St. Thomas police officer cleared in assault case won’t face professional discipline

A St. Thomas police officer recently cleared of an assault charge won’t face professional discipline, the city’s police chief says.

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Ontario’s police watchdog, the Special Investigations Unit (SIU), charged Const. Sean James, a canine handler, with assault causing bodily harm in November 2022 after a suspect fleeing from police on a bike was seriously injured.

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Ontario Court Justice Edward Graham dismissed the charge — which had been reduced to assault — against James last week.

After a criminal case against a police officer is completed, forces conduct a mandatory internal investigation to determine whether professional misconduct charges are warranted under the Police Services Act, the law governing policing in Ontario and under which police forces hold disciplinary hearings.

James won’t face any professional misconduct charges, Chief Mark Roskamp said, citing the outcome of the court case.

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Court heard James was driving in a cruiser on Sept. 1, 2022, when he spotted a man, 29, wanted on multiple arrest warrants. James told the man to stop, but the suspect took off on his bike, prompting James to release his police dog, who was struck by a vehicle and injured.

The man used two different bikes and ran through several backyards before another police officer caught him in a plaza parking lot. The officer pulled his conducted-energy weapon and told him to get on the ground, the court heard.

James and another officer arrived at the scene and there was a struggle on the ground to handcuff the man, who suffered a fractured clavicle — an injury that was later determined not to be related to his arrest — and several scrapes, the court heard.

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Graham ruled James’s use of force was “reasonable and proportionate” and dismissed the charge last Thursday, when nearly two dozen St. Thomas police officers packed the courtroom in a show of support for James.

The union representing St. Thomas police officers had questioned why the criminal proceeding against James continued after the initial charge was reduced to assault, related to the scrapes the man suffered during his arrest. The SIU investigates all cases of death, serious injury, gunfire and allegations of sexual assault involving police officers.

“We thought the SIU investigation was flawed from the beginning,” St. Thomas Police Association president Const. Paul Tunks said after last week’s ruling.

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The most recent case marks the second time James has been charged by the police watchdog and later cleared in court. The SIU charged James and two other officers with assault causing bodily harm in 2016 in connection with the arrest of a suspect in a violent St. Thomas jewelry store robbery.

The three officers were conducting surveillance at a south London home on Feb. 2, 2016, when they saw a suspect get into a taxi. The three officers helped arrest the man after police surrounded the cab and pulled him out. The man, who wasn’t involved in the robbery, was punched by one of the officers and kicked by another, court heard.

A judge acquitted the three officers after the Crown conceded the they had probable grounds to make the arrest.

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