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Two separate incidents involving Saskatoon Police Service (SPS) officers have resulted in six being suspended with pay.
Saskatoon Police Chief Cam McBride explained in a press conference on Nov. 8 why the officers are still being paid.
“Because the investigation is currently being conducted internally,” said McBride. “Without a proper and full understanding of the circumstances and the facts, that’s what I believe is appropriate.”
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One incident involved five off-duty officers and occurred in the middle of September.
McBride explained why the public is only learning about the suspensions now.
“There is an internal investigation going on and the facts are not fully realized,” said McBride. “It would’ve been imprudent to provide details of something we don’t fully understand.”
That’s not the only investigation into the incident, as the Saskatchewan Serious Incident Response Team (SIRT) was also brought in to conduct their own investigation into one of the allegations.
Civilian-led SIRT investigates serious incidents involving police officers.
“SIRT has a legislated mandate and one of the allegations that arose led us to believe there may be an element that SIRT would be obligated to hear of and investigate if they deemed appropriate,” said McBride. “They did take on that one aspect of the circumstance.”
McBride said police only learned about the separate incident involving the sixth officer last week and no further information was provided at Friday’s press conference.
It is not known what the incidents involved or which department the officers operated out of.
McBride said all six officers will continue to work from home.
“The only provisions they have is that they are on a day shift,” said McBride. “(They’re) working at home and are to be accessible should we need to contact them.”
The announcement comes after a report from Saskatchewan Information and Privacy Commissioner revealed in August that three SPS officers were found looking for personal information using the police records management system.
Nine Saskatoon police officers now face some sort of disciplinary action following three separate incidents, and McBride said he hadn’t seen anything like this.
“This has not occurred for some time and it is unusual,” said McBride, who was named police chief in May.
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