Sunday, March 19, 2006
Justice Department undermining RCMP fraud squads, say documents
Justice Department undermining RCMP fraud squads, say documents
By DEAN BEEBY
Sunday, March 19, 2006
OTTAWA (CP) - The RCMP's new market fraud teams were supposed to nail more corporate thieves by bringing together hard-nosed cops, financial sleuths and savvy prosecutors.
But recently disclosed documents suggest the highly touted Integrated Market Enforcement Teams (IMETs) may have been undermined by the federal Justice Department.
When they were launched in June 2003, the teams were to include advisers and prosecutors from the Justice Department to help guide complex probes of major frauds involving Canada's financial markets.
The $120 million, five-year initiative needed the federal lawyers to give "advice and assistance regarding aspects such as wiretap applications, search warrants and disclosure advice to the IMETs during the course of investigations," according to an internal planning document.
But Justice, which was handed $17 million for its participation, initially failed to deliver these key team members.
"The purpose of this note is to express concern with respect to the lack of participation to date by the Department of Justice in the operations component of the IMET initiative," RCMP Supt. John Sliter, director of the IMETs, wrote to his counterpart at Justice almost a year after the launch.
"We are at a point in our implementation where we are in dire need of legal advisers to work along side of our investigators. They were to form an integral part of our integrated teams. . .there is a noticeable and serious lacking on each of our teams, caused by the absence of representation from the DOJ (Department of Justice)."
Sliter's note, among a group of RCMP documents obtained under the Access to Information Act, cites investigations in Vancouver and Halifax that required immediate help from federal lawyers, who had not been provided.
The document also refers to the first two IMET offices, established in Toronto and Vancouver: "Both offices have been designed to accommodate DOJ legal advisors on site. We have done so in good faith and yet none of the positions have been filled to date."
A briefing note to the RCMP commissioner seven months later suggests the Justice Department staffing issue remained unresolved, with a senior officer advising: "the situation remains far from satisfactory."
Heavily censored documents indicate that Justice Department staffing problems stemmed partly from government-wide restrictions on hiring, even though funds were specially provided for IMET work.
But beyond the red tape, Justice was also concerned about federal-provincial relations, although legislation had been passed in March 2004 allowing federal lawyers to prosecute fraud cases that would otherwise be the responsibility of the provinces.
"The other issue is $$$," says a January 2004 e-mail from a senior RCMP officer.
"Justice does not want to start a precedent whereby the Feds fund Prov. prosecutions."
The response from another senior officer: "We want our cases prosecuted and if one level can't or won't, we hope the other will."
The IMET initiative specifically earmarked $13.4 million to cover the direct costs of prosecutions by the provinces.
More than three years after it was announced, the IMET program has yet to lay charges in any of its high-profile investigations.
And earlier this month there were further indications of Justice Department staffing issues, in connection with an IMET probe of Royal Group Technologies, which involves Greg Sorbara, Ontario's former finance minister.
Sorbara's lawyer filed a court affidavit suggesting that two Justice Department officials had been pulled from the file and that the department "was no longer advising IMET" in Sorbara's case.
RCMP has declined to comment on the Royal Group Technologies file.
But a May 2005 report by Sliter suggested that Justice is taking a less hands-on role in IMET investigations as "an attempt to deal with legal concerns that participation by non-law enforcement agencies in 'management' of investigations might be seen to be an abuse of process."
A Justice Department spokesman says federal lawyers are currently assigned to two of the three Toronto IMET teams, and one to each of the other teams in Vancouver, Calgary and Montreal.
Chris Girouard also rejected suggestions that IMET's work was impeded in any way by the Justice Department.
"Before the IMET advisers (from Justice) were in place, in those cities, we provided advice to the program whenever it was sought," he said in an interview.
"We've been working closely with them from the start. . .There was never any case that was delayed in the progress of any of the IMET files."
Asked whether problems of co-operation with Justice had been resolved, RCMP spokeswoman Sgt. Nathalie Deschenes said only that "IMETs use an integrated approach which includes members of the Department of Justice, whose mandate is to provide in-house counsel in each respective local.
"During the investigation stage, Department of Justice legal counsel play an advisory role."
Copyright © 2006, Canoe Inc. All rights reserved.
