Crown drops pursuit of assault charges against N.W.T. man who claims RCMP used excessive force
Public prosecutors are abandoning their pursuit of charges against a man they had previously said assaulted peace officers while in RCMP custody in Fort Smith, N.W.T.. The same man has complained that the same officers used excessive force against him during one of those interactions.
The Crown had filed an appeal after Kelly Canadian was found not guilty on five counts of assault against four officers at the Fort Smith RCMP detachment between Jan. 6-11, 2023.
The Crown is now abandoning that appeal, a change of plans that comes while officers are under criminal investigation for their use of force against Canadian.
N.W.T. Chief Prosecutor Alex Godfrey said in an email that the Public Prosecution Service of Canada could not comment on why it is not moving forward with the appeal. He said only that Crown counsel proceeds with prosecutions when there is a reasonable prospect of conviction and the prosecution is in the public interest.
"We decided that we did not meet this test at the appeal stage and therefore decided not to continue the appeal," Godfrey wrote.
Canadian's counsel, Evan McIntyre, said the trial judge's initial decision to acquit Canadian was the right one, and he feels that dropping the appeal is likewise the right choice.
McIntyre said that the Crown filed to abandon the appeal in March, but due to what he believes is an oversight, he was only notified Wednesday.
Charges and trial decision
Two of the charges against Canadian included spitting at one officer and throwing a container of salad at another officer. In her decision to find Canadian not guilty, territorial court Judge Christine Gagnon applied the principle of "de minimis" — meaning that, if there were assaults, the incidents were so minimal that they shouldn't attract the attention of the criminal law.
Gagnon dismissed the third charge as not having happened at all.
A still from RCMP surveillance video presented in court captures four RCMP officers and Kelly Canadian in a cell in the Fort Smith detachment. Canadian was acquitted of assault charges in incidents around this altercation. (CBC)
For the final two charges, Gagnon said the circumstances raised doubt as to whether the officers were assaulted and she acquitted Canadian as a result.
On one charge, she said that the officer, Sgt. Cagri Yilmaz, has incentive to claim Canadian assaulted him, to justify his own use of force against Canadian.
"There would be an interest for [Yilmaz] to claim that he was assaulted, in order to justify — after the fact, the force that he used against Mr. Canadian," Gagnon said in her decision.
Canadian filed a complaint against the officers in April 2023. He claims they used excessive force against him while he was being held at the Fort Smith detachment in the same time period.
The altercation with RCMP left Canadian with a fractured vertebrae according to hospital documents included in court files. In Canadian's complaint he describes being struck repeatedly with a closed fist by officers.
That complaint was escalated by the investigating unit last year, and remains under investigation by Alberta RCMP.
