Hamilton Police Under Investigation For Writing Fake Tickets
The Hamilton police ACTION (Addressing Crime Trends In Our Neighborhoods) team is described on the Hamilton police website as:
“The ACTION Team is made possible through funding obtained from the Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services under the Provincial Anti-Violence Intervention Strategy (PAVIS). PAVIS aims to reduce illegal gang, drug and weapons activities in communities by focusing on intervention, prevention, enforcement and community mobilization.”
hamiltonpolice.on.ca
Police cheif Glenn DeCaire has repeatedly applauded the team for “cleaning up” the downtown core. Even though not much has changed. You can take a walk down King St. and watch drug deals out in the open on a daily basis, and the alcohol problems are just as prevelent.
Anyone who has spent any amount of time in downtown Hamilton has at least seen the ACTION team. There are days where there is as many as 8 action team officers are patroling the intersection of King St. and James St. On several of those days I had been in the area filming, had them approach me asking what I was doing and even had one officer state “I smell weed smoke, do you smoke weed?”. This kind of behavior is not out of the ordinary, I have been told by countless people that Action team officers have unjustly harrassed them.
Now the ACTION team is under investigation for writing fake tickets, to improve their numbers.
A unit from Hamilton police’s ACTION team is being investigated for allegedly writing false tickets that would count towards police statistics but were never handed out.
According to the Hamilton Spectator, police association president Mike Thomas confirmed an investigation is ongoing but he wouldn’t comment on the details.
Police spokesperson Catherine Martin told CBC Hamilton by email that all internal investigations “must be kept confidential” because of the Police Services Act.
“What we can say is that the Service takes any allegations of misconduct very seriously,” she said. “Internal investigations are thorough and they involve allegations of potential violations of the Police Services Act as well as the Criminal Code.
“When Police Services Act charges are warranted, there is a Police Services Act tribunal.”
According to the Spectator, police sources say detectives are investigating members of the ACTION team after provincial offence notice books were found in a box that was going to be shredded earlier this fall.
The tickets in the books that have to be given to the person being ticketed were still attached.
The Spectator says the tickets were logged with the courts and counted in police statistics but were never handed out.
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