RCMP Watch

Theophilos Argitis, Bloomberg

The image of the Canadian Mountie, the dependable champion of law and order parodied by Dudley Do- Right in Rocky and Bullwinkle television cartoons, is in tatters.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the country’s national police, faces accusations by current and retired officers that senior management sought to cover up fraud at the force’s pension plan. The RCMP also is accused of botching investigations and of political interference, after it began a criminal probe during the 2005 election campaign that may have helped Prime Minister Stephen Harper win power.

“I can’t think to another time where you had so much going so wrong so quickly and at such high levels,” said Michael Dawson, a professor at St. Thomas University in New Brunswick and author of a book on the RCMP’s image.

Surveys show that the controversies are eroding public faith in one of Canada’s most enduring symbols. Forty-two percent of those surveyed by Angus Reid last month said their confidence in the RCMP fell during the past two years, and 72 percent agreed that the allegations suggest a “culture of corruption” at the top. The online survey of 1,009 adults has a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points.

The mounted police was started in 1873 to crack down on American bandits trading whiskey and firearms on Canada’s western frontier. Over time, the force gained far-reaching powers and developed a gilded image.

Cultural Icon

“We’ve invested a lot in terms of our cultural history and the idea of the RCMP as a perfect and unblemished police force,” said Wesley Wark, a professor at the University of Toronto. “It runs deep.”

The RCMP nurtures that image. In 1995, the force signed a five-year licensing agreement with Walt Disney Co. Licensed products on the market range from a C$5.99 Lil’ Mountie coloring book to a handcrafted commemorative wood trunk that sells for C$699 ($634).

The force offers advice to television and movie producers on RCMP characters. The partnership with Hollywood dates back to the so-called Northerns produced in the 1920s through 1940s that centered on the heroic Mountie who, garbed in scarlet military dress coat and Stetson, “always gets his man.”

In one parody, the inept Dudley Do-Right, revived as the title character in a 1999 film starring Brendan Fraser and Sarah Jessica Parker, somehow always failed to catch his nemesis, Snidely Whiplash.

Broad Role

The RCMP handles all federal policing, from investigating politicians and helping guard borders to fighting drug trafficking and securities crime. It’s under contract to provide policing in three federal territories, eight provinces and about 200 municipalities, making it the local police force in much of rural Canada.

“You don’t like to see your symbol tarnished,” said George Stephens, 75, a retired oilfield supervisor in Calgary. “When the individual Mountie goes out into the small communities, especially in the north, he is the only authority. Everybody looks up to him.”

Much of the blame for the recent discord is directed at former RCMP Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli, who quit in December following a government inquiry that found his agency gave the U.S. false information linking Canadian Maher Arar to terrorism.

After detaining Arar on suspicion of links to al-Qaeda, the U.S. deported him to his native Syria. He was jailed and tortured there, the inquiry found. The judge cleared Arar, and the Canadian government paid him C$10.5 million in compensation.

`Delays, Roadblocks, Lies’

Another case centers on allegations that Zaccardelli tried to cover up mismanagement of the pension fund. Ron Lewis, a former rank-and-file representative at the RCMP, testified to a parliamentary committee in March that Zaccardelli met his efforts to expose nepotism and fraud “with inaction, delays, roadblocks, obstruction and lies.”

Lewis testified that the RCMP punishes whistleblowers and protects senior managers who break rules. That prompted Harper to appoint David Brown, former chairman of the Ontario Securities Commission, to determine whether a formal inquiry is needed.

Zaccardelli, 58, denied the charges. He thought an audit should be done before starting a criminal investigation, he said in an interview this week.

The RCMP commissioner’s actions also may have influenced election results.

On Dec. 23, 2005, a month before the vote that brought Harper to power, Zaccardelli faxed a letter to New Democratic Party lawmaker Judy Wasylycia-Leis, disclosing plans to investigate allegations that a major policy decision on dividend taxes had been leaked to investors. Wasylycia-Leis shared the letter with journalists. Within a week, the Liberal Party government lost its lead to Harper’s Conservative Party in opinion polls.

`Duty to Act’

“I had a duty to act on it,” Zaccarelli said. “You’re damned if you do, you’re damned if you don’t.”

The RCMP eventually charged Serge Nadeau, a Finance Ministry bureaucrat having no political ties to the previous Liberal Party government, with breach of trust. He will plead not guilty if the case goes to trial, said his lawyer, Raphael Schachter.

The Globe and Mail newspaper, citing court documents, reported today that the RCMP alleges Nadeau made a profit of no more than C$7,378 from trading on confidential information.

“Zaccardelli might have been the worst administrator in RCMP history,” said Barry Cooper, a University of Calgary political science professor who last year wrote a report on the police force for the Vancouver-based Fraser Institute.

“There is no oversight,” Cooper said. “That is the heart of the problem.”