In respect of our ongoing and protracted attempts to get our hands on a copy of the 320 page book that Vancouver Police Department Det. Cst. Lori Shenher wrote about her experience with the missing women investigation, John Boddie has advised us as follows:

“Commission staff have received the Shenher manuscript from Mr. Crossin with the redactions he has proposed for privacy.  He have [sic] forwarded that to the VPD for the usual redaction.  It contains info about Vic 97, etc. In the event you want further redactions we invite you to read this current version for your preparation and you can deal with the small amount of remaining redactions when the hearing resumes. ”

Mr. Boddie is the Executive Director of the Missing Women Commission of Inquiry and a former 16 year veteran of the VPD.  Despite his written advice, the Commission is still refusing to deliver a copy of the manuscript/book to us. The statement reproduced above is a microcosmic example of the difficulties we have experienced in getting access to the records that we consider relevant to the Commission’s mandate.  Every piece of paper has been scrutinized by the police and their lawyers, then scrutinized again, then redacted and re-redacted on a wide variety of grounds that we were never consulted about, before finally being submitted to the Commission for inclusion in its unwieldy cloud-based document database….

….

For anyone interested in the Shenher book odyssey, here’s the relevant timeline so far:

April 23, 2003: The Globe and Mail reports that Shenher, a former journalist, has secured a deal to publish a book on the missing women case.

April 24, 2003:  The Province reports that VPD spokesperson Anne Drennan has denied that Shenher has written or is writing a book…”there is no book”, says Drennan.

August 2010: VPD Deputy Chief LePard publishes the Missing Women Investigation Review, a 407 page document that fails to mention that Shenher in fact wrote a book about her experience with the investigation.

October 2010:  The Attorney General announces the formation of the Missing Women Commission of Inquiry to inquire into the conduct of the investigations and submit its report by December 31, 2011.

December 2010: Our clients, the families of the missing and murdered women, are granted participant status.

May 2011: We are given access to the document database and learn that the VPD and RCMP lawyers have been vetting and redacting documents prior to disclosure.

October 7, 2011: Evidentiary hearings begin.

November 2011:  We ask the Commission “to obtain all records related to Shenher’s negotiations in respect of a potential book contract…”, but receive nothing in response.

January 31, 2012: Under cross-examination, Shenher confirms that she wrote a book that was scheduled for publication in September of 2003 by McClelland & Stewart.  We immediately apply for a copy.

March 7, 2012: Commissioner Oppal orders that the book be disclosed once Shenher’s counsel, David Crossin Q.C., has vetted it for “privacy” reasons.

March 14: 2012:  Still waiting….

On Monday morning Commissioner Oppal announced that the Missing Women Commission of Inquiry hearings would be adjourned until April 2, 2012 to enable Commission Counsel to find a lawyer to replace Robyn Gervais, who recently quit as “Independent Commission Counsel” for Aboriginal interests.  The announcement took us completely by surprise, as we had been preparing through the weekend to question a panel of four Vancouver Police Department major crime investigators that was scheduled to appear this week.  Despite our protestations, the Commission does not consult with us or notify us in respect of significant procedural developments like this.

In our view, there is now no possibility that the Commission can complete its mandate by its self-imposed deadline of April 30, 2012.  There are simply too many witnesses yet to be heard from.

The following editorial appeared in the Victoria Times-Colonist of March 7, 2012:
  “An abrupt resignation has shaken the Missing Women Inquiry in Vancouver. Robyn Gervais, a Métis lawyer appointed to represent aboriginal people at the proceedings, has quit in disgust.
The inquiry was set up in 2010 to investigate how serial murderer Willie Pickton managed to conduct a decade-long reign of terror before he was caught.
Pickton was eventually convicted of killing six women at his pig farm in Port Coquitlam. The Crown then elected to stay a further 20 murder charges.
But it is believed the number of women Pickton killed approaches 50, many of them aboriginal sex-trade workers.
When retired B.C. attorney general Wally Oppal was asked to lead the inquiry, one of his first acts was to appoint Gervais. It was her job to ensure First Nations groups got a hearing.
But on Monday, Gervais told Oppal she was through. Although she cited lack of support from the aboriginal community, her main complaint went to the heart of the process.
She feels the hearings are being dominated by law-enforcement agencies. Of the 53 days of testimony so far, close to 40 have been taken over by police officers and their lawyers. And though she did not say so, some of this testimony has been offensively self-justifying.
Meanwhile community and aboriginal groups, who cannot afford lawyers to represent them, have gone largely unheard. The result, Gervais believes, is a lopsided inquiry that has little chance of finding the truth.
These are powerful complaints, and all the more so given the context. One reason Pickton got away with it so long was the voiceless, invisible place in society his victims occupied. It is deeply troubling that their plight lives on at this inquiry.
That said, there is another aspect to this dilemma that must be considered. Oppal has been given the power to bring a finding of misconduct against any individual he deems culpable.
In the circumstances, police officers are the obvious targets. Moreover, it is entirely possible that a finding of misconduct could lead to civil or criminal charges.
This has actually happened on occasion. The 1993 Krever Inquiry into the tainted-blood scandal led to criminal charges against senior public officials.
So it was a foregone conclusion, when Oppal was given such wide latitude, that the Vancouver police agencies would “lawyer up.” And offensive as some of their posturing has been, that also was to be expected. Given the inquiry’s mandate, anything approaching an admission of guilt could have serious legal consequences.
But was such a mandate ever in doubt? If Oppal had been told to stick to fact-finding, and avoid any suggestion of misconduct, there would have been allegations of a whitewash.
The real mistake, if one was made, occurred before Oppal was even appointed. The government wanted a quick, cost-limited inquiry that would cover the main points, but avoid bogging down. For that reason, most community groups were refused funding to hire legal representation.
Fears about cost overruns are understandable: There is a long history of inquiries in Canada going on forever and running up huge bills. The Krever commission took four years, and burned through $15 million in lawyers’ fees.
But that is the nature of the beast. You either want an inquiry or you don’t. There is no halfway measure. At least, there is none that will satisfy anyone.
Oppal is a sensible man. It’s unlikely the parade of uniformed officers and their lawyers carries much weight with him. It may indeed harden his views about what went wrong.
But appearances are another matter. By trying to rush this inquiry through, and skimp on resources, the government has defeated the whole purpose — to ensure that justice is seen to be done.”
© Copyright (c) The Victoria Times Colonist

