The Director of the Special Investigations Unit, Joseph Martino, has found no reasonable grounds to believe that officers with the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) and Durham Regional Police Service (DRPS) committed a criminal offence in connection with the death of a 45-year-old man in January.
On January 9, 2022, the man was involved in a crash in Port Hope and left the scene. The man entered the backseat of a pickup truck and ordered the driver, at knifepoint, to operate the vehicle. OPP officers attempted to perform a rolling block of the truck and a spike belt was deployed. The driver hit the spike belt and was subsequently forced off the roadway into a ditch by OPP officers in the area of Highway 115/35.
OPP and DRPS officers located the man with knife wounds and administered CPR. He was taken via air ambulance to a hospital in Toronto. The man died of self-inflicted knife wounds.
Director Martino said there were no reasonable grounds to believe that any of the officers involved in the events that culminated in the man’s death failed to comport themselves within the limits of the criminal law, leaving no basis for proceeding with criminal charges in this case. The file has been closed.
Full Director’s Report (with Incident Narrative, Evidence, and Analysis & Director’s Decision):
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Author: Pete Fisher
Has been a photojournalist for over 30-years and have been honoured to win numerous awards for photography and writing over the years. Best selling author for the book Highway of Heroes - True Patriot Love
