Two separate incidents involving Saskatoon Police Service (SPS) officers resulted in six suspensions with pay.

Saskatoon Police Chief Cam McBride explained during a Nov. 8 press conference why officers are still paid.

“Because the investigation is currently being conducted internally,” McBride said. “Without an adequate and complete understanding of the circumstances and facts, this is what I believe to be appropriate.”

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An incident involved five off-duty officers and occurred in mid-September..

McBride explained why the public is only learning about suspensions now.

“An internal investigation is ongoing and the facts are not fully established,” McBride said. “It would have been unwise to provide details about something we don’t fully understand.”

This is not the only investigation into the incident, as the Saskatchewan Serious Incident Response Team (SIRT) was also tasked with conducting its own investigation into one of the allegations.

The civilian-led SIRT investigates serious incidents involving police officers.

“SIRT has a legal mandate and one of the allegations that has been raised has led us to believe that there may be something that SIRT would be obliged to hear about and investigate if they deemed it appropriate,” McBride said. “They took care of that side of the situation.”

McBride said police only became aware of the separate incident involving the sixth officer last week and no further information was provided during Friday’s news conference.

It is unclear what incidents were involved or what department the officers were operating in.

McBride said all six officers will continue to work from home.

“The only arrangement they have is they work a day shift,” McBride said. “(They) work from home and need to be accessible if we need to contact them.”

The announcement follows a report from Saskatchewan Information and Privacy Commissioner revealed in August that three SPS officers found searching personal information using police records management system.

Nine Saskatoon police officers are now facing some sort of disciplinary action following three separate incidents, and McBride said he hasn’t seen anything like this.

“This hasn’t happened in a while and it’s unusual,” said McBride, who was named police chief in May.

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