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2006/03/19/1495730-cp.html
By DEAN BEEBY
Sunday, March 19, 2006
OTTAWA (CP) - The RCMP's new market fraud teams were supposed to nail more corporate thieves by bringing together hard-nosed cops, financial sleuths and savvy prosecutors.
But recently disclosed documents suggest the highly touted Integrated Market Enforcement Teams (IMETs) may have been undermined by the federal Justice Department.
When they were launched in June 2003, the teams were to include advisers and prosecutors from the Justice Department to help guide complex probes of major frauds involving Canada's financial markets.
The $120 million, five-year initiative needed the federal lawyers to give "advice and assistance regarding aspects such as wiretap applications, search warrants and disclosure advice to the IMETs during the course of investigations," according to an internal planning document.
But Justice, which was handed $17 million for its participation, initially failed to deliver these key team members.
"The purpose of this note is to express concern with respect to the lack of participation to date by the Department of Justice in the operations component of the IMET initiative," RCMP Supt. John Sliter, director of the IMETs, wrote to his counterpart at Justice almost a year after the launch.
"We are at a point in our implementation where we are in dire need of legal advisers to work along side of our investigators. They were to form an integral part of our integrated teams. . .there is a noticeable and serious lacking on each of our teams, caused by the absence of representation from the DOJ (Department of Justice)."
Sliter's note, among a group of RCMP documents obtained under the Access to Information Act, cites investigations in Vancouver and Halifax that required immediate help from federal lawyers, who had not been provided.
The document also refers to the first two IMET offices, established in Toronto and Vancouver: "Both offices have been designed to accommodate DOJ legal advisors on site. We have done so in good faith and yet none of the positions have been filled to date."
A briefing note to the RCMP commissioner seven months later suggests the Justice Department staffing issue remained unresolved, with a senior officer advising: "the situation remains far from satisfactory."
Heavily censored documents indicate that Justice Department staffing problems stemmed partly from government-wide restrictions on hiring, even though funds were specially provided for IMET work.
But beyond the red tape, Justice was also concerned about federal-provincial relations, although legislation had been passed in March 2004 allowing federal lawyers to prosecute fraud cases that would otherwise be the responsibility of the provinces.
"The other issue is $$$," says a January 2004 e-mail from a senior RCMP officer.
"Justice does not want to start a precedent whereby the Feds fund Prov. prosecutions."
The response from another senior officer: "We want our cases prosecuted and if one level can't or won't, we hope the other will."
The IMET initiative specifically earmarked $13.4 million to cover the direct costs of prosecutions by the provinces.
More than three years after it was announced, the IMET program has yet to lay charges in any of its high-profile investigations.
And earlier this month there were further indications of Justice Department staffing issues, in connection with an IMET probe of Royal Group Technologies, which involves Greg Sorbara, Ontario's former finance minister.
Sorbara's lawyer filed a court affidavit suggesting that two Justice Department officials had been pulled from the file and that the department "was no longer advising IMET" in Sorbara's case.
RCMP has declined to comment on the Royal Group Technologies file.
But a May 2005 report by Sliter suggested that Justice is taking a less hands-on role in IMET investigations as "an attempt to deal with legal concerns that participation by non-law enforcement agencies in 'management' of investigations might be seen to be an abuse of process."
A Justice Department spokesman says federal lawyers are currently assigned to two of the three Toronto IMET teams, and one to each of the other teams in Vancouver, Calgary and Montreal.
Chris Girouard also rejected suggestions that IMET's work was impeded in any way by the Justice Department.
"Before the IMET advisers (from Justice) were in place, in those cities, we provided advice to the program whenever it was sought," he said in an interview.
"We've been working closely with them from the start. . .There was never any case that was delayed in the progress of any of the IMET files."
Asked whether problems of co-operation with Justice had been resolved, RCMP spokeswoman Sgt. Nathalie Deschenes said only that "IMETs use an integrated approach which includes members of the Department of Justice, whose mandate is to provide in-house counsel in each respective local.
"During the investigation stage, Department of Justice legal counsel play an advisory role."
Copyright © 2006, Canoe Inc. All rights reserved.
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2006/03/19/1495730-cp.html
# posted by mike @ 12:00 PM
