The drama surrounding suspended Victoria police chief Frank Elsner seems to grow more surreal by the day. Elsner was suspended in 2015 over allegations he had sent inappropriate Twitter messages to the wife of a subordinate. There were also assertions he had harassed four female officers.
Last week, Elsner filed an affidavit in B.C. Supreme Court saying he wanted to resign and move on with his life, but was not free to do so.
But three days later, Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps, who co-chairs the Victoria police board, contradicted him. Elsner, she said, can resign any time he wants.
The deputy police complaint commissioner, Rollie Woods, agreed with Helps. Woods said nothing in the Police Act prevents an officer from resigning during an investigation; it often happens.
However, whenever the chief quits, another important issue has been raised. Woods told reporters that neither the police board nor the public are entitled to see the inquiry’s report when it is finished.
He went further. Neither the police board nor the public are entitled to know what sort of disciplinary measures are taken if Elsner is indeed found to have engaged in misconduct.
This is unacceptable. What is the point of having a police board, if its members are kept in the dark about the conduct of their most senior officer? How can it make sense to deny them knowledge of whether disciplinary sanctions were imposed?
And just as important, where is the justification for withholding this information from the public?
Legally speaking, Woods is correct. The Police Act authorizes the commissioner to keep the contents of an investigation, and any disciplinary measures involved, under wraps. This has been the practice on some occasions, and there is no suggestion that in doing so, anyone acted improperly.
Yet the act also says commissioners are not obliged to seal reports. They may publish whatever information they choose, if it’s in the public interest.
How could this not be in the public interest? No one suggests that every minor complaint should be given a full airing. But the allegations are serious.
In addition, there are questions about the manner in which the inquiry has been conducted. Elsner insists that personal notebooks containing information that could help his defence have disappeared.
If our court system can operate in full public view, it is difficult to see why an investigation into alleged police misconduct cannot be handled in a similar way.
Yes, washing dirty linen in public can be embarrassing. But suppressing details of an inquiry like this does no one any favours. It merely leads to suspicion that things are being brushed under the carpet.
Moreover, if Elsner is exonerated, he is entitled to the fullest disclosure of the evidence and judgments that led to this outcome.
Apparently some form of news release will be published at the end of the investigation. That is not good enough.
This inquiry, by its very nature, concerns matters in which all of us have a vital interest. Has a senior officer acted improperly? Are female staff members subject to workplace harassment in Victoria’s police force? And what are the appropriate penalties if such behaviour did occur?
The commissioner’s website calls the present arrangement “effective, transparent civilian oversight.” Whether the process is effective or not, we have no way of knowing. That it is anything but transparent is evident.
For now, the matter rests with the commissioner. We encourage him to release the relevant portions of the inquiry’s report, if need be electronically, and give a full account of what has been going on.
However, the lasting solution is an amendment to the Police Act that imposes genuine transparency on an essential public function.
