'Change your behaviour or quit'

Ottawa Police Service (OPS) Chief Eric Stubbs has warned officers to "change your behaviour or quit" amid a pattern of sexual misconduct.

Stubbs spoke to reporters Monday, his first public comments since a leaked internal video confronting inappropriate conduct, which included allegations that officers are running the licence plates of women to contact them and "messaging vulnerable victims on calls that they've attended in an attempt to develop an intimate relationship," CTV News reported.

"We could say that we're not making any progress. One can also say that we are heavily invested in trying to get this right, and learning, and being better, and we will not stop trying," he said Monday.

Ahead of the Ottawa Police Services Board meeting — the first in person since 2022 — the service unveiled measures including a review of misconduct reporting, a new "THRIVE" advisory committee, stronger leadership accountability and a greater focus on early intervention, according to the report.

The committee forms part of the force's broader Safe Workplace Program, now realigned to the Human Resources Directorate, which routes complaints through a Triage and Resolution Committee, according to OPS reports to its board. That program's budget has been trimmed from $8.2 million in 2022 to a current $5.4 million, of which roughly $4.9 million has been spent, according to CBC News.

In 2024, a police officer in Hamilton, Ont. was found guilty of sexually assaulting a woman he was mentoring in 2010 – but a judge ruled that he would not be serving any jail time.

OPS: shift toward prevention and peer oversight

OPS Deputy Chief Trish Ferguson said past efforts had failed. "They were costly, sometimes ineffective in changing behaviour and revictimized our complainants, and did more damage than restoration," she said, according to CTV News.

She said the force will now ask officers to police one another.

"I think what's going to be different now is we're going to be asking our members… in terms of the oversight amongst ourselves to be calling out that behavior to be addressing it, what is happening, not waiting for necessarily the chief to decide, but actually getting members to be comfortable and empowered to be able to have those conversations themselves before it rises to the level where investigations and oversight needs to happen."

The service has made training mandatory in workplace harassment, violence, equity and inclusion, says CTV News, and is shifting from a reactive to a preventative model. Officers may also have to sign a code of conduct on joining.

Discipline limits and next steps

Asked whether officers had been fired or quit over inappropriate behaviour, Stubbs said the service must work within existing disciplinary rules and did not say whether anyone had left, CTV News reported.

"Obviously, in the private world, things are a lot different than they are in the unionized world, and also we even have another level above that, as I mentioned in the legislative capacity that we have to follow strict process before that occurs," he said — a constraint HR in unionised workplaces will know well.

In April, an Ottawa officer was charged with assault and criminal harassment in an intimate partner violence incident, while another was demoted for 18 months for using police databases to search for ex-partners and members of the public. The service aims for women to make up 30% of sworn members, with the board reporting within six to 12 months, says CTV News.

Stubbs said the work was unfinished. "There is the overwhelming majority, high percentage of our officers. They're embarrassed by some of this that their colleagues have stained the badge that they wear, so there is momentum and there is a willingness, but we need to be able to do the work," he said. "This is not getting this done next month. This is a measured approach that is going to take some time, and it's always hard to measure over time if we've made a difference, and I think we will because the head space is there."

In May, Ontario's solicitor general said he will review a request from Toronto's police chief to expand the circumstances under which officers can be suspended without pay — a legal gap exposed after three Toronto police officers were charged over an alleged assault on a sex worker in Barcelona earlier this month. The officers were arrested in Spain following an incident in a taxi involving a woman who was allegedly hurt and sexually assaulted, according to several Spanish media outlets. Toronto Police Service (TPS) confirmed the arrests, noting all three were off duty and vacationing at the time.

Here are some data relating to sexual violence in the OPS, according to different sources: