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City of Canton | Safety | Canton PD | I.A.B.

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A Police Officer acts as an official representative of government who is required and trusted to work within the law.  The Officer's powers and duties are conferred by statute.  The fundamental duties of a Police Officer include serving the community, safeguarding lives and property, protecting the innocent, keeping the peace and ensuring the rights of all to liberty, equality and justice.

To ensure that these goals and mission statements are fulfilled in a professional manner by the Police officers, the Canton Police Department has in place an Internal Affairs Office which functions as a checks and balance and in essence is 'Police policing themselves'.

The Internal Affairs Unit is primarily responsible for conducting investigations of misconduct, allegations of a serious nature and those of a less serious nature.  These allegations are generated both from the citizen population and from employees.  The investigation of these complaints is conducted with three purposes in mind:

1. To protect the integrity of the Canton Police Department
2. To protect the public's interest
3. To protect the accused officers from unjust accusations   

The Internal Affairs Bureau headed by Captain J.W. Myers, is also staffed by Sergeant G. Boudreaux and their secretary Cynthia L. Jones