To those who say the law is applied equally to citizens and police, I’ve only got one word:
Bullshit.
I’ll cite the case of Chilliwack RCMP constable Matt Wright this time to make my point.
RCMP Constable Wright, according to the Ottawa Citizen article on his case, is a former military man. Generally speaking, military men comprehend honour, integrity and right from wrong. Clearly Constable Wright missed out on those character traits.
He was found to have breached the RCMP Code of Conduct twice… here’s the lowdown on the first case, which is minor in comparison to the one I’ll address in a moment.
Const. Matt Wright’s police work was anything but textbook the day he made an arrest in a street-level drugs and money bust.
The RCMP constable, a former military man, never fully documented the bag of pills and wad of cash he seized.
Then two months later, after working late at the Chilliwack, B.C. detachment, Wright, left with a box containing files, his notebooks, RCMP identification card, and the seized money and drugs.
He loaded the box into his personal vehicle and later that same night reported it had been stolen from his car. Everything was recovered, except the drugs and money. It is impossible to know what kind or the exact amount of drugs because they were never fully documented, nor was the cash. Wright says it was a bag of about 50 blue pills and a “thin wad” of cash, that contained at least one $20 note on the outside.
In an internal disciplinary ruling in Ottawa dated March 28, Wright, who admitted the allegations, was docked two days pay for neglect of duty.
“The lapse of judgment in the proper care, control and storage of an exhibit may be out of character; however, members must be vigilant in properly processing exhibits. The public and the courts expect nothing less than perfection,” the disciplinary board ruled.
So, theft and lying about the theft don’t get this RCMP constable criminal charges like it would any of us “mere mortal” citizens of Canada.
He just gets a fine of two-day’s pay, and it’s right back to work.
Nobody even cares what he did with the drugs and money [allegedly] stolen from his vehicle. Does anyone besides me find it odd that everything else was found and returned except that?
It reminds me of RCMP Constable Geoff Mantler’s current paid vacation for violently assaulting Buddy Tavares by brutally kicking him in the face. Officially they call it “suspension with pay”… sure sounds like a paid vacation to me though. Can you imagine if Mantler’s heinous act had NOT been caught on video?
The second case involving Constable Wright is much more disturbing to me, for it shows with crystal clarity the double-standard the RCMP uses when one of its own violates firearm laws, compared with we mere citizens.
You see RCMP Constable Wright does not have a firearms license.
That makes it illegal for him to own or possess firearms.
Two years later, his supervisor learned Wright had a rifle in his possession that was not registered to him. And Wright still didn’t have a firearms certificate.
His supervisor seized the gun and Wright was charged with disgraceful conduct under the RCMP Act.
No charges under Section 91 of the Criminal Code like you and I would get… just “disgraceful conduct” charges under the RCMP Act.
That’s a Double-Standard. That’s treating RCMP constables very differently than the rest of us.
The penalty for you and me would be a couple years in the Big House, after an expensive trial that would have been preceded by an armed raid on our residence so they could confiscate whatever they pleased before charging us with, as in the recent example of 76-year-old Henry Barnes, “unsafe storage” despite his firearms being stored in full compliance with the law.
So far as I can tell, nobody is even willing to say why they went after the 76-year-old man in the first place. He could hardly be considered a danger to society, given his recent triple-bypass surgery!
No, Constable Wright is one of the “chosen ones“, therefore he doesn’t merit the same abuse as Henry Barnes, or Allen Carlos, or Ian Thomson, or David Lind, or … well… I could probably go on listing names all day.
Members of that privileged class of Canadian, “RCMP Members” get treated very differently than you or I would be.
Instead of suffering through a heavily-armed “high risk takedown” like 76-year-old Henry Barnes, and the resulting arrest, trial, probable conviction followed by lengthy prison sentence, what does Chilliwack RCMP constable Matt Wright suffer?
The loss of three days pay.
That’s it.
Sounds to me the State owes apologies and financial restitution to Allen Carlos, David Lind, Ian Thomson and, of course Henry Barnes and Bruce Montague.
