Gray suffered fatal injuries during a 2015 arrest by seven Vancouver police officers responding to a 911 call
The Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner says a public hearing will be held into the beating death of Myles Gray at the hands of seven Vancouver police officers nearly a decade ago.
Gray died after the officers responded to a 911 call on Aug. 13, 2015, and the officers used “significant force” while trying to subdue and restrain him. The hearing will determine whether police committed any misconduct.
B.C.’s civilian complaint commissioner, Prabhu Rajan, said it is the job of his office to call a hearing if it is in the public interest.
“The alleged misconduct in this case is serious and connected to a tragic loss of life, and there is meaningful uncertainty as to what happened,” said Rajan in a statement Wednesday. “In such circumstances, it is appropriate for the public to know that the best available evidence has been gathered, tested, and considered before a final decision is made.”
That report, the commissioner said at the time, is not publicly available because of “confidentiality provisions contained in the Police Act.”
Dubord himself noted that “the framework for discipline proceedings under the Police Act has inherent limitations that restricted the testing of evidence and arguments from respondent members,” said the commissioner.
Gray, 33, suffered extensive injuries during the violent beating including a ruptured testicle and fractures of his eye socket, nose, voice box and ribs. The 911 call was about an agitated man who was behaving erratically and had sprayed a woman with water from a garden hose.
The commissioner decided a public hearing “would assist in better understanding the truth of what happened and would allow for the best available evidence to be presented and tested in a transparent way before an independent adjudicator.”
Retired B.C. Supreme Court judge Elizabeth Arnold-Bailey will preside over the hearing, and it will be her responsibility to determine whether the officers committed misconduct, and to decide whether disciplinary or corrective measures are warranted and whether recommendations are appropriate.
The hearing “is not limited to the evidence and issues considered during the discipline proceeding,” noted Rajan. “Witnesses may be called and subjected to examination and cross-examination. The family, and other parties, may be participants at the hearing.”
It will be open to the public and media unless Arnold-Bailey decides to impose restrictions. If any officer doesn’t testify, an “adverse inference may be drawn.”
The officers involved are VPD constables Kory Folkestad, Eric Birzneck, Derek Cain, Josh Wong, Beau Spencer, Hardeep Sahota and Nick Thompson. The official complainant is Mike Easson, Gray’s brother-in-law.
With files from The Canadian Press