Former Victoria police board member files complaint against VicPD amid corruption controversy
CTV
A man who resigned from the Victoria and Esquimalt Police Board over ethical concerns has filed a complaint against the Victoria Police Department in response to a corruption scandal.
A man who resigned from the Victoria and Esquimalt Police Board over ethical concerns has filed a complaint against the Victoria Police Department in response to a corruption scandal.
This week, revelations about misconduct within the department came to light. Charges were stayed in a major drug trafficking prosecution after VicPD allowed an officer who was being investigated by the RCMP to work on the case.
When the officer, Const. Robb Ferris, was arrested for breach of trust and obstruction of justice in June of 2020, a court record suggests other officers tried to conceal his involvement with the investigation. Ferris was not criminally charged, but a disciplinary investigation found 19 instances of misconduct were substantiated.
Paul Schachter, a retired lawyer who resigned from the police board in 2022, filed a Police Act complaint against the department on Thursday afternoon.
“We can’t trust a department that turns its back on corruption. We can’t trust a department that, in fact, files deceptive and false reports to the Crown and to the judiciary,” Schachter told CTV News.
Schachter submitted his complaint to the board, which must forward it to the Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner and VicPD’s chief. The board has not responded to a request for comment on this story.
“We deserve to be informed of what caused this fiasco,” Schachter said.
