D-065-066-1 - Adjudication Board Decision

Two members had to answer to a series of disciplinary allegations the main thrust of which was that they had appropriated goods seized during searches and that they had allowed some colleagues to do the same. In both cases, the members submitted a motion to the Adjudication Board seeking to have the allegations quashed, for the reason that the Appropriate Officer, who was the same person in both cases, had not initiated the disciplinary hearings within the limitation period of "one year from the time the contravention and the identity of that member became known to the appropriate officer," according to sub-section 43(8) of the RCMP Act. The hearings had been initiated in September 1997. The members claimed that the Appropriate Officer had become aware of the facts in the allegations 21 months earlier, when he had suspended them from their duties, in December 1995. The Adjudication Board responsible for studying the first case granted the motion finding four of the five allegations against the first member to be time-barred. The Adjudication Board responsible for the second case granted the motion for five of the seven allegations against that member. Both Boards found that the documentation that had been forwarded to the Appropriate Officer for him to determine whether there were grounds for suspending the members had included the principal information on which most of the allegations were based. However, in the first case, it was determined that this documentation said nothing about one of the allegations and that it was therefore not time-barred, the Appropriate Officer having been made aware of the facts of this allegation only upon receipt of the final report of the internal investigation. The Adjudication Board in the second case came to a similar conclusion with regard to two of the allegations.

The Adjudication Board in the first case then concluded that the timely allegation against the member was founded. This allegation claimed that he had conducted himself in a disgraceful manner by appropriating speakers that had been taken from a seized vehicle. As for the second case, the Adjudication Board found that only one of the allegations was founded. This was an allegation of disgraceful conduct, related to the fact that the member had taken a cart from an exhibits vault and had used it in completing renovations at his home. In both cases the Adjudication Boards ordered the members to resign or they would be dismissed. One of the grounds of appeal raised by the members alleged that the allegations that had been found to have merit had been time-barred.

On October 28, 1999, the ERC issued its findings and recommendations. The External Review Committee found that the two Adjudication Boards had committed an error by distinguishing the allegations that it had judged timely from the others, simply because they were not part of the examples of misconduct mentioned in the report addressed to the Appropriate Officer at the time that the members were suspended. According to the Committee, the Adjudication Board had required a much too detailed knowledge on the part of the Appropriate Officer of the pertinent facts. If it weren't for the fact that these allegations all related to facts that regarded related activities, the Adjudication Boards' findings could be considered quite logical. However, these particular cases included very special circumstances in that the allegations all concerned actions of the same nature. The actions of which the members were accused were all known to the RCMP at the time of the suspension. The actions underlying the allegations judged by the Adjudication Boards to not be time-barred had, no doubt, not been reported because they were judged to be too trivial at the time that suspension was recommended. It would be paradoxical if the absence of details judged to be of little importance at the time were sufficient to extend the period available to the Appropriate Officer to initiate a hearing. The Parliament's intention to provide procedural protection to members would be thwarted in such a case.

The Committee found that the delay in convening the two disciplinary hearings had nothing to do with the fact that the information provided to the Appropriate Officer at the time of the suspensions did not state the allegations at issue. The delay was rather related to the fact that the disciplinary investigations had taken more than a year to be completed. The Committee therefore recommended to the Commissioner that he allow the appeals and reverse the decisions of the arbitration boards.

On January 19, 2000, the Commissioner rendered his decision. His decision, as summarized by his office, is as follows:

The Commissioner concurred in the findings and recommendations of the External Review Committee (the ERC). Like the ERC, he found that the Adjudication Board had erred in law when it found that allegation No. 4 was not time-barred and he made no ruling concerning the other grounds for appeal. The Commissioner held that the Appropriate Officer had enough information in December 1995 to act on all of the allegations, including allegation No. 4. The Commissioner indicated that the Appropriate Officer had not acted within the limitation period in convening the hearing in September 1997.

The Commissioner allowed the appeal and rescinded the Adjudication Board's decision. In order to determine the reasons for the delay in this case and since an administrative investigation had already been requested in a similar case, the Commissioner held that the circumstances surrounding the delay in this case would be reviewed simultaneously.