Future Incidents: Canadian Jurisdictions and Investigatory Units

future incidents: The leaders of Canada's special investigatory units have tended to focus on their main mandate deciding if officers have broken the law and recommending prosecutions in serious incidents involving the police, ranging from shootings to sexual assault, according to National Observer. But Roach says there's also a role for directors to refer cases that may not meet that bar to police complaints commissions, and to describe changes in policing that might avoid future incidents. Most Canadian jurisdictions choose former prosecutors to watch the police, said Roach, a prominent University of Toronto law professor. ; But Cacchione, the grandson of Italian immigrants to Montreal, is a veteran superior court judge and criminal lawyer he retired from the Nova Scotia Supreme Court just weeks before being named director of the province's Serious Incident Response Team SIRT . The appointment of a former supreme court justice and former legal aid lawyer is exceptional, said Roach in a recent interview. Roach who has researched the special units in Ontario says Cacchione could bring a gravitas that lends weight to anything he says on the underlying problems in policing, along with his recommendations on criminal prosecutions. Depending on the situation, it may not be off limits, he said during an interview Wednesday. But Cacchione, 68, displays a judge's prudence when asked if he will wade into wider policy issues when he handles investigations or in his annual reports. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.