From knowing a lot of different people working in enforcement organizations, and reading the news over the years, it's clear that there's a lot of dicks working in enforcement organizations across Canada and they have a serious internal culture program.
Having the power of authority over others, including the power to boss people around while having a gun strapped to your hip, tends to attract a certain type of person, and also tends to turn good people into a certain type of person.
I'm not a fan of the "a lot of dicks" idea. I think the culture that is sustained by the brass is much more influential ... and where that comes from: what are the political and other pressures that sustain/require certain types of behaviour.
I think you're right about the 'type that likes to boss people around with a gun ... ", but how do those 'dicks' get hired? How do they keep getting away with it? That's the culture from the top sustaining it.
Does one officer decide alone to disobey rules and cover something up, for example? Or does the culture sustain/require that?
"Prosecutors failed to disclose information and RCMP deleted files that pointed to another possible suspect." "The reasons why are far-reaching and start at the very beginning of this case, during the investigation, and span every level of the justice system, right past the [Nova Scotia] Court of Appeal to the Department of Justice," said MacDonald.https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/glen-assoun-brenda-way-justice-miscarriage-1.5210082Sounds more like collusion from/by the prosecutor than just "a dick" cop: Did the prosecutor suggest that the information 'disappear'?
Oh ya, and the innocent guy who spent
17 years in jail ... was
Indigenous.
There is that.
It certainly creates an issue of public trust, might lead someone like me to question RCMP data that placed blame for deaths of Missing and Murdered Indigenous women "mostly" Indigenous men ... and fails to even mention serial killers.
Do we even know how widespread the practice is of deleting information that doesn't fit the 'popular narrative' in criminal cases? Is it worse than in other police forces? Given the vastness and often remoteness of RCMP jurisdictions across Canada, is it more likely that RCMP officers are inclined to make the evidence fit a chosen narrative?
We don't know, and we could not ever independently access the data to evaluate that and other questions. Eg, CPIC data from all police forces across the country isn't accessible by the public in any form. Seems odd, given that 'freedom of information' is the law now.
A lot of questions ... and very few avenues to find answers.
146 years of NWMP/RCMP service all across the country, and much less public accountability than other forces, it seems to me. That alone is a recipe for an ingrown and corrupted service.
I wouldn't entirely put responsibility for that on the RCMP, either: Who else helps sustain that? Whose needs are served by that? Who are the power brokers?