Ontario’s police watchdog says there was no wrongdoing on the part of a Hamilton police officer who assisted a man after he had consumed a “liquid cleaning agent” in a residential area on the mountain.
According to Hamilton police, a call came in on the evening of June 14 around 11 p.m. from a residence at Innswood Place near Rymal Road and Upper Gage Avenue. The caller claimed his brother had locked himself in his car and drunk cleaning fluid.
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An officer arrived on the scene about five minutes after the call and discovered a 34-year-old man inside a vehicle. According to police, he assisted in removing the man from the interior of his car, in which he had locked himself.
Paramedics arrived on the scene minutes later and transported the man to the emergency department in “life-threatening condition,” police say.
The man was stabilized and admitted to the intensive care unit.
In his report, interim director of the Special Investigations Unit Joseph Martino said it was apparent that “the man caused himself harm before the police even arrived” and that, in his view, there was “nothing to investigate as far as the potential criminality of any police officer is concerned.”
Martino says the investigation and the file are now closed.
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