Broken RCMP means broken people

This week, a serving member of the RCMP sent a message to the Prime Minister of Canada complaining about the actions of the Commissioner of the RCMP. Yes, you read that right.

I have never heard of such a thing. 

The author is one of the YVR Four who was scapegoated by the Force.  I have written much about their case, included the fact they were scapegoated, thrown under the bus, and two of them served jail sentences for doing their job. 

And the RCMP knew that all along. In a May 2008 report examining the actions of the RCMP in the October 2007 incident at YVR in which Polish traveller Robert Dziekanski lost his life, the authors spent more than 1200 pages examining, primarily, their communications failures and errors after the event. But, throughout the document it clearly states the members were in the lawful execution of their duties and acted according to their training and the use of a Taser (CEW) was appropriate. 

Indeed, in the report it links to an email written to the Commanding Officer, Deputy Commissioner Gary Bass in November 2007, a month after the incident which says all of that. 

Yet, they never said that publicly. They never defended their members despite the withering media criticism, the subsequent Braidwood Commission, the Special Prosecutor appointment, the prosecution of all four members and the conviction and jailing of two of them. They never came to their defence despite knowing all along they did nothing wrong.

The author of the complaint requested an investigation by the RCMP into all of this claiming it amounted to Obstruction and Breach of Trust. The Commissioner, Brenda Lucki, declined to do this hiding behind the fact there was pending litigation against the Force by three of the four members and that precluded a criminal investigation. Stuff and nonsense. 

After being sworn in as Commissioner Lucki said, “I plan to challenge assumptions, seek explanations, and better understand the reasons how we operate. This means that no stone will be left unturned.” Well, apparently this is one stone she will leave unturned.

Hence, the complaint to the Prime Minister who thus far, has declined to get involved. Sgt. Peter Merrifield, co-chair of the National Police Federation, the group seeking standing to represent rank and file members of the Force as their union, also weighed in saying to the Prime Minister, “Your government is playing ‘politics’ with peoples lives. Innocent members of the RCMP have been put in prison, hundreds of them have been destroyed emotionally by the abuse and lack of fair recourse institutionally, and are looking to you to hold the RCMP to account. Worst of all hundreds of our members have been destroyed by internal abuses and a lack of accountability and some of them have tragically taken their own lives.”

Then there’s the treatment of another four members. Four female members, unknown to each other at the time, who were all victimized by the same male member, Rob Blundell. 

Blundell was an undercover operator at the time. When he was working a project in Calgary, he asked for, and got assigned to him, young female constables eager to play with the big boys to act as arm candy, so to speak, to help him establish his cover. In at least one of the cases he never had authorization to do that. But, I suspect, that may have been the case in all.

In each of the cases, after much drinking to play their role, Blundell got them back to his hotel using ruses like: there’s been a mistake with your room booking and now the hotel is sold out so you’ll have to stay in my room or we need to debrief the evening’s operation. 

In three of the cases he molested the female members during the night and they fought back. In one case, the young woman awoke with him having penetrating sex with her. 

None of the four said anything initially, fearing they wouldn’t be believed or it would hurt their career prospects. After Catherine Galliford came forward with her story publicly, the dam burst and each of the four came forward with similar complaints, in similar circumstances about the same male member. One of them was Krista Carle who committed suicide two weeks ago. 

Carle was one of the faces of the hundreds of female members who complained of systemic bullying and sexual harassment in the RCMP. She spoke out very publicly about the abuse. 

But the real problem wasn’t just the abuse she suffered at the hands of Blundell. No, it was the way the RCMP abandoned her and the other three members and protected a rapist. 

After their complaints were laid, the Old Boys network kicked into overdrive. The gossip mill was rife with lies about the four complainants much in the same way the RCMP tried to assassinate the character of Galliford. They were drunks or sluts or slackers or whatever. 

Needless to say none of it was true, but still they endured it. Blundell was brought up in an administrative hearing before a tribunal of senior officers. But, for whatever reason, the RCMP started with the rape complaint, not the groping complaints which would have laid the groundwork for the rape allegation. Instead, they started with that one and in the absence of corroborating evidence, which the other three would have provided had their cases been called first, Blundell was acquitted by the tribunal.

The RCMP then brought administrative proceedings against Blundell on the other three almost identical matters. Suddenly, a senior officer from BC showed up in Calgary and after discussions with Blundell told the counsel representing the women that Blundell would plead guilty to sexual touching, and be disciplined, and the matter would go away. 

Counsel said the three women wanted to tell their stories in the hearing.  They wanted their day in court and she would have to seek instructions before agreeing to the deal. The senior officer, Peter German, now the investigator into the systemic casino money laundering in BC, told the lawyer her client was the CO of E Division, Deputy Commissioner Bev Busson who was paying the bills not the three women. 

And with that Blundell got the only penalty he would ever get for being a predator and a rapist, a day suspension when he pled guilty to sexual touching, admitting to groping over their clothes when the truth is nothing of the sort. 

The Old Boys Network protected another of their own. Blundell retired last year with a full Staff Sergeant’s pension. Two of the four women spoke publicly about the incidents. One of whom has been marginalized in a Vancouver Island Detachment in a non-operational job, and has not been promoted since she filed her complaint. The other is Krista Carle, who left the Force after the administrative hearings and killed herself two weeks ago. 

And the Commissioner insists the Force is not broken. 

-30-

Leo Knight

@primetimecrime