An RCMP officer who ran over an injured pedestrian and hit a man who’d stopped to help him on an Alberta highway last year has been charged with dangerous driving causing death and dangerous driving causing bodily harm.
The Alberta Serious Incident Response Team (ASIRT) investigation found there are “grounds to believe offences were committed.”
Const. Michelle Phillips, 27, has been released on a promise to appear and is set to appear in Fort McMurray Provincial Court on Aug. 2.
READ MORE: Wood Buffalo RCMP investigate after pedestrian killed on Highway 881
She had one year of service with the RCMP at the time of the incident, Alberta RCMP said in a statement.
An internal code of conduct review is underway within the RCMP. A statement said Phillips has been suspended with pay and will stay off duty until the internal processes and criminal charges are resolved.
READ MORE: Alberta’s police watchdog investigating whether pedestrian killed on Highway 881 was hit by police
The incident happened on Aug. 21, 2016 on a poorly lit section of Highway 881 near Anzac, a hamlet in northern Alberta. Phillips was responding to a report that a car had hit and injured a pedestrian who’d been walking on the highway.
“While responding at an extremely high rate of speed, the officer came upon a number of vehicles stopped on one side of the highway with their lights on and proceeded to drive past these vehicles without slowing,” ASIRT said in a Friday statement.
“Unfortunately, this location was where the pedestrian had been originally struck and the officer ran over the injured pedestrian prone on the roadway with the police vehicle, killing him, and striking the hand of a 71-year-old man who had been rendering aid to the pedestrian, causing serious injury.”
EMS declared the 41-year-old pedestrian deceased at the scene. The bystander was treated for serious but non-life-threatening injuries in hospital.
According to a spokesperson with ASIRT, 25 of its 433 files have resulted in charges since it started operating in 2008. ASIRT said 28 officers have been charged, including one officer who has been charged twice in separate investigations.
Criminologist and Mount Royal University justice and policy studies lecturer Ritesh Narayan said he thinks ASIRT may be under more public scrutiny with the number of cases they’ve recently taken on.
“I think ASIRT does feel more pressure to take further action just beyond disciplinary ones,” he said. “They do feel the public pressure, particularly to start recommending stricter penalties.”
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