In August 2021, a Toronto drug case took a dramatic flip when a prosecutor made what the decide known as a “highly unusual” request, asking the court docket to throw out proof by a key police witness.
It got here after defence attorneys had grilled Toronto Police Service Const. Ryan Kotzer over “disparaging comments about black people” in an unofficial 51 Division police chat group.
In one other dialog, a unique 51 Division officer requested in regards to the pubic hair of a feminine colleague and whether or not it was “like a blk chick.”
That vulgarity additionally discovered its method into the courts — used to depict the officer who made the remark as racist in a bid to throw out a separate human-trafficking case.
The troubling content material of the unofficial Toronto Police Service 51 Division discussion groups has been rising in social media leaks for years.
Screenshots shared with The Canadian Press present officers exchanging pornographic content material, rape jokes, complaints about “leftist” judges, and a photograph of Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s daughters, with one officer commenting, “I know which one I want.”
Nevertheless it’s by no means beforehand been reported how the conversations had been used to attempt to impeach the credibility of police witnesses in no less than two instances.
It’s an instance of how courts and police forces are being compelled to grapple with the results of personal discussion groups amongst officers. Such discussion groups elevate authorized and moral questions, blurring strains between private and non-private behaviour, whereas revealing — and doubtlessly obscuring — racism, sexism and different misconduct amongst officers.
Defence lawyer Alonzo Abbey stated he was shocked when the Crown prosecutor requested the court docket to completely scrap what the decide within the Ontario court docket of justice known as “very problematic” testimony from Kotzer, who had been surveilling the Moss Park homeless encampment in downtown Toronto.
“It was shocking,” stated Abbey. “I’ve never seen that before.”
It was clear, the decide dominated, that Kotzer’s proof towards two 20-year-olds accused of possessing fentanyl and a loaded handgun was compromised. The case then collapsed, by no means making it to trial.
“The fact that these are police officers who are talking like that among themselves in the private chat is very concerning and troubling,” stated Abbey, who represented one of many accused.
Privateness and allegations of investigative overreach getting used towards officers have in the meantime emerged as a key battlefield over unofficial police chats.
In British Columbia, officers within the Nelson Police Division and Coquitlam RCMP have tried to dam separate disciplinary probes involving group chats on private telephones.
In a single dialogue outlined in an RCMP search warrant software, unidentified Coquitlam Mounties had been stated to imagine their personal chats wouldn’t be uncovered as a result of they had been “amongst the trusted.”
Get day by day Nationwide information
Get the day’s high information, political, financial, and present affairs headlines, delivered to your inbox as soon as a day.
It’s a place that displays critics’ considerations that some group chats are used to improperly hold police issues personal.
Toronto Police Affiliation president Clayton Campbell stated police departments throughout the nation are carefully watching a court docket problem by the officers in Nelson towards the seizure of their private telephones “because it could have impacts across Canada.”
Campbell stated the brand new Group Security and Policing Act in Ontario has comparable language to B.C.’s Police Act, “about warrantless search of our members’ personal cellphones.”
He stated police group chat materials that’s been made public could also be “troubling,” however individuals in regulated professions like policing nonetheless have rights to privateness and rights assured by the Constitution of Rights and Freedoms.
Concerning the 51 Division chats, he stated officers at the moment are issued telephones by the Toronto Police Service, and “things have changed.”
Kotzer couldn’t be reached for remark. Gary Clewley, a lawyer who has beforehand represented him, stated Kotzer wouldn’t wish to be interviewed, whereas declining to assist put The Canadian Press in contact with him.
The Toronto Police service and the Toronto Police Affiliation each declined to facilitate an interview with Kotzer.
Former Toronto Police Service officer Firouzeh Zarabi-Majd leaked among the unofficial 51 Division group chats on social media from 2019, together with these of Kotzer.
Zarabi-Majd stated she later watched group members depart the chats in real-time after they discovered they had been “compromised,” and people group chats “no longer exist.”
