D-143 - Adjudication Board Decision

The Appellant has appealed the decision of an RCMP Adjudication Board (Board) ordering her to resign within 14 days or be dismissed for having conducted herself in a disgraceful manner that could bring discredit on the RCMP. The appeal stems from the Appellant’s actions while she was a general duty member in [X]. The Appellant submitted information on three operational files that was false, misleading or inaccurate. In each of the files, the Appellant documented that she investigated and made contact with the subjects of the complaints, and that she issued verbal warnings to them. However, she never made contact with the subjects of the complaints and she fabricated the results of her files. The proceedings were supposed to proceed by way of a contested hearing, but at the hearing, the Appellant admitted to the three allegations of disgraceful conduct.

The Appellant is appealing solely the sanction of dismissal. She argues that she was denied procedural fairness because she was denied the opportunity to cross-examine the Appropriate Officer on the loss of confidence and that the Board demonstrated a reasonable apprehension of bias. She further argues that the Board misapprehended evidence regarding mitigating and aggravating factors. Lastly, the Appellant argues that the sanction is not in line with the principle of parity of sanction.  

The ERC found that the Appellant’s right to procedural fairness had not been breached since the Appropriate Officer Representative’s comments on the Commanding Officer’s request for dismissal did not reach the threshold of providing this Commanding Officer’s personal views on the Appellant. Further, the ERC found that the Appellant waived her right to cross-examine the Commanding Officer by failing to object to the submission and not requesting that the Commanding Officer be called as a witness. The ERC found that the Appellant did not rebut the presumption that the Board was impartial. It further found that the Board did not err in its assessment of the Appellant’s medical condition since the Appellant provided no evidence of her medical condition and how this condition may have impacted her actions. Lastly, the ERC found that the Board did not err on sanction when it distinguished the cases provided by the parties nor did it breach the principle of parity of sanction. Most of the cases provided resulted from a joint submission on sanction, and none had previous discipline as an aggravating factor. The Board could not be fettered in its discretion to impose a sanction of dismissal.    

The ERC recommended that the appeal be denied.

The Commissioner’s decision, as summarized by his office, is as follows:

The Commissioner agreed with the ERC and dismissed the appeal