Pubdate: Mon, 29 Sep 2014
Source: Toronto Star (CN ON)
Copyright: 2014 The Toronto Star
Contact:  http://www.thestar.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/456
Author: Wendy Gillis
Page: A1

OFFICER 'FABRICATED' DRUG DEAL EVIDENCE

'Inexcusable Deceptive Conduct' By Veteran Toronto Constable Prompts 
Judge to Toss Out Trafficking Case

The confidential informant's tip was alarming. A Markham convenience 
store was peddling more than milk and eggs; if you knew to ask a 
certain employee, he would hook you up with heroin. The informant 
told Toronto police he had bought some himself. So in the early 
morning of Oct. 1, 2012, Const. Robert Warrener, a 20-year Toronto 
police veteran and member of the drug squad, pulled into the Daisy 
Mart lot, parked where he could see the store and the employee's grey 
Toyota, and settled in to watch. His goal was to witness activity 
that would back up the informant's claims, in turn providing vital 
evidence police needed to obtain a search warrant.

Warrener later told a court that within a half an hour, he witnessed 
the target employee leave the store, walk to his car, meet a "black 
man in a leather jacket," and make an exchange - an interaction the 
police officer judged to be a hand-to-hand drug deal.

Five hours later, police obtained court approved search warrants for 
the store, the employee's house and his car. They seized 99 grams of 
powdered cocaine, bags of heroin and crack cocaine, oxycodone pills, 
nearly $6,000 in cash, 251 rounds of ammunition and a Taser. They 
arrested and charged the employee, 35-year-old Pankaj Bedi, with drug 
trafficking and weapons possession. The only problem? The drug sale 
that gave the green light for it all never happened, Ontario Superior 
Court Justice Beth Allen ruled this week.

In a scathing indictment of Warrener, Allen threw out all the 
evidence against Bedi, saying the Toronto officer had "deliberately 
fabricated" the drug transaction - "inexcusable deceptive conduct" 
that led to "unlawful" searches resulting in Bedi's arrest, she wrote 
in her ruling, which was delivered on Thursday.

Without the evidence, the Crown had no case. Bedi, who has a prior 
criminal record for weapon possession, was acquitted Thursday.

"Taking the shortcut through deception is no replacement for good 
police work. Time, patience and a more dedicated investigation might 
have served the police well and culminated in a different result," Allen wrote.

"I find the nature of this police action to be on the more extreme 
end of the spectrum of seriousness. The court cannot be seen to 
condone this conduct and must dissociate itself from it."

The Star could not reach Const. Warrener for comment. Toronto police 
have launched a Professional Standards investigation, said police 
spokesperson Meaghan Gray. If they move forward with the case, the 
officer could be charged with offences under the Police Services Act, 
such as deceit or discreditable conduct.

"Depending on the outcome, like with any case, officers can face a 
range of penalties ranging from deducting a day's pay to rank 
reduction to dismissal," she wrote in an email.

Bedi's lawyer, James Miglin, said he is concerned Allen's ruling 
could point to a larger issue of police conduct in courtrooms. 
"Findings like this are extremely troubling, yet there appears to be 
little, if anything, of substance that is being done about it - 
nobody appears to be seriously looking into the conduct underlying 
these findings or doing anything about it," he wrote in an email. 
"And in my view, that is completely unacceptable." Gray said any time 
comments such as Miglin's are made, "they are taken very seriously 
and investigated thoroughly." Problems with Warrener's testimony 
began after he gave "a very detailed account" of the hand-to-hand 
drug sale, despite not having written notes about what he saw, Allen 
wrote. Among the facts he recounted: which hands each man used, which 
sides of each hand Warrener saw, and that Bedi had been unloading 
goods from the rear passenger side of his car just prior to the 
transaction, which he said took place near the passenger's! side. 
Surveillance video shown in court did not capture the transaction 
Warrener claimed occurred. Allen writes that there is only a one 
window of time when Bedi steps outside the camera's scope when the 
transaction could have happened, and she notes that it is "only a 
split second." The video also illustrated substantial contradictions 
in Warrener's account, including that Bedi was unloading goods from 
the opposite side of the car Warrener had testified. Faced with the 
video evidence, Warrener recanted his account about the location of 
the transaction, saying it instead took place on the other side of 
the car. "I find it incredible, if Officer Warrener observed a drug 
deal, that he could vividly recall minor details of an interaction 
that occurred nearly two years earlier, without having made notes, 
but to be mistaken about a very important fact - exactly where the 
drug deal happened."

She criticized Warrener for shrugging off the mix-up about the side 
of the car, "as though he made only a minor error."

"I was actually astounded by Officer Warrener's underplay of the 
critical importance of officers being precise about directions and 
locations when reporting findings to other officers, given the 
dangers intrinsic to police work. Life or death of fellow officers 
and the safety of members of the public depend on accurate reporting."

A recent Star investigation, Police Who Lie, highlighted 100 Canadian 
cases in which judges suspected police officers had been deceitful on 
the stand. The resulting probe by Ontario's attorney general produced 
rules requiring the Crown to report cases in which a judge has found 
that or suspects that an officer lied.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom