Justice committee  I'll start. The officers that we select to be canine handlers certainly are a unique breed. They're dedicated beyond most. What I mean by that is it's a 24-7 job. When they go home, they're still looking after that dog. Will they deploy any differently? I don't think so. Will the

Justice committee  I agree. It's going to be the interpretation by the courts. It's probably going to start to define what injured is, as we see in many cases as we get new legislation. I agree with what Steve has mentioned, that we're dealing with two opposite ends of the spectrum when we're dea

Justice committee  I think it was well said. I agree. The chances of it happening are very rare. But again when you're dealing with an animal, they are unpredictable. At times you don't know what that one thing is. When I look back at that situation, there are times when you're training your dog a

Justice committee  I'll give you an example. I think, obviously as a retired RCMP officer, you'd be very familiar with an incident that we had in and around Edmonton where that case did happen. That's with Corporal Jim Galloway who lost his life. We, as a service, went out and collected his service

Justice committee  I'd have to disagree because when we get to court anything is possible. We're very fortunate here in Edmonton that we have a special crown that deals with these specific incidents. I think you've heard nationally there's a wide range on the spectrum as to whether these charges a

Justice committee  It was 26 months.

Justice committee  I think I touched on it a little bit. To answer your question from a public point of view—and I'm certainly not speaking for all the public, of course—it was a very wide range of the public that I received feedback from, and they were all very supportive of a need for this, to a

Justice committee  It's a very good starting point. Again, it's what the public wants, and that's what I'm focusing on a lot here, because again, as a police officer, I have some strong opinions on the criminal justice system but I'm interpreting what I have heard from the public. As I said, it was

Justice committee  Agreed.

Justice committee  Sure, and I'll speak a little, in particular, to what we saw dealing with Quanto and working with the crown prosecutor. Unfortunately, we have to have a special crown prosecutor assigned because of the cases that we see in Edmonton to deal with animal cruelty charges. He was an e

Justice committee  Good afternoon. I have a prepared statement that I'll read to everybody this afternoon because it has a direct link to why we're here. On October 7, 2013, a police service dog, Quanto, and his handler, Matt Williamson, were called to the area of 90 Street and 118th Avenue at 5: