B.C. police complaint commissioner investigating sexual misconduct allegations against Vancouver police sergeant
CTV
A veteran sergeant with the Vancouver Police Department is under investigation by the B.C. police complaint commissioner following allegations of sexual misconduct from seven women, including female police officers and former students of his criminal justice courses.
A veteran sergeant with the Vancouver Police Department is under investigation by the B.C. police complaint commissioner following allegations of sexual misconduct from seven women, including female police officers and former students of his criminal justice courses.
The Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner will hold a public hearing into the conduct of Sgt. Keiron McConnell, who has served as an officer for more than 33 years, including 18 years as a Vancouver police sergeant, the agency said in a statement Wednesday.
McConnell has also worked as an instructor at "numerous higher educational institutions," as well as the Justice Institute of B.C., where he has taught courses in policing and criminal justice, the statement said.
The allegations against McConnell first came to light in December 2021, when a photo of the sergeant with two senior VPD officers was posted on social media. The police oversight body says the photo drew comments calling McConnell a "sexual predator" with a "history of sexually assaulting his students" at Royal Roads University.
The following month, a Vancouver police colleague of McConnell's went to the department's professional standards section with a series of Facebook messages she had exchanged with the sergeant, which she felt were sexually inappropriate, according to the commissioner's notice about the public hearing.
"(The officer) felt she could not report Sgt. McConnell's conduct due to his rank and status within the VPD and believed there would be consequences for her at the VPD if she did," the statement says.
In April 2022, the police complaint commissioner ordered the Vancouver Police Department's professional standards section to investigate the sergeant. During the investigation, the OPCC received information that McConnell had sent inappropriate messages to three female students at Royal Roads University between 2015 and 2017, the statement says.
