Allegations of gender-based violence make up one-third of suspensions, finds CBC
Police suspensions proved to be costly to Ottawa taxpayers over the past decade, according to a report.
Overall, these suspensions cost taxpayers in eastern Ontario about $24 million since 2013, reported CBC.
That is equivalent to nearly one-fifth of all salaries for officers taken off the job in the province while under investigation for alleged wrongdoing.
The cost of paid suspensions in eastern Ontario represents close to 18% of all amounts spent across Ontario, according to the report.
Those municipally-run law enforcement departments include Ottawa, Kingston, Cornwall, Brockville, Smiths Falls and Belleville.
Among these police departments, the Ottawa Police Service has the highest spend for police suspensions. The service has suspended 35 officers since 2013 and it has costs taxpayers nearly $11 million, according to the CBC report.
It also has the biggest workforce in the group with about 1,500 sworn officers.
"It's frustrating that you have an officer that's off, not being productive while facing these cases, and it's costing the taxpayers and costing the police service," said former Ottawa police chief Charles Bordeleau, who served in the role from 2012 to 2019 and now works as a consultant at StrategyCorp, in the report.
The 35 Ottawa police suspensions over the decade represent about 2.3 per cent of the current, active workforce.
CBC’s calculation is based on publicly available data, cross-referenced against Ontario's Sunshine List and labour information from Statistics Canada.
Reasons for police officer suspensions
These police suspensions involved major offenses, and allegations of gender-based violence, including intimate partner violence, sexual assault and sexual harassment, account for about a third of all cases.
At the Ottawa Police Service, Supt. Mark Patterson was suspended after he was charged with sexual assault and breach of trust for allegedly grooming and sexually assaulting a woman he recruited to the force over four years, according to CBC.
Meanwhile, Deputy chief Uday Jaswal resigned in February 2022 after collecting more than $500,000 of pay over nearly two years since being suspended in March 2020 over allegations of sexual harassment, according to the report.
Recently, a former human resources director of the Calgary Police Service (CPS) claimed that the workplace is rife with harassment, bullying and discrimination – and she experienced it firsthand.
Suspension without pay for police officers
The Community Safety and Policing Act will take effect April 1, a full five years after it was passed.
The legislation allows a chief of police to impose any combination of disciplinary measures on a police officer who is a member of the chief’s police service – other than a deputy chief of police – if an investigation gives the chief of police reasonable grounds to believe that the officer has engaged in conduct that constitutes misconduct or unsatisfactory work performance.
These disciplinary measures include:
- Suspend the police officer without pay for a period not exceeding 30 days or 240 hours, as the case may be.
- Direct that the police officer forfeit not more than three days or 24 hours pay, as the case may be.
- Direct that the police officer forfeit not more than 20 days or 160 hours off, as the case may be.
- Reprimand the police officer.
- Direct that the police officer undergo specified counselling, treatment or training.
- Direct that the police officer to participate in a specified program or activity.