However officers “still use their own phones to communicate,” she stated in a textual content message. “That’s not going to stop.”
‘THE BUSINESS OF THE PUBLIC’
Aislin Jackson, a lawyer with the BC Civil Liberties Affiliation, stated police shouldn’t anticipate privateness in the event that they use off-the-books discussion groups.
“It seems to me like none of us can reasonably expect that our communications to any police officer will be private from the police, including the police themselves,” she stated.
She stated there’s “a very real possibility” police use private telephones and encrypted messaging to skirt freedom-of-information or defence disclosure obligations.
If officers in discussion groups wished to conduct “the business of the public” in personal, “that does not seem proper to me,” she stated, and it was “naive” to anticipate privateness for remarks revealing misconduct.
Within the Coquitlam case, a search warrant software in B.C. provincial court docket by Sgt. Bryson Yuzyk, an RCMP skilled requirements officer, describes personal chat remarks by Mounties that allegedly embrace:
— calling a feminine rookie “disgusting” and “gross” and mocking her weight by “insinuating that the shape of her vagina was visible through her clothing;”
— use of a homophobic slur towards black individuals and calling a fellow RCMP officer who was not within the chat a “turban twister;”
— bragging about “Tasering unarmed black people” and calling an alleged sexual assault sufferer a “dumb Mexican.”
RCMP constables Ian Solven, Mersad Mesbah and Philip Dick have code of conduct hearings scheduled for Feb. 17 in Surrey, B.C.
They tried to exclude the non-public telephone proof from their upcoming code of conduct case, claiming its use violated their Constitution rights. An RCMP conduct board rejected the declare final June.
The trio declined to remark for this story, and not one of the allegations towards them have been confirmed.
Within the case of two former and three present cops in Nelson in B.C.’s southern Inside, precisely what they stated in a WhatsApp chat group hasn’t been made public, though deputy police grievance commissioner Andrea Spindler characterised the chat group as containing “racist and discriminatory type of jokes and commentary.”
She stated in an interview that except the investigation by the Police Grievance Commissioner goes to a public listening to, she couldn’t say whether or not the chat’s contents can be launched.
The officers are petitioning the B.C. Supreme Courtroom over the seizure and search of their private telephones. All say in affidavits they “considered that the WhatsApp group was private and would remain private.”
“I appreciate that the members are making the argument that these are their private thoughts, their private messages,” Spindler stated.
“But I think there are societal and community expectations that we have of police officers and by making commentary that is seen to be, if proven, racist or discriminatory, in our view that could amount to discrediting the reputation of the police department and amount to misconduct.”
Christine Joseph, the lawyer performing on behalf of the Nelson Law enforcement officials, declined to remark when contacted by The Canadian Press.
Joseph advised the Nelson Star in August 2024 that, “any time there is an investigation under the Police Act, officers — whether accused of misconduct or just witnesses — are at risk of having the contents of their personal phones, text and instant messaging, search and call history, photos, social media accounts and the like seized and reviewed by an investigator.”
The Toronto Police Affiliation’s Campbell stated he agreed with the Nelson police, that warrantless searches of officers’ private cellphones are unconstitutional, and correct course of must be adopted to make sure searches are lawful moderately than a “fishing expedition.”
He stated group chat contents being made public — whether or not by a whistleblower or by way of official investigations — may have severe penalties.
“That content, once it’s out in the public realm, defence attorneys will 100 per cent use it to disparage a member in a trial,” he stated.
“It’s important because it could have ramifications to real victims, important prosecutions, so we take it very seriously, so we just want proper process.”
Jackson with the B.C. Civil Liberties Affiliation stated police accountability was of paramount concern.
“(With) the amount of power that the police have to interfere in the lives and even cause harm to members of the public, it’s really important that the police are held to high standards of behaviour and held accountable for any misconduct,” she stated.
“Why should the police have any additional protection over and above what an ordinary citizen would have when they’re communicating with police officers?”