The Commission has posted its ruling on our document production application.

We are awaiting decisions on two other applications; our written application for further witnesses (submitted December 24, 2011) and our oral application for disclosure of Det. Cst. Lori Shenher’s book manuscript (first made January 31, 2012).

From the Oxford English Dictionary:

“Cover-up: an attempt to prevent people discovering the truth about a serious mistake or crime.”

“Whitewash: a deliberate attempt to conceal unpleasant or incriminationg facts about a person or organization in order to protect their reputation.”

A less authoritative source, Wikipedia, describes a cover-up in these terms:

“A cover-up is an attempt, whether successful or not, to conceal evidence of wrong-doing, error, incompetence or other embarrassing information. In a passive cover-up information is simply not provided; in an active cover-up deception is used.The expression is usually applied to people in positions of authority who abuse their power to avoid or silence criticism or to deflect guilt of wrongdoing. Those who initiate a cover up (or their allies) may be responsible for a misdeed, a breach of trust or duty or a crime.While the terms are often used interchangeably, cover-up involves withholding incriminatory evidence, while whitewash involves releasing misleading evidence.”

Wikipedia has this to say about the typology of cover-ups:

“The following list is considered to be a typology since those who engage in cover-ups tend to use many of the same methods of hiding the truth and defending themselves. This list was compiled from famous cover-ups such as Watergate Scandal, Iran-Contra Affair, My Lai Massacre, Pentagon Papers, the cover-up of corruption in New York City under Boss Tweed (William M. Tweed and Tammany Hall) in the late 1800s, and the tobacco industry coverup of the health hazards of smoking.  The methods in actual cover-ups tend to follow the general order of the list below.

Initial Response to Allegation

1. Flat Denial
2. Convince the Media to Bury the Story
3. Preemptively Distribute False Information
4. Claim That the “Problem” is Minimal
5. Claim Faulty Memory
6. Claim the Accusations are Half Truths
7. Claim the Critic Has No Proof
8. Attack the Critic’s Motive
9. Attack the Critic’s Character

Withhold or Tamper with Evidence

1. Prevent the Discovery of Evidence
2. Destroy or Alter the Evidence
3. Make Discovery of Evidence Difficult
4. Create Misleading Names of Individuals and Companies to Hide Funding
5. Lie or Commit Perjury
6. Block or Delay Investigations
7. Issue Restraining Orders
8. Claim Executive Privilege

Delayed Response to Allegation

1. Deny a Restricted Definition of Wrongdoing (e.g. torture)
2. Limited Hang Out (i.e., Confess to Minor Charges)
3. Use Biased Evidence as a Defense
4. Claim That the Critic’s Evidence is Biased.
5. Select a Biased Blue Ribbon Commission or “Independent” Inquiry

Intimidate Participants, Witnesses or Whistleblowers

1. Bribe or buy out the critic
2. Generally Intimidate the Critic By Following Him/Her, Killing Pets, etc.
3. Blackmail: Hire Private Investigators and Threaten to Reveal Past Wrongdoing (“Dirt’)
4. Death Threats of the Critic or His Family
5. Threaten the Critic with Loss of Job or Future Employment in Industry
6. Transfer the Critic to an Inferior Job or Location
7. Intimidate the Critic with Lawsuits or SLAPP suits
8. Murder; Assassination

Publicity Management

1. Bribe the Press
2. Secretly Plant Stories in the Press
3. Retaliate Against Hostile Media
4. Threaten the Press With Loss of Access
5. Attack the Motives of the Press
6. Place Defensive Advertisements
7. Buy Out the News Source.

Damage Control

1. Claim No Knowledge of Wrongdoing
2. Scapegoats: Blame an Underling for Unauthorized Action
3. Fire the Person(s) in Charge

Win Court Cases

1. Hire the Best Lawyers
2. Hire Scientists and Expert Witnesses Who Will Support Your Story
3. Delay with Legal Maneuvers
4. Influence or Control the Judges

Reward Cover-up Participants

1. Hush Money
2. Little or No Punishment
3. Pardon or Commute Sentences
4. Promote Employees as a Reward for Cover-up
5. Reemploy the Employee After Dust Clears”