A 'predator' at CSIS: B.C. officers allege rape, harassment and a toxic workplace culture

Four officers with the B.C. CSIS physical surveillance unit who say it was a toxic workplace where bullying, harassment and worse went unchecked, and where young female officers were victimized.

A rookie surveillance officer with Canada's spy agency and another officer decades her senior were tracking a person in British Columbia in the summer of 2019 when they lost sight of their target.

She said the senior officer later blamed a communications failure due to a radio dead zone.

But the woman said the real reason was her colleague was raping her, having broken off surveillance to drive to a parkade where the alleged attack took place in their Canadian Security Intelligence Service vehicle.

The man, who was supposed to be her mentor and coach, treated his “own needs as more important than doing the job,” she said in an interview.

She said she was raped by her colleague nine times while at work in CSIS surveillance vehicles between July 2019 and February 2020.

A second officer said she too was sexually assaulted as a rookie by the same officer in surveillance vehicles during covert missions, despite warnings from the first to their bosses that he should not be partnered with young women.

They say supervisors told them other women had complained about not feeling safe around the man in the past.