Court didn’t get full view of police assault

Paula Simons (Calgary Herald) – A picture, goes the cliche, is worth a thousand words.

What, then, is the worth of a police video? On Nov. 7, 2009, RCMP in Bonnyville pulled over oilfield worker Eric Oullette, then 21, on suspicion of impaired driving. Oullette blew 0.14 on the breathalyzer, almost twice the legal limit, and was taken into custody.

That’s where things went south. According to the images recorded on an RCMP surveillance video, and obtained by Oullette’s lawyer, Tom Engel, Oullette was sitting on a chair in the corridor of the Bonnyville RCMP detachment. In the video, Oullette does not appear to struggle or resist in any way, nor does he make any threatening gesture. He turns to the arresting officer, RCMP Const. Shawn Kropielniski, who is leaning against the wall beside him, and appears to say something.

Kropielniski’s reaction is immediate. He charges at Oullette and shoves him hard, twice, knocking him out of the chair and to the floor. The officer then pushes Oullette against the wall, and hauls him to his feet. On the video, things seem to settle down. More words are exchanged. Then another officer grabs Oullette in a headlock, and Kropielniski gets off two more quick shots to Oullette’s head.

The assault is all over in about 30 seconds. It’s not a horrific beating -Oullette suffered no visible or lasting injury. Nonetheless, the tape seems to show an RCMP officer out of control. It’s uncomfortable viewing.

Kropielniski was charged with assault. He pleaded guilty; as part of the plea agreement, a charge that Kropielniski had assaulted another man, in a separate incident, was dropped.

But Judge Marilyn White, who sentenced the Mountie in Fort Saskatchewan last month, never got to see the tape of the RCMP officer’s attack on Oullette.

When the case came before her, White was told by the Crown prosecutor, Kevin Fotty, that the video wasn’t working.

Instead, Fotty described the attack to the judge. But according to the court transcript, Fotty’s description left out some essential details. Fotty did tell the judge the officer pushed Oullette off his chair. But he didn’t mention that the second officer held Oullette in a headlock while Kropielniski hit him.

There’s no audio to go with the video, no recording of what Oullette said to provoke the attack. For the sake of argument, let’s assume Oullette’s words were, in fact, provocative, rude and offensive.

I don’t envy police officers who have to put up with vile and insulting language regularly. I’m sure it’s exasperating and hurtful.

It is also part of the job. We don’t train, equip and arm our police officers to attend garden parties. We train, equip and arm them to deal with drunks and punks and loudmouths.

But as unbecoming as Kropielniski’s actions were, the more serious questions are about the way Fotty, the Crown prosecutor, appeared to handle this trial.

It was surely impossible for the judge to pass a fair and just sentence without seeing the incriminating record of the event. It was Fotty’s duty to make sure the video, the most important piece of evidence, was played in court, so the judge could draw an independent impartial conclusion. Yet Fotty, a veteran prosecutor, failed to ensure that the video was properly entered into evidence.

It is even more perplexing that Fotty’s description of Kropielniski’s actions appears to have minimized the seriousness of the assault.

Fotty resigned from the Crown prosecutors’ office June 17 -not long after Oullette’s lawyer and a CBC reporter raised questions about the Kropielniski case. Alberta Justice says Fotty’s departure has nothing to do with this matter, and that it has full confidence in the way Fotty handled the file. And Fotty himself has been unavailable for comment.

The work of a Crown prosecutor, like the work of a police officer, is difficult and stressful. Crowns in Alberta have been complaining for years that their offices are overworked and under-resourced. Perhaps the video didn’t work because Crown prosecutors don’t have the necessary computer technology available at provincial courthouses to do their jobs properly. If so, that’s a serious concern for all Albertans.

Kropielniski received a one-year suspended sentence and returned to duty. That was the joint sentencing recommendation of the Crown and the defence, and the judge accepted it, based on the evidence before her. Would the outcome have been the same if she’d been told all the facts, and shown the complete video?

We’ll never know. But a Crown prosecutor has a fundamental duty to present all the relevant evidence to a court, as completely and accurately as possible. For whatever reasons, that didn’t happen here. Eric Oullette has the right to ask why. So do the rest of us.