Halifax police to send certain closed sex assault cases to RCMP review committee

Halifax Regional Police will send certain sexual assault cases to an RCMP oversight committee to be examined, but an advocate for a different review model says she's disappointed and confused by the move.

On Wednesday, Halifax's board of police commissioners directed Halifax Regional Police (HRP) to take part in the Nova Scotia RCMP's sexual assault investigations review committee process for the next year.

The RCMP's committee is made up of civilian experts on health and sexual violence who review a selection of sexual assault cases that the Mounties have closed without laying charges. The committee can recommend whether cases should be reopened, and give feedback on how officers handled investigations.

Now, Halifax Regional Police will randomly select a few closed sex assault files, partially vet them, and share them with the RCMP's committee for review.

"I have full faith in our folks and our people that we are going to take what we can learn from this committee and help it to improve our best practice," said HRP Deputy Chief Andrew Matthews after the board meeting.

Matthews said it will be a simple transition because Halifax cases are all investigated by a sexual assault investigation team made up of both RCMP and HRP officers.

The board originally asked Halifax police to consider a different oversight model.

In June 2022, commissioners asked HRP to consider a model known as the violence against women advocate case review (VACR).

That review process also involves a panel of civilian experts on sexual violence, but it examines every sex assault file a police force has closed without charges. The VACR model is being used by about 30 police forces in five provinces across Canada, including Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick. 

It was endorsed by the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police in 2020 and has been included as best practice in the Canadian Framework for Collaborative Police Response on Sexual Violence.

Speaking to the police board Wednesday, HRP said they were told by municipal lawyers that the VACR model raises privacy concerns based on current Nova Scotia legislation.

While both models require civilian participants to sign confidentiality agreements, Matthews said he was told HRP could open itself up to problems if it shared files directly with a VACR panel. He did not elaborate.

Independence key in a review, says advocate

Sunny Marriner, national co-ordinator with the VACR model based in Nova Scotia, said she was disappointed Halifax police never brought those privacy concerns to her.

"I was really surprised by that, actually. Privacy was the first issue that we dealt with when we looked at case reviews in Canada dating back as far as 2013," Marriner said in an interview Wednesday.

Marriner said her team has worked closely with privacy commissioners on provincial and federal levels across the country, and VACR is fully compliant with those rules. She questioned why Halifax police feel the RCMP review model doesn't have the same legal issues when it is the same private information being shared.

If there is a specific Nova Scotia issue that would keep the model from being used anywhere in the province, Marriner said she'd like to learn more about it and work with Nova Scotia's privacy commissioner.

"I would really be hopeful that there's the possibility of moving forward," said Marriner, who has previously raised concerns about the independence of the RCMP review committee process.

"We've certainly heard from survivors around the country how important they believe independence is in a review. And I would like to see that same level of attention and detail being available to survivors reporting here in Nova Scotia," she added.

Marriner said her team is working on a national framework to track the outcomes of VACR teams across the country, but knows of some cases that have been reopened and led to charges.

A report to the board said there were 433 sex assaults reported in 2023 within the Halifax region, with charges laid in 73 cases (about 17 per cent). That leaves 360 cases closed without charges that could be eligible for the RCMP committee's review process. 

As of August 2024, 233 assaults had been reported with charges laid in 22 (nine per cent), and 211 cases closed without charges.