre judgment in June 2022 and the end of May 2023, 100% of the police officers of six municipal bodies out of 13 who were the subject of investigations refused to answer its investigators, including those of Longueuil, Laval, Trois-Rivières and Saguenay. In the case of five other bodies, the refusal rate varies from 50% to more than 88%, the latter rate being that of the Montreal police officers.
No unanimity
It should be noted that two police unions stand apart. The police officers of the City of Quebec, whose Fraternity is the second most important of the FPMQ behind that of Montreal, did not follow the movement. BEI data show that SPVQ police officers responded to BEI investigators in 100% of cases, even if their Federation is a party to the dispute.
“There is no watchword and there is no opposition on our part to any instructions. We are part of the Federation of Municipal Police Officers and we adhere to its positions, ”said the president of the Fraternity of police officers of the City of Quebec, Martine Fortier, in an interview with The Canadian Press. Ironically, she attributes this result to the same reasons as the opposite results of the other unions of the Federation: “It is certain that it stems from the advice given to them by their lawyer. »
For its part, the union of the Sûreté du Québec, the largest police force in Quebec, is not even one of the applicants seeking to break the BEI regulations before the Court. The Association of Provincial Police Officers of Quebec (APPQ) only requested the status of “mis-en-cause”, although its members are also subject to the regulations governing the BEI. Its president, Jacques Painchaud, indicated in an e-mail to The Canadian Press that “we have not had a specific case allowing us to go directly to the appeal. Furthermore, we are implicated because we have a legal interest in this case. »
However, BEI statistics show that in almost 95% of cases, the SQ police officers involved in a BEI investigation answered the questions of its investigators. For what ? “We have no comments on this subject,” replies Mr. Painchaud.
Long strained relationship
Relations between the BEI and all the police forces in Quebec, including the SQ and the SPVQ, can certainly be described as difficult. The BEI sent to The Canadian Press no less than 22 letters sent by the Bureau’s management to the directors of various police forces between 2018 and 2023 reproaching them for not having complied with the procedures in the case of investigations, especially for having dragged their feet, either to notify the BEI of an event, or to submit reports.
In one of these letters, dated October 18, on the sidelines of an event that took place in Montreal in June, the director of the BEI, Me Pierre Goulet, reminds the acting director of the SPVM at the time, Sophie Roy, that the regulations “require the police officer involved or witness to write, sign and submit his report to the investigators of the Independent Investigations Bureau within 24 hours of the event”.
He goes on to inform him of “systematic behaviour”, that is, since the St-Pierre judgment, “the police officers involved and witnesses systematically refuse to answer our questions”.
The director finds it “to say the least regrettable that police officers who have witnessed events during which people have suffered serious injuries or died refuse to take part in an exercise which seeks to clarify and clarify certain details of the police operation. […] The population has the right to expect better from our police officers whom everyone respects. »