Ontario’s police watchdog says a Wellington County OPP officer acted lawfully after a woman suffered a broken arm while being arrested in September 2020.
Officers were dispatched to an address in the small community of Rockwood on Sept. 19 for reports of a domestic dispute between a man and a woman.
In its report released on Monday, the Special Investigations Unit said police had grounds to charge the 28-year-old woman with mischief and assault.
But when officers went to arrest the woman, she ran into the backyard of the home with the officers giving chase.
“There ensued a struggle of some duration as they attempted to take her into custody,” the report stated. “The complainant flailed her arms and legs, thrashed her body and resisted the officers’ efforts to bring her to the ground.”
SIU director Joseph Martino said a female officer appears to have been most responsible for the fracture when she forced the woman’s arm behind her back.
“I am unable to reasonably conclude that it was excessive in the circumstances,” he said in the report. “By all accounts, the complainant struggled vigorously to avoid being placed in handcuffs.”
Martino added the woman’s arm could have also been broken when the officer took the woman down in what he described as a spirited confrontation.
Another officer was even bitten on the elbow by a dog during the arrest.
“There was some necessity in bringing the matter to an end as quickly as possible and I am unable to fault the officer for acting forcefully and resolutely to do so,” Martino said.
The SIU noted that the OPP didn’t initially know the woman’s arm was broken, but only when she showed up at the detachment a month later to be fingerprinted wearing a sling.
She reported that her arm was broken when she was arrested and her injury required elbow replacement surgery. Police then notified the SIU on Oct. 20, 2020.
The SIU also noted that the arresting officer declined to be interviewed but provided her notes.