Will they get it?
Of course not. They’re not members of the “privileged” class… they’re just mere citizens.
It’s no wonder the RCMP has been called one of the most corrupt and integrity-deficient police forces in the country. What else do you call it when there is one set of rules for them, and another set of rules for the rest of us?
RCMP constable Matt Wright disgusts me, but not nearly as much as the RCMP itself does for how they’ve handled his case. Wright should have been fired for breaking the law that sends others to jail. Then he should have been charged, tried and convicted just like every other Canadian would be for buying and possessing an illegal firearm, and suffer the same fate: jail time.
The RCMP brass’s bias for their own and against the very citizens they are supposedly sworn to serve and protect is so repulsively clear.
God help us all if the RCMP doesn’t find some integrity, and find it soon.
Well, the get-out-of-jail-free card for Constable Wright is written right into the Criminal Code:
Criminal Code – R.S.C., 1985, c. C-46 (Section 117.07)
Public officers
117.07 (1) Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act, but subject to section 117.1, no public officer is guilty of an offence under this Act or the Firearms Act by reason only that the public officer
(f) fails to report the loss, theft or finding of any firearm, prohibited weapon, restricted weapon, prohibited device, ammunition, prohibited ammunition or explosive substance that occurs in the course of the public officer’s duties or employment or the destruction of any such thing in the course of the public officer’s duties or employment; or
117.1 Sections 117.07 to 117.09 do not apply if the public officer or the individual is subject to a prohibition order and acts contrary to that order or to an authorization or a licence issued under the authority of an order made under subsection 113(1).
Therefore if he finds or loses a rifle, a pistol, a Stinger, a bomb, or whatever, the worst that can happen is a disciplinary process if he gets caught. The interesting question is, would there have been disciplinary action in the second case if it weren’t for the first case?
Well said, Wm.
In a country where all men and women are to be treated equal, it’s good to see that there is, just like in old Soviet Russia, those who are “more equal” than others.
The law that sends you and me to jail merely gets one of the “more equal” class a slap on the wrist.
Thank you for reminding me of one of the more asinine sections of the Criminal Code.
As to your question… it’s a good one. My guess is “no”, given the insular nature of the RCMP and the willingness to protect its own.
All gun owners and other freedom and justice defenders had best realize that we can look back in history and identify when nations and people were subjected to excesses of tyranny and corruption by the system.
So it is today in Canada today where we face a danger as evil and unjust as many of the historical times in other nations where freedom and justice were under attack. The danger here and now is political correctness, which is brother to fascism, a system that tolerates no dissent from the agenda. That agenda is pushed by academia, religion, and even enforcement agencies. Take a look at the gun banning tactics of the RCMP and police chiefs associations where leftist drivel and cries of gun banning is shouted from the ranks of these civil servants who are illegally in the lobbying business.
Political correctness is but a religion, taught in schools, in essence, defined as a “no value” value system where pseudo intellectuals of the system impose their dogmas on society. Look at the likes of Allen Rock, Ann McLellan, Cretien, and their useful idiots like Wendy “Kookier”. Look at the pushers of the thought police of the Human Rights Commissions and the defunct Section 13 in whose court, as we were told, “Truth is not a defence.”
Unless you missed it there is a fight against these dark forces, a fight which has been and is continual of right verses wrong, all throughout history.
We can either run and hide like cowards or face the ogres and villains of the other side. Civil disobedience is part and parcel of that fight and I believe we will all have to decide whether to resist or capitulate to the demands of political correct fascism.
Bruce made that choice and we supported him, it is time we supported him again, this time guaranteeing that he and his family are repaid well for their sacrifices, duress, and attacks by the damned system.
I have already presented what is a just and proper recompense for them and am ready to be the first to give as a demonstration of my gratitude to them and as an act of defiance against the damned system that are every bit as unjust and intolerant as the “inquisitors” of the past, damn both these groups to their just reward.