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Page 18 Clowning around in Pitt Meadows. 604-463-2281
June 1, 2010
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Local officer faces charge AMY STEELE asteele@mrtimes.com A Ridge Meadows RCMP officer who has been charged with assault causing bodily harm for allegedly hitting a man in the face with a flashlight is still on active duty. Const. Mike Cardinal was charged in relation to an incident that occurred in February 2008. It’s alleged that while attending a complaint of a noisy party in Maple Ridge and attempting to arrest a man he struck the man with the flashlight, causing facial injuries.
QUOTE: “At this point in time it is only an allegation. It has yet to be proved in court.” Superintendent Dave Walsh
BC Ambulance Service treated the man at the scene and he was taken to cells where he was later released. Ridge Meadows RCMP Superintendent Dave Walsh said the decision for Cardinal to remain on active duty was made by the commanding officer of the RCMP’s E Division. Walsh said there have been no other formal complaints against Cardinal, who has been a cop for five years. Cardinal will face a code of conduct hearing to review his actions and use of force and a separate disciplinary hearing. “They are awaiting the outcome of the criminal
case before they hold a conduct hearing,” said Walsh. Walsh said Cardinal is currently on active duty with the street enforcement unit, which investigates grow-ops, drug cases, stolen vehicles and break-ins. “At this point in time it is only an allegation. It has yet to be proved in court and like anyone he’s entitled to the fair process of the system,” said Walsh, adding Cardinal has a “fairly exemplary record” aside from the alleged incident. “ This was an on-duty (incident) while making an arrest and investigating a house party complaint. You have to flavour that with it’s dark, i t ’s n i g h t , lots of drunk people at a party and of course what transpired after that will work its way through the criminal court. That’s the environment around which the complaint originated,” said Walsh. When asked about Cardinal still being on active duty while facing assault causing bodily harm charge, Walsh said that Cardinal has been on active duty since the alleged incident with no complaints against him. “He’s been operational for the last two years without an incident so why would you turn around and suspend him?” said Walsh. “Other than that one incident he’s been a very good officer.” Cardinal will make his next court appearance on June 14 in Port Coquitlam provincial court.
32 pages
HISTORY COSTUME EPIC
Mitch Thompson/TIMES
Kevin Garvey (centre) sights a target during practice at a meeting of the Society for Creative Anachronism at the fairgrounds near Planet Ice on Sunday. Garvey has been practicing archery for three years, and participating in the SCA for two-and-a-half years.
No vote for businesses A
task force established to look at local government elections has made 31 recommendations for changes, including limits on candidate and political party campaign spending and for Elections B.C. to investigate complaints and monitor compliance with campaign financial disclosure rules. However, the task force didn’t support a cap on campaign contributions or a ban on donations from unions o r c o r p o ra t i o n s, w h i c h exists in federal elections. The task force also rejected a tax credit or rebate for campaign contributions and a corporate vote, which would have allowed businesses that pay taxes in a municipality to have a vote.
WE’RE CLOSER THAN YOU THINK!
Currently in municipal elections there’s no limit on campaign spending and municipal staff are responsible for monitoring compliance with campaign financial disclosure rules and for investigating complaints. The task force also recommended extending the period of time that people could make complaints about an offence under municipal elections legislation and the time under which charges could be laid by police. Currently people can only make complaints and charges can only be laid for six months after an election and meanwhile candidates are required to disclose their campaign spending within
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120 days. If the recommendations are accepted, candidates would have to disclose their spending within 90 days and the information be published online. There would be a spending limit imposed on third party advertisers and they would have to disclose how much they spent on ads and who contributed to them. Bill Bennett, Minister of Community and Rural Development, said the task force decided a cap on contributions by one donor wasn’t necessary. “There’s this underlying sort of assumption sometimes that you can buy elections or you can buy the people in elections and actually it’s quite offensive
to people who are in public life so putting a contribution cap on it doesn’t really change anything,” said Bennett. “I think what’s important is the public gets to see where the money comes from...so that if company XYZ donates $5,000 to some mayoral candidate in Mission it’s going to be clearer after the election the mayor got a $5,000 donation from that particular company.” Bennett said campaign spending limits were agreed upon because “that way you can level the playing field.” “That way you can say OK if you want to collect a bunch of money you can but you can only spend X number of dollars in the campaign,” he said.
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