Friday, June 18, 2010

BC to Take Second Look at Prosecuting the Vancouver Airport Four in Dziekanski Killing

That didn't take long. Perhaps embarrassed by the Braidwood Report, the BC government has announced it will appoint a special prosecutor to review whether the mounties who killed Robert Dziekanski should be prosecuted and for what.

About damned time.

Long before the evidence was in, Victoria announced the mounties would not be prosecuted for the homicide itself. Those who viewed the bystander video of the killing and followed the Braidwood enquiry were never in any doubt that the Campbell government was boneheaded.

In a statement, Attorney-General and Solicitor-General Mike de Jong pointed to the report’s findings that “a number of discrepancies between what RCMP officers told investigators in 2008 and what came out at the inquiry” as the rationale for the appointment of a special prosecutor.

The province will also move to enact a key recommendation of the Braidwood inquiry, saying it will launch within a year a new civilian-led investigations unit that will be able to conduct criminal investigations into any police-related incidents involving death or serious harm.


The unit will be headed by a civilian who has never been a police officer, Mr. de Jong said in a statement. Its mandate will be to investigate all independent municipal police- and RCMP-related deaths and serious incidents across British Columbia.


I'm sure this flip-flop won't be enough to redeem BC's none-too-liberal Liberals and save their worthless hides in the next election but the news is welcome enough in any case.

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