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	City Cop Lashes out at Dunlop By Trevor Pritchard Standard Freeholder June 5, 2008 http://www.standard-freeholder.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=1060027 His voice breaking, a high-ranking city police officer on the stand at the Cornwall Public Inquiry Wednesday lashed out at the former cop who sued him and his force 12 years ago. Insp. Brendon Wells asked for forgiveness if he appeared "a little sensitive" before suggesting Perry Dunlop's 1996 lawsuit was filled with "slanders" that damaged his personal and professional reputation. "I'm extremely disappointed that Mr. Dunlop will not come forward to explain to my family and I why he felt it was necessary -in pursuit of this multi-million dollar claim -to spread these untruths," said Wells, a 39-year veteran of the Cornwall Police Service. In 1993, Dunlop -who was then working in the force's drug investigation unit -learned of a $32,000 settlement between David Silmser and the Alexandria-Cornwall Roman Catholic Diocese. Silmser had accepted the money in exchange for dropping his complaint against Rev. Charles MacDonald, a Cornwall priest who had allegedly abused him decades earlier while he was an altar boy. MacDonald was never convicted on any sex abuse charges. Charges laid later by the OPP were stayed in 2002 after a judge determined they'd taken too long to come to trial. In September 1993, Dunlop turned Silmser's statement over to the Children's Aid Society. After that statement appeared on an Ottawa news broadcast, Dunlop was charged under the Police Services Act with discreditable conduct. He was exonerated on those charges and in 1996 sued a number of people in the CPS -including Wells - for what he claimed was a "malicious" prosecution. Dunlop has repeatedly refused to testify at the inquiry and is currently serving a six-month jail sentence for contempt. As the force's professional standards officer in early 1994, Wells was assigned to investigate how Silmser's statement ended up in the hands of the press, after Silmser lodged a complaint with Cornwall police. Wells said Wednesday he had originally wanted an arms-length provincial police commission to investigate the complaint. But the commission turned that request down, said Wells, who couldn't remember the reasons behind that decision. Inquiry lawyer Karen Jones took Wells to comments he made in an Ottawa Citizen article the day after Silmser's statement appeared in the news. In the January 1994 article, Wells was quoted as saying the force was confident no CPS officer had leaked Silmser's statement to the media. Wells backtracked from those statements yesterday, accusing the reporter of misquoting him. Silmser hadn't even made his complaint yet, he said, so there was no way he could have been sure the leak didn't come from inside the force. "I would not lie to the media," said Wells. "I would not mislead them." Jones found it odd that Wells -who at the time was also the force's media spokesperson -didn't try to correct the alleged misquote. Another CPS officer called a number of media outlets the next day, yet his notes made no mention of the incorrect information, she said. "There's a possibility I did not read (the Citizen piece),"Wells replied. Citizens for Community Renewal lawyer Helen Daley suggested the reason the alleged misquote was never fixed was because a correction would mean the CPS would be putting out "negative information." "The correction wouldn't sound good because it would be a statement to the effect of, 'We can't be satisfied that no member of our force (released the statement)," she said. Calling the leak of Silmser's statements "unprecedented," Daley asked Wells if the CPS ever considered doing more than issuing press releases to restore the community's faith that the police weren't mishandling confidential documents. "I'm not aware of anyone that gave . . . thought to that," said Wells. "I'm not saying they didn't." Wells ultimately found that Const. Heidi Sebalj, the officer who investigated Silmser's complaint, had nothing to do with the release of the file. Wells is scheduled to return to the stand when the inquiry -which is probing how institutions like the CPS handled historical sexual abuse complaints -resumes this morning.
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