The RCMP seriously interfered with press freedoms, unreasonably blocked media access and arbitrarily detained a reporter during a 2020 raid on Wet’suwet’en-led blockades in northern British Columbia, the force’s review body says.
Five years after that operation, the Mounties formally apologized to complainant Ethan Cox, senior editor at independent news outlet Ricochet Media, and Gitxsan reporter Jerome Turner, for breaching Turner’s Charter rights.
“I welcome this apology. I think it’s tremendous,” said Cox, who praised the review’s findings as precedent-setting.
“I think it’s a step in the right direction, but it has to be followed with action, and that action has to trickle down to the officers on the front lines.”
Signed by Staff Sgt. Maj. Kent MacNeill, the force’s Feb. 19 letter of regret was a welcome surprise for Turner, who accepts the apology — on one condition.
“I accept it, with the caveat that they don’t do this to journalists ever again,” he said.
The rebuke from the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission adds to a list of racist or unconstitutional conduct by the RCMP’s Community-Industry Response Group (C-IRG).
Last week, a B.C. judge found C-IRG violated Charter rights by making “grossly offensive, racist and dehumanizing” remarks about First Nations women during another raid on Wet’suwet’en-led blockades against Coastal GasLink pipeline construction in 2021.
Last fall, the review body lambasted C-IRG for its wrongful arrest of hiker Brian Smallshaw, criticizing the unit for its “disproportionately intrusive methods,” at the Fairy Creek anti-logging blockades in 2021.
Meanwhile, the complaints commission is already conducting a systemic investigation into the unit, which was renamed the Critical Response Unit, or CRU-BC, amid the federal probe last year.
While it’s taken years, Cox suggests chickens are coming home to roost for a unit that documents show was created to defend pipelines from Indigenous activists and environmentalists.
“The systemic review that comes out later this year is going to be perhaps even more scathing, and I hope that that leads the RCMP to get rid of the C-IRG,” said Cox.
“I don’t think the C-IRG is defensible. I don’t think it’s redeemable. It is a really bald faced exercise in policing at the service of industry.”
Turner was assigned to cover Wet’suwet’en resistance to the Coastal GasLink pipeline in 2020. That February, RCMP swept in to enforce an injunction against blockades interfering with pipeline construction.
Turner was previously granted access to the area, the review says, but an RCMP member told him that the “rules had changed.” Instead, Mounties excluded Turner, detained him for hours and threatened him with arrest, heavily curtailing his freedom of movement.
‘Overreach of police powers’
In the 70-page final report, the commission says the RCMP’s use of “access control points and exclusion zones” was unreasonable, calling the threats to arrest Turner groundless and his subsequent detention unjustified.
The RCMP’s conduct was “imperious, ill-considered, and arguably unlawful,” and the report expresses concern that the media barriers were “a feature, not a bug,” of the operation’s design.
“The RCMP’s unreasonable conduct … caused a substantial and serious interference with the freedom of the press, including Mr. Turner’s ability to report on an important Indigenous matter in the public interest, inconsistent with the common law and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms,” the commission says.
The report says the RCMP approached Turner and other reporters with disquiet and distrust, relying on coercive powers to exclude and control rather than constructive dialogue. This distrust was grounded in “vague and speculative” concerns activists may be posing as journalists.
“Officers can deal with such cases when they have reasonable suspicion of specific wrongdoing, but it is unreasonable to treat the media as potential adversaries in blanket fashion,” the commission says.
“This leads to potential suppression of freedom of the press and an overreach of police powers.”
The review comes after the RCMP investigated and cleared itself of misconduct in the case, as the commission can only review complaints where the complainant is dissatisfied with the RCMP’s investigation.
In response, the RCMP commissioner agreed with all the findings and promised to act. The force supported all the recommendations except one, which calls for a standardized policy for accrediting reporters.
“There are operational and logistical barriers in implementing an effective policy for unplanned events such as protests,” RCMP Commissioner Mike Duheme said in a letter to the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission.
Cox and Turner were also concerned by that recommendation but for a different reason.
“That’s just a step towards totalitarianism, having the Canadian national police force determine who gets to be a journalist,” said Turner.
As for Coastal GasLink, the pipeline is now mechanically complete and awaiting completion of an LNG Canada export terminal in Kitimat, B.C.
