Toronto Police ‘misconduct’ leads to collapse of voyeur case

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An Ontario judge has thrown out all evidence — including a seized firearm — against a man accused of spying on his female university tenants due to numerous Charter violations by Toronto Police.

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Once Justice Brock Jones excluded videos found on the suspect’s phone and the non-restricted rifle with a loose trigger lock, there was no case left against accused voyeur Philip Rush.

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But don’t blame the judge. Blame the sloppy police.

“What emerged from this hearing overall left me with the impression of police carelessness, negligence, and indifference to the officers’ obligations in general and Mr. Rush’s Charterrights in particular,” Brock wrote in his recent ruling.

It was an embarrassing cock up from the start.

In 2023, the police were investigating several complaints that the property manager of a rooming house at 39 Haynes Ave. near York University had engaged in crude behaviour, unwanted remarks, sexualized conduct, unlawful entry into tenants’ apartment units, and theft of some of their clothing.

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By December, they had a warrant and seven officers went to look for evidence of criminal harassment, unlawful entry and committing an indecent act.

Just one problem: the search warrant was for the wrong building on the wrong street.

“The unexplained failure of the officers that resulted in them searching a completely unrelated residence to Mr. Rush initially cries out for condemnation,” the judge wrote.

He also chastised them for trying to gloss over that “appalling mistake,” by all conveniently producing no notes about the first search.

“Astonishingly, not just one, but multiple officers involved in this case appear to have taken the same view that they need not have disclosed this material to the Crown’s office as it prepared the prosecution against Mr. Rush,” the judge wrote.

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When questioned by defence lawyer Craig Bottomley, the officers claimed they had or “would have” taken notes.

“I do not accept this was a case of collective amnesia. Rather, the officers were attempting to deceive me about their failure to create accurate notes of their search at this address, rather than simply acknowledged this shortcoming.”

Two days later, they were armed with another search warrant, this time, for the right address. But according to the judge, its execution involved “an alarming lack of care and attention.”

None of the allegations against Rush involved any kind of violence, he said, and he lived in student housing. “They were not entering a drug den to apprehend a known gang member.”

Instead of knocking and properly announcing their presence, the police used a battering ram to get through one door while another officer went through the basement with his firearm pointed at student tenants — and never filed the requisite “use of force report.”

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“This would have been a terrifying ordeal for these entirely innocent residents,” Brock wrote.

Rush was dressed only in pyjama pants, yet he was handcuffed without being allowed to put on a shirt and paraded half-naked into the winter afternoon.

“A minor display of compassion is all it would have taken, with no risk to officer safety,” the judge noted.

Then followed a shockingly long list of Charter breaches: Rush wasn’t immediately given his right to counsel and was questioned with the “intention of obtaining incriminating evidence,” police looked through his cellphone and its video files in an “entirely unjustified” search without a warrant and when they did get one, they searched the phone a day after the warrant had expired.

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“Condoning the officers’ misconduct in this case would bring the administration of justice into disrepute,” Brock concluded. “They initially searched the wrong address and failed to comply with their notetaking and disclosure obligations. Their failure to ‘knock and announce’ at the correct address, along with their resort to the use of a battering ram, violated a long-cherished norm regarding the execution of search warrants in Canada, which is constitutionally required.

“Their collective failure to provide Mr. Rush with his right to counsel immediately after his arrest and to question him before he had the opportunity to speak to counsel demands strong judicial condemnation.”

And so all the evidence against him was tossed.

mmandel@postmedia.com

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