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When it comes to police brutality cases I don’t surprise easy.  So often they are pathetically predictable.

Today, however, I was shocked to see Kelowna thug and RCMP Constable Geoff Mantler suddenly changed his plea to guilty.

This sad excuse for a man spent the past two years proclaiming his innocence, blaming his RCMP bosses for “tossing him under the bus”, and now, just before he was scheduled to testify in his own defence, Geoff Mantler entered a guilty plea.

Buddy Tavares, the man who Mantler brutally kicked in the face, was understandably upset by the turn of events.  He wanted to hear this RCMP thug explain himself in open court.  Now that will never happen.

“I’ve been waiting a long time man, years, to hear why he did that. I’m not going to hear it. Well, let ‘er go. Move on.”

All that remains now is for Canadians to find out what deal was made in exchange for the guilty plea.

Given that two-time killer and former RCMP Corporal Monty Robinson was handed just 30 days of house arrest for doing everything he could to stifle the investigation into his killing of Orion Hutchinson while under the influence of alcohol, I don’t hold out any hope that Geoff Mantler will actually receive the sentence he so richly deserves.

I am, unfortunately, fully prepared to be disgusted and outraged.

What should happen is that

a) Geoff Mantler spend some time inside a prison cell and,
b) he is fired from the RCMP immediately.

While I believe this is what should happen, I have absolutely no faith whatsoever that it will happen.

My money is on Geoff Mantler being reinstated to the RCMP and back on patrol within a year.

Yes, that is repulsive, but that seems to be the way justice is served here in Canada when it comes to rogue RCMP constables.

Hey, who knows?  I could be completely wrong and Mantler will get everything he deserves…

But sure I won’t be holding my breath waiting for that to happen, and I’m not alone.

One commenter on the CBC story of Mantler’s guilty plea wrote:

We all know what kind of sentence this coward will get….he’ll be back in uniform with all his back pay before the snow melts.

Another person wrote:

Guilty plea or not, I will be disgusted (but, sadly, not surprised) if he gets any kind of discharge.

Public confidence in our justice system is at an all-time low when it comes to sentencing criminal cops, but nowhere more so than here in British Columbia.  Here, for some reason that utterly defies comprehension, our judges refuse to render a just sentence to these particular violent offenders.

That simply must change.

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