WINNIPEG: Police forces in Manitoba will soon receive new laser scanners, body armour and other equipment thanks to the sale of property seized from criminals or people with suspected links to crimes.
More than $672,000 has been set aside this year for the RCMP, the Winnipeg Police Service and provincial conservation officers, Attorney General Gord Mackintosh said Monday. Funding for other municipal services will be announced in the coming days, he added.
The seizures can be made even when there is no criminal conviction — something that has sparked civil rights concerns in some provinces with similar laws.
The money was collected under the Criminal Property Forfeiture Act, which, since 2009, has allowed the province to confiscate property, cash and other goods linked to criminal activity. Money is put into a fund which police forces can draw on for new equipment and training.
“It really provides an opportunity to channel profits from organized crime … into positive things,” said Danny Smyth, deputy police chief in Winnipeg.
Last year, the Winnipeg force used some of its share to buy a new robot for its bomb-unit, replacing one that was 15 years old and behind the times technologically. The robot has been used in several recent cases, including an explosion that severely injured a Winnipeg lawyer in July as she sat in her family law office.
This year, Winnipeg police have approval to use their share to buy items that include a laser scanner to investigate traffic accidents.
RCMP detachments across the province plan to buy new body armour, off-road vehicles and other goods.
The value of criminal property seized for this year’s police funding is up slightly from last year, said program director Gord Schumacher, who added the vast majority of cash and property seized is linked to organized crime and the drug trade.
Like some other provinces, Manitoba’s law does not require a criminal conviction for someone’s property to be taken. Government officials ask a Court of Queen’s Bench justice to declare that the property is either the proceeds of, or an instrument used for, criminal activity.
And because the process is a civil proceeding — not a criminal one — the burden of proof is lower. A judge need only be convinced on a balance of probabilities, not beyond a reasonable doubt.
Some lawyers have raised concerns and argued that this makes it easy for innocent people to lose their homes or possessions.
The British Columbia Civil Liberties Association has become involved in the case of David Lloydsmith, who was arrested after marijuana plants were found in his home in Mission, B.C., in 2007. He was arrested but never charged, and the provincial government has brought a forfeiture application on his home.
An Ontario judge ruled last year that a North Bay man could not reclaim $10,000 in suspected drug money that police seized from his pockets. Jason Paquette was arrested and charged with public intoxication. Police found wads of cash in his pants and the Crown submitted the money was either the proceeds of unlawful activity, an instrument of unlawful activity, or both.
There was no direct evidence that the money came from a drug transaction, but the judge wrote that he was satisfied by circumstantial evidence, including Paquette’s two previous drug possession convictions.
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