Sam Cooper (Postmedia) – After weeks of complex testimony in a police-conduct hearing, RCMP adjudicators ruled a female officer was not coerced into sexual relations with her boss, and is guilty of disgraceful conduct for having sex with him on the job.
Const. Susan Gastaldo and Staff Sgt. Travis Pearson were accused of having sex in a police car during work hours and exchanging intimate messages via an RCMP BlackBerry in 2009, while Gastaldo worked for Pearson in the “Special O” surveillance unit in the Lower Mainland.
After the two officers’ cases were severed this week, Pearson pleaded guilty to the charges and apologized for disgracing his family and the force.
Gastaldo claimed she was coerced into the relationship by indirect threats, based on her vulnerable mental state.
The disgraceful conduct has been proved, the board said Friday.
“The essential issue is whether she was to be believed that she was compelled and not consensual,” board chair Supt. John Reid said. “She was in a consensual affair.”
The board said 120 phone calls and 160 emails between the two that were romantic and sexual in nature proved “the romantic intensity never waned right up to the finding of the BlackBerry,” by her husband.
The three-person board had to decide whether Pearson’s position of power and Gastaldo’s psychological vulnerability combined to make her a victim, rather than a willing participant in about 20 sexual encounters between May and August 2009.
They essentially upheld the arguments of RCMP conduct prosecutor Cpl. Gregory Rose and Pearson’s counsel, Const. James Rowland, who presented a theory built upon previous findings by RCMP and Vancouver police investigations.
After Gastaldo’s husband Chris Williams, a former RCMP member, found her RCMP BlackBerry with its “sext” messages on Aug. 1, 2009, she told him her version of events and he suggested Pearson was criminally responsible.
According to Rose and Rowland, Gastaldo shaped her testimony to her husband’s interpretation of events and falsely accused Pearson of rape.
“Mr. Williams was the force that moved a sexual relation with Travis Pearson to an allegation of rape,” Rose told adjudicators Thursday. “She had to stick to (Williams’s) version and put at risk her co-worker, or not stick to the version and put at risk her family, her children and her dream home.”
The board will now decide on Pearson’s case and sanctions for both.
[Source]
Position of authority is all that should be looked at. There is no justice for female members as sexual harrassment is not just actions ……it is ostracizing, ignoring and it can be a career stopper for the female. I feel sorry for her and a panel of 3 men who were not sexually harrassed does not know what a reasonable person has to do.
Just a thought. I think there needs to be more respect.
The members need to have more respect for the uniform and the history of the force. More respect for the ideal of making the outfit functional again.
Because it is a two way street, the force has to have more respect for it’s membership and what is asked of it. More respect for those who work hard. More respect for those who are genuinely suffering from workplace related injuries and those who have genuine harassment grievances.
It is time to take the culture of entitlement away, bring a sense of honor, team work and pride back and start hiring the right people again on merit. Time to get the bureaucrats away and bring in common sense.
It is time to say- time is running out…
RCMP officer’s sex coercion claims dismissed
CBC News
December 16, 2011
An RCMP code of conduct hearing in Vancouver has ruled against a female Mountie who claimed her supervisor coerced her into a sexual relationship and sexually assaulted her.
On Friday, the board rejected Const. Susan Gastaldo’s claim that she was forced into a lengthy relationship with a superior, Staff Sgt. Travis Pearson.
RCMP adjudicators found both officers guilty of disgraceful conduct for having sex in a police car and misusing RCMP equipment to send romantic text messages.
Gastaldo’s defence during the hearing was based on the claim that Pearson abused his power, coercing her into a sexual relationship by preying on her anxieties.
But the three male adjudicators dismissed the claim, saying that “no reasonable woman” would stay in contact with a sexual assailant after the assault.
They also said they could not accept that she sincerely believed that Pearson controlled her career in the force.
An RCMP prosecutor and Gastaldo’s defence counsel made a joint submission for a reprimand and seven days docked pay, but the adjudicators rejected it, saying options up to dismissal have to be considered.
They also called for harsh sanctions against Pearson, including possible demotion.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2011/12/16/bc-rcmp-sex-lawsuit-ruling.html