"Alternative measures" considered for police chief's wife who sprayed woman with hose
An incident involving the wife of the Delta police chief “has been referred to BC Corrections for consideration of an ‘alternative measures’ resolution,” the BC Prosecution Service (BCPS) said on Friday.
And in a statement to Daily Hive, a BCPS spokesperson said “if the person alleged to have committed an offence in this case enters into and successfully completes an Alternative Measures agreement there will be no prosecution.”
The alleged incident took place in June of this year, when Kiran Sidhu attended a friend’s physically distanced birthday celebration on Tsawwassen’s Centennial Beach on June 6 and said she was sprayed while walking back to her car.
“I was stunned in that moment,” she told Daily Hive. “It was also very dehumanizing as a woman of colour just trying to get to my car. She was treating me like this animal or this pest that needs to be sprayed or washed away.”
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Surrey RCMP confirmed at the time that an independent investigation into the incident had been launched, but could not offer any further details.
Sidhu had to leave the party earlier than her friends, and she doesn’t know the area well. The tide had risen during the birthday party, so she couldn’t walk back to the parking lot the way she came.
She saw some people ahead of her climbing over rocks to get back and decided she’d take the same route. As she was climbing, a woman in a beachfront house above her began yelling.
At first, Sidhu said the white woman told her she couldn’t be there and tried to shoo her away. Sidhu explained the water was too high and this was her only option.
The rocks meet with a fence surrounding the woman’s property, and the woman allegedly told Sidhu not to touch her fence. Then, the woman allegedly began insulting her.
The incident caused a commotion, and several neighbours came outside, according to Sidhu. One of the neighbours asked the women if they knew that house belonged to the Delta Police Chief Neil Dubord and his wife, Lorraine.
Sidhu reported the incident to police and said an officer took an emailed statement from her and met with her friend who filmed the video.
During the investigation, Sidhu said her friend mentioned to the officer that the woman was the police chief’s wife. She said the officer became visibly uncomfortable and asked how she knew.
“I think they were hoping that we wouldn’t find out,” Sidhu said.
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In the end, police told Sidhu their investigation found the incident did not meet the threshold for assault.
On Friday, the BCPS said that Crown Counsel are encouraged to consider alternative measures “in every case where the successful completion of an alternative measures program can achieve the most important objectives of a court prosecution.”
The spokesperson added that the BCPS “will have no further comment while the matter is under consideration for alternative measures.”
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