The province’s police watchdog has cleared Vancouver officers of any wrongdoing in an incident that occurred almost two years ago involving a police dog that attacked an innocent man during an arrest of homicide suspects in New Westminster.
The Independent Investigations Office of B.C. issued a statement Tuesday saying Vancouver police officers’ actions were “justified” in a September 2016 case where a police dog attacked an innocent man. Photo Dan Toulgoet
The Independent Investigations Office of B.C. posted a brief statement Tuesday on its website related to the Sept. 19, 2016 incident that saw a Vancouver police dog drag Vicknesh Supramaniam down a hill and rip off a portion of his ear.
Vancouver police were attempting to arrest suspects in New Westminster who were connected to a kidnapping and homicides at a house on Dieppe Place, near Grandview Highway and Boundary Road. The take-down of the suspects occurred around 4 p.m.
“Based on a review of all of the evidence collected during the course of the investigation and the relevant law, the [chief civilian director] has found the actions of the police were justified, and thus does not consider that any police officer has committed an offence under any enactment,” the statement said. “Therefore, the matter will not be referred to Crown counsel for consideration of charges.”
The investigations’ office said it will not release a full public report on the case at this time because of a concurrent police investigation and associated trial. The office didn’t provide details on the investigation or type of trial, but said it will release a report at the conclusion “of that matter.”
Following the incident, the VPD apologized to Supramaniam. Even so, the police made it clear at the time of the incident what was at stake in rescuing a hostage.
“In this situation, I’d be willing to guarantee that if they got away, that hostage would be dead,” said Const. Brian Montague, who was a media liaison officer at the time the Courier interviewed him in October 2016. “Obviously, there’s no intent to bite someone that’s not involved in criminal activity like that. It’s an unfortunate set of circumstances that resulted in this person getting bit, who was clearly not involved.”
Supramaniam could not be reached for comment before this story was posted.
