CROWN DECRIED POLICE RESOURCES

Corruption Case; 'This Is Not A Case For Inexperienced Officers,'
Prosecution Wrote In 2006 Letter

The prosecution of six drug squad officers on corruption-related
charges was in "dire" straits unless Toronto police provided more
resources, the lead Crown attorney warned in a letter nearly two
years before all charges were thrown out for unreasonable delay.

"A day of reckoning is upon us," stated Milan Rupic in a March 29,
2006, letter to the internal Toronto police task force set up to
probe allegations officers were routinely stealing money and
valuables during drug raids several years earlier.

"I am skeptical that the Toronto Police Service is capable of
marshalling the necessary resources to do what is necessary on a case
of this type," wrote Mr. Rupic in the confidential letter obtained by
the National Post.

With the initial head of the task force, RCMP Assistant Commissioner
John Neily, back with the RCMP and many investigators about to
retire, Mr. Rupic said he was "dismayed" by some of the replacements.
"This is not a case for inexperienced officers; they will get eaten
up alive," he wrote.

The letter was sent near the end of the preliminary hearing for
Detective Sergeant John Schertzer and five colleagues who were
charged in January, 2004, with several corruption-related offences.

All of the charges were stayed on Jan. 31 this year by Superior Court
Justice Ian Nordheimer. He found there had been "no explanation" for
the "glacial progress" of the prosecution and it routinely failed to
meet its obligation to disclose all relevant evidence to the defence
in a timely fashion.

Revelations of the sentiments outlined in the letter sent by Mr.
Rupic are the first time the frustration of the prosecution team has
been made public. Three years earlier, it was the Crown that was on
the receiving end of an angry letter. Assistant Commissioner Neily
wrote to the Ministry of the Attorney-General in March, 2003, and
accused it of being unprepared for the upcoming prosecution.

"This is the largest police corruption scandal known in Canadian
history yet if anyone asks me what the Crown's reaction is, I could
not provide them that answer," wrote the senior RCMP officer.

The Crown letter and other confidential documents recently made
public by CBC radio suggest that three internal investigations and
the prosecution of the officers were marred by infighting among
various law enforcement agencies and finger-pointing at organizations
and individuals.

Mr. Schertzer (who retired last year) was accused of leading officers
on "a crime spree in the drug culture of Toronto," by Assistant
Commissioner Neily in a confidential report sent to the Toronto police chief.

Yet more than a decade after allegations were first made public, none
of the original targets of the internal investigations has been
tried, let alone convicted of a criminal offence. As for the
criticisms spelled out by Mr. Rupic, Toronto police spokesman Mark
Pugash declined to comment because the Crown is appealing Judge
Nordheimer's ruling.

Alok Mukherjee, chairman of the Toronto Police Services Board, which
is the civilian oversight agency, said he was never made aware of the
Crown's frustration. Whether the task force had sufficient resources
after charges were laid, "has never been part of our discussions," he said.

John Rosen, the lawyer for Mr. Schertzer, questioned the criticisms
outlined in the Crown letter. "To the extent they delegated the
disclosure obligations to the police, it was wrong. The Crown should
be doing it themselves in a major case," Mr. Rosen said.

The task force was set up in 2001 following increasing media
attention about the corruption allegations and reports that federal
prosecutors had stayed charges in dozens of drug cases because of
credibility issues.

An internal report written a few months earlier, advised then-chief
Julian Fantino that the task force might reduce demands for a public
inquiry. Investigators were told to engage in a "sample audit" of
other drug units "to provide some assurance that it was just this one
team," wrote Inspector Tony Corrie.

The Crown appeal of Judge Nordheimer's ruling is unlikely to be heard
until 2009.