LAWYER WANTS PUBLIC PROBE

One of 10 prominent Toronto lawyers whose 1999 complaints about
alleged police corruption helped prompt the RCMP-led special task
force probe now suggests that the criminal charges against John
Schertzer's drug team should immediately be dropped and a public
inquiry ordered.

"Mark my words, these charges are going south," Edward Sapiano said
after reading Insp. Tony Corrie's 2001 report.

"It is my considered opinion that all the criminal charges faced by
the various police officers resulting from the RCMP-led investigation
. should be stayed by the Crown today and a sizeable public inquiry
should be launched," he said.

Sapiano suggested that an upcoming Section 11(b) Charter argument for
unreasonable delay in getting Schertzer's team to trial will "without
a doubt" result in the criminal charges being stayed. Sapiano said the
judicial clock for unreasonable delay will start from the onset of the
original fink fund charges in 2000, not from when Schertzer and five
squad members were charged with conspiracy in January 2004.

"Only the criminal charges stand in the way of a public inquiry,"
Sapiano said. "This very report vindicates and verifies all I have
been saying since 1999 and before ... it totally confirms my
position," he said.

Sapiano said Justice Minister Vic Toews should become involved because
the application of the Criminal Code of Canada has been tainted.

Sapiano asked why the Toronto Police Services Board -- the public's
oversight of police -- has "been so silent.

"The board should be hotly debating not if there will be a public
inquiry, but when will a public inquiry be instituted. Not if it
should be launched, but, indeed, the terms of its mandate."

Lawyer Peter Biro said Corrie's memo is an inappropriate "public
relations strategy" designed to avoid a public inquiry and "limit the
damage."

Biro has repeatedly called for a public inquiry.

Biro said he understands why Toronto Police would not want to make its
dirty laundry public, but he questioned why Corrie -- an internal
affairs officer with a mandate to probe allegations of wrongdoing and
impose discipline -- appears to have turned into a strategist.

Biro, who filed civil lawsuits on behalf of a Toronto man who claims
he was badly beaten up while in drug squad custody and later robbed of
drugs and cash, and a pizza store owner who claims $375,000 was stolen
from a safety deposit box, said the memo shows a "built-in conflict of
interest."

Biro said Premier Dalton McGuinty and Attorney General Michael Bryant
must see the memo, as should the judiciary.