The Law Enforcement Review Agency (LERA) recently released its 2003 annual report, in which it concluded that one in five Winnipeg Police officers faced a complaint during 2003. Over 400 complaints were called in to LERA against some of Winnipeg's 1181 police officers during 2003, but only 250 of those complaints were actually followed through in writing - the highest number since LERA's inception in 1985.

LERA Annual Reports (1989 - 2004)

George Wright, a 30-year veteran with the RCMP, is the commissioner for LERA. Along with two other investigators, Wright sifts through a LERA complaint each day. He says that 90% of the complaints were against Winnipeg Police officers and that on average one in five Winnipeg Police officers had a complaint filed against them.

"What you looking at is one complaint for every five officers. Is there one constable out there with a large number of complaints, no, I wouldn't say that," Wright told NewWinnipeg.com. "There are certainly some officers who appear at LERA on different occasions, but there are also certainly many officers who have gone through their whole career without a complaint."

Shelly Glover, the spokesperson for the Winnipeg Police Service, downplays the statistics from LERA by pointing to the number of service calls instead of the number of officers.

"Last year, we had over 280,000 service calls," Glover told NewWinnipeg.com, adding that Winnipeg Police have "millions" of other interactions with citizens. "So, 250 complaints isn't very much at all."

The report says that 63% of the complaints occur either in the street or at the person's home, while 20% of the incidents occured at a Winnipeg police station. The gender and age of the complainants have remained the same over the past few years, with most complaints coming from men (70%) and over a quarter of the complaints coming from people aged 18-29.

Only two percent of the complaints actually go to court, while many of the complaints are either abandoned by the complainant (41%) or dropped due to lack of sufficient evidence (31%).

LERA investigates complaints against police officers in 14 Manitoba communities, including the Dakota Ojibway Police Service.

(ed. note that Alex Reid also filed a LERA complaint in 2004)