JUDGE TOSSES DRUG EVIDENCE

Cops Hosed Down Suspects, 'Ignored' Their Rights

A judge has tossed out all evidence seized in a massive Richmond-based
ecstasy-production investigation.

The controversial move came after B.C. Provincial Court Judge Paul R.
Meyers found that RCMP officers "ignored" the Charter rights of five
suspects to such a degree that "one might have thought that the
investigation took place before the Charter of Rights had been enacted."

In a 34-page ruling, the judge took officers to task for hosing down
two half-naked suspects outside their home in the cold, failing to
bring in interpreters to read suspects their rights, failing to allow
suspects to read warrants and not filing court documents in a timely
manner.

"The officers in charge just did not seem to care," Judge Meyers
wrote.

"I find that the cumulative violations in this case lead to the
conclusion that the officers in charge of this investigation operated
throughout in 'bad faith.'"

The scathing judgment, dated June 21 and posted online this week, came
after more than two dozen hearings carried out over two years.

A spokeswoman for the Public Prosecution Service of Canada, which
handles drug-related cases, said the decision will not be appealed.

Over 14 months, RCMP drug investigators multiple locations in Richmond
under surveillance.

Police learned that ecstasy tablets were being produced, packed into
foil bags marked "Chinese tea" and then shipped to Toronto and
elsewhere - an operation that a police expert later testified was
capable of producing $10-million worth of pills.

In January 2007, police watched as two men discarded two large plastic
garbage bags into a dumpster. Believing the suspects had clued in that
police were watching them and were now dismantling their production
plant, officers decided to move in and arrest the suspects.

The missteps by police, according to the judge, began
immediately.

Even though police had a "pretty good idea" that some of the suspects
had limited English skills, police "basically just closed their eyes
to this real, potential problem" and did nothing in advance to plan
for it, such as having warrants translated into Chinese or bringing in
Chinese interpreters, the judge said.

In at least one instance, a suspect answered "no" when asked by the
arresting officer whether he understood his rights after they were
read to him.

At one home, two occupants were forced to lie handcuffed on the front
lawn on their stomachs: One was wearing only boxers, the other was
wearing boxers and a T-shirt.

Because police believed the men had been exposed to toxic chemicals,
they called in a fire crew to decontaminate the men by spraying their
bodies with cold water.

"It is not an insignificant thing to force someone to stand or sit,
halfnaked, while being hosed down in front of their neighbours, in the
middle of the day and in the middle of winter," the judge said.

"This humiliation so easily could have been avoided" if police brought
in portable privacy screens.