Canada’s national police force is facing more scrutiny, for failing to save documents linked to this country’s largest serial murder investigation.
That revelation came during questioning today at the Missing Women Inquiry in Vancouver.
Jennifer Evans, an Ontario deputy police chief who interviewed dozens of RCMP and Vancouver Police officers last year, told Cameron Ward she was frustrated she wasn’t given access to numerous documents including RCMP emails. The questioning went as follows;
‘You can’t prove a negative is what you’re saying? Yes, but I didn’t see a lot of communication from senior management. You assumed the files would be available and organized and ready to review, fair? Yes. All right and you found that wasn’t the case at all? That’s correct.”
The RCMP has a policy to delete all emails after 90 days.
Earlier, Evans rejected suggestions police didn’t consider the missing women file a priority in the late 1990’s because the victims were sex trade workers, but Ward reminded her of statements attributed to at least one senior member of the VPD.
“Quote ‘they’re just a bunch of hookers’ it suggests senior management of the VPD was disdainful of these missing people because of who they were. ‘They’re just hookers.’ it’s a pretty important point, isn’t it? It is.”
Inquiry commissioner Wally Oppal must determine if anything could have been done to catch serial killer Robert Pickton sooner than his arrest in 2002.
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