B.C.’s OPCC rules
on witness tampering
B.C. police complaint commissioner Stan T. Lowe
and his deputy Rollie Woods actually approve of the process
Witness tampering was routine when Rollie Woods ran
Vancouver Police Professional Standards. Now the repugnant
liar is B.C.’s deputy police complaint commissioner.
The story broke just before April Fool’s Day. Two of the four RCMP officers involved in Robert Dziekanski’s Taser-related death complained to B.C.’s Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner that Vancouver cops conducted witness tampering while investigating whether the four Mounties collaborated on their testimony.
You don’t need sympathy for these thoroughly disgraced cops to acknowledge they might have a point. From personal experience I know Vancouver Police Professional Standards conducted witness tampering while Rollie Woods was in charge. The sick irony is that he’s now B.C.’s deputy police complaint commissioner. And he’s still a liar.
In my case Woods brazenly lied about the Criminal Code (section 494, dealing with the right of civilians, including private security guards, to arrest people). Woods’ staff conducted a dishonest investigation that disregarded evidence in favour of the complainant, knowingly accepted false or obviously unreliable evidence against the complainant, conducted a heavy-handed interrogation to try to intimidate the complainant into changing statements, ignored important aspects of the complaint, used vague, highly subjective or otherwise unsupportable judgements to cast doubt on the complainant and support police, and came to decisions before even interviewing the complainant.
That was my experience. But there’s no reason to think it was unique. This had to be standard procedure for Woods and his staff. The VPD promoted at least one of them, a contemptible liar named Ian Upton, from sergeant to inspector.
As soon as Woods retired, B.C. police complaint commissioner Stan T. Lowe hired him. Woods is still a liar, but now a double-dipping liar. In B.C., corruption pays well.
So it’s no surprise that the OPCC automatically rejected the witness tampering allegations, actually claiming such actions “would not constitute misconduct.”
Still, the Dziekanski death squad has had no better friend than Lowe. While a Crown attorney and member of the Criminal Justice Branch executive management, he took part in the unanimous decision to exonerate the four Mounties. Lowe stated adamantly that the five Taser blasts and other vicious treatment inflicted on Dziekanski were “reasonable and necessary.”
Six days later, Lowe got his promotion to police complaint commissioner.
Read more about B.C.’s Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner
Read about the Stan Lowe/Bruce Brown/Rollie Woods/OPCC cover-up
of VPD constable Taylor Robinson’s assault on a disabled woman
Read more news and comment about police accountability in B.C.