N.S. evaluating N.B. proposal to collaborate on serious incident response team

For years, New Brunswick has relied on agencies outside its borders to come in and investigate when there's a serious incident involving police.

But a new proposal to Nova Scotia's Serious Incident Response Team, or SIRT, could provide the province with its own version of an independent police watchdog.

Nova Scotia SIRT director Felix Cacchione said he sent New Brunswick's proposal to Nova Scotia's deputy minister of justice and is awaiting a meeting with the minister.

The idea of New Brunswick collaborating with at least one other Atlantic province on a serious incident response team isn't new.

But it's gained momentum after the fatal police shootings of two Indigenous people only days apart in June, which also prompted calls for a public inquiry into systemic racism.

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Chantel Moore, 26, was shot and killed by an officer who was carrying out a wellness check on the Nuu-chah-nulth woman of Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation in B.C.

Days later, a Sunny Corner RCMP officer shot and killed 48-year-old Rodney Levi from Metepenagiag First Nation.

"After that, there seemed to be a renewed conversation," Cacchione said.

With half of Nova Scotia SIRT's investigators focused on investigating incidents related to the April mass shootings, the shooting deaths of Moore and Levi are being investigated by the Quebec Bureau des Enqutes Indpendantes (BEI).

But relying on other agencies to help is not feasible in the future, according to Cacchione.

"We definitely do not have the manpower to cover the province of New Brunswick," he said.

Former government was trying to get 'consensus' on SIRT

Back in 2017, momentum seemed to be building on creating an Atlantic SIRT.

All four provinces were involved in discussions that were backed by the four premiers at the time, according to documents CBC News obtained through access to information.

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Denis Landry, the Liberal MLA for Bathurst East-Nepisiguit-Saint-Isidore and the minister of public safety in the previous government, said establishing such a unit would require changes to legislation, notably the Police Act.

To do that, his government was trying to obtain consensus from a number of organizations, including municipalities and police unions.

"I think there were little disagreements here and there and this is what we were working on to make or to obtain a consensus between all of those different organizations," Landry said.

He wouldn't elaborate on which stakeholder was resistant to the idea.

Without an agreement for an Atlantic SIRT, Newfoundland and Labrador went ahead and formed its own investigative team, while Prince Edward Island has a memorandum of understanding that would have Nova Scotia SIRTinvestigate when needed.

"Given the demands on the Nova Scotia team and their work with the other Atlantic provinces we didn't want to risk a lack of available resources should a response be required in this province," Lesley Clarke, a spokesperson for Newfoundland and Labrador's Department of Justice, wrote in an emailed statement.

"We will never close the door on collaboration with other Atlantic provinces, but we are confident our stand-alone model was the right choice for right now."

Support from police chiefs

The resistance doesn't appear to be coming from municipal police agencies.

CBC News did an informal survey of New Brunswick police forces this week to see if they would support some kind of SIRT in the province. The New Brunswick RCMP referred the question to the provincial Department of Public Safety, but all the municipal police chiefs who answered the survey said they support the idea.

"The [New Brunswick Association of Chiefs of Police] and myself have long supported the concept of an independent investigative body to investigate police. Our support for such a concept remains unchanged," Kennebecasis Regional Police Force Chief Wayne Gallant wrote in an email.

"Whether it is a [New Brunswick] only or Atlantic wide, or some other structural concept, the fact remains such a body is needed in [New Brunswick] and has been for a long time."

Estimated to use SIRT 21 times per year

There's also a clear need for an independent body, given the number of incidents in New Brunswick, according to Ron MacDonald, the former director of Nova Scotia SIRT.

"I believe that the numbers do justify it, especially either for New Brunswick to have their own team or a joint type of team that would permit this type of work to be done on a moment's notice," said MacDonald, who is now chief civilian director of the Independent Investigations Office of British Columbia.

Police chiefs in New Brunswick were asked in 2017 to try to estimate how often they'd use a SIRT if the province had one. It assumed thatNew Brunswick would use the same criteria as Nova Scotia SIRT, which has a mandate to investigate "all matters that involve death, serious injury, sexual assault and domestic violence or other matters of significant public interest" arising from the actions of a police officer.

The police chiefs estimated it could be needed 21 times per year, emails show.

CBC's Deadly Force database, which tracks fatalities where police have used force, shows seven people have been killed by police in New Brunswick between 2010 and the end of June 2020.

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That means there are many serious incidents that don't rise to the level of someone losing their life and which aren't often known publicly.

"There can be significant public issues with matters that fall short of shooting cases and when you're only picking and choosing certain ones, that does leave the potential for the public to have concerns about other cases that aren't being investigated by an independent body," MacDonald said.

Details of proposed partnership unclear

It's not clear exactly how a New Brunswick-Nova Scotia SIRT partnership would work and whether it means New Brunswick would have its own civilian director or satellite office.

As it stands, sending investigators from another province, without having extra resources or separate legislation, comes with problems, beyond the fact that other provinces may not have the resources to send.

Every time an investigator from Nova Scotia SIRT comes to New Brunswick, they need to be made a peace officer in order to do their work, according to Cacchione.

When they work in New Brunswick, they need the Crown to approve laying criminal charges, an added layer that isn't present in Nova Scotia, where SIRT has the power to lay charges.

It also means a delay in getting investigators on scene, which means a delay in collecting evidence and interviewing witnesses.

2019 review recommended NB develop a SIRT

That came up in a 2019 government-ordered review of the New Brunswick Police Commission, which investigates citizen complaints of officer conduct and other complaints related to policing in the province.

"SIRT investigators must have scenes secured and delays in attending a scene can impact the investigation negatively or unreasonably inconvenience the public," wrote Alphonse MacNeil, who authored the review.

MacNeil recommended the government consider developing "a SIRT entity" in New Brunswick and suggested a possible model: a two-investigator team that would work in New Brunswick under the direction of Nova Scotia's SIRT director.

It's not clear if that's the model New Brunswick prefers. No one from the Department of Public Safety was made available for an interview for this story, nor was anyone from Nova Scotia's Department of Justice.

"Minister [Carl] Urquhart has recently mentioned an interest in having a permanent independent agency to investigate police use of force, and has spoken about various options, including a regional agency serving more than one province,"New Brunswick Department of Public Safety spokesperson Coreen Enos wrote in an emailed statement.

"Our discussions with Nova Scotia officials are part of our exploration of various models."