WPS ‘aware’ of officer testimony

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This article was published 26/08/2017 (2975 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Winnipeg Police Service can’t say whether a 28-year veteran officer will face disciplinary action for giving “unbelievable” testimony in court to support his friend.

The service’s professional standards unit is aware of the case involving officer Kevin Pawl, police spokesman Const. Rob Carver confirmed Friday, adding the service is unable to comment on whether there is an investigation.

“We do not initiate investigations based on news reports. In a court situation, if an officer’s conduct is concerning, the Crown’s office will contact the WPS (usually via the professional standards unit) and indicate their concerns, based on either Criminal Code issues or regulations,” Carver wrote in an email to the Free Press.

He said the professional standards unit, which is responsible for looking into allegations of officer misconduct, was aware of the case “not as a result of a Crown’s office notification.”

Pawl testified in March on behalf of his mechanic, a longtime friend who has since been convicted of child-pornography charges. His testimony supported the accused’s story about how a folder of naked photos of children came to be in his garage.

Pawl told court about a conversation he had with a now-deceased colleague who had said the accused mentioned finding the photos in a used car he bought at auction as far back as 10 years ago.

Manitoba Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Sadie Bond found it “simply unbelievable” he would recall what he described as a brief, routine conversation in detail a decade later.

In her decision Thursday convicting the accused on two counts of possession of child pornography, she questioned Pawl’s credibility because he didn’t report his involvement in the case to his supervisors.

“There is nothing to say that a police officer cannot or should not testify on behalf of an accused person. Indeed, if he has relevant evidence to give, then he should. But to do so in a serious case where possession of child pornography is alleged without bringing it to the attention of his supervisor or the investigators seems improbable unless you want to keep your involvement quiet. For all these reasons, I do not accept Officer Pawl’s evidence,” she said.

The judge’s finding a Winnipeg Police Service officer gave “unbelievable” testimony to support a friend should trigger an assessment about whether criminal charges should be laid, a former deputy attorney general of Manitoba says.

Bruce MacFarlane, who also previously worked as a federal prosecutor and is currently a law professor at the University of Manitoba, said the case is serious enough to warrant further investigation.

“A finding like this concerning a police officer is extremely serious and should be referred to the Crown for an assessment on whether charges should be laid,” he said.

“This is a police officer who is there to enforce the law and will commonly be asked to go to court to testify in a wide variety of cases. Any finding that the officer’s evidence was unreliable or not truthful is extremely serious because it could bring into question other cases that the officer testified in.”

But just because a judge doesn’t accept someone’s evidence doesn’t mean perjury charges should be laid, MacFarlane said.

Judges regularly have to assess credibility, and there’s a difference in law between truthfulness and reliability of evidence.

“Judges have to make those decisions daily, and often there’s a he said, she said scenario and you can’t assume that perjury charges should be laid in every instance,” MacFarlane said.

Perjury charges are “extremely rare” in Canada, and they’re difficult to prove, he said, because they require evidence to show not only the person was lying, but they were doing it deliberately to mislead the court.

“I think that society as a whole is looking at the role of the police in the enforcement of the law and I think that’s healthy. I think it’s healthy for the police service and it’s healthy for society. This case is a good example where there should be a pretty close examination of what occurred, and if it’s appropriate, to refer to the Crown,” MacFarlane said.

At the time of his testimony during the accused’s trial, Pawl was working in photo enforcement for the traffic division and had been a Winnipeg Police Service officer for 28 years.

He described the accused — who can’t be identified as a result of a publication ban meant to protect the identities of his former foster children — as “my mechanic and my go-to guy.” He said he had been bringing his car to him for repair since 1991.

In his testimony, Pawl recalled a conversation with WPS officer Peter O’Kane, who died in 2012. Pawl said the conversation happened in a Public Safety Building locker room in 2007 or 2008, when he was working in the child-abuse unit. He said O’Kane told him the accused had mentioned finding the photos of children in his car.

“He told me about these naked pictures and, being in child abuse, I asked him, ‘You know, do you know that these are…’ He interrupted me and he said, ‘They’re not adults.’ He says, ‘They’re kids in various states of undress,’” Pawl said. “And I asked him if there was any sexual acts and he said no. And I asked him if he had the pictures and he said that he gave them back to (the accused) and (the accused) put them back in the car.”

Pawl said he told O’Kane he should have seized the photos and reported them to the RCMP, who had jurisdiction to investigate the accused in West St. Paul. He said he understood O’Kane would “look after it.”

O’Kane never reported the incident to the RCMP, court heard.

katie.may@freepress.mb.ca Twitter: @thatkatiemay