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City officers cleared of fabrication

Not guilty in botched drug case

By: Mike McIntyre

Posted: 09/13/2012 1:00 AM | Comments: 0

Two Winnipeg police officers have been cleared of fabricating evidence in a botched drug investigation where the key witness against them was a well-respected Crown attorney.

Const. Graeme Beattie, 33, and Const. Paul Clark, 44, were found not guilty Wednesday of obstruction-of-justice charges in a career-saving decision. Queen's Bench Chief Justice Glenn Joyal admitted there are still plenty of questions about what truly occurred, but said he must give the pair the benefit of the doubt.

"Simply put, I am unable to conclude that the Crown has established beyond a reasonable doubt that Consts. Beattie and Clark knowingly prepared false notes and false police reports," Joyal wrote in a 68-page decision.

Crown attorney Erin Magas testified she had to drop charges of trafficking and proceeds of crime against a 20-year-old man after she learned Beattie and Clark had fabricated evidence. The revelation came during a meeting with the officers just as they were to testify at a preliminary hearing in October 2008.

Beattie and Clark initially said they were on patrol when they saw four men fighting in the backyard of a Redwood Avenue home, court was told. They said they got out of their cruiser to stop the melee, and the men scattered. They said one ran into the house and dropped a bag, which they picked up and found to be filled with cocaine. They followed him inside -- without a warrant -- and found him with more cocaine and some cash and arrested him, they said.

But Magas told court that story changed drastically when Beattie and Clark requested a private meeting with her and asked whether she knew if a videotape of the incident existed.

"They told me there was no fight; they saw four known drug dealers sitting on lawn chairs," Magas testified. Beattie told her they got out of the vehicle to speak with the men, who fled. One of them ran into the home and dropped a bag -- but they didn't pick it up to check the contents until after they had gone into the home, spotted the accused with drugs and arrested him, Magas recounted.

Beattie insists he picked the drugs up before entering the home, a fact reflected in his notes. But he told court that a few days before the preliminary hearing, Clark pointed out his separate notes claimed Beattie picked up the bag of drugs only when he left the house having already made the arrest.

Special prosecutor Robert Tapper argued some elements of what the two officers said after the incident were "absurd." He said notes Beattie made about what transpired during the arrest and seizure were "nonsense."

Beattie admitted on the witness stand he didn't protest when Magas accused him of botching the drug investigation and warned he could face serious legal consequences. But he said his silence shouldn't be taken as a sign of misconduct. Under intense cross-examination, Beattie repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and suggested he and his partner are the victims of a terrible misunderstanding. He said the only thing he is guilty of is not properly explaining himself at the time the incident came up.

Defence lawyers accused Magas of having a poor memory of what the officers told her, being confused about the exact circumstances of the arrest and even "intimidating" the two accused. Magas insisted she had no doubt about what the police officers admitted to, which she recorded the same day in a memo that was forwarded to her supervisor and that, ultimately, led to charges against Beattie and Clark.

www.mikeoncrime.com

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition September 13, 2012 B1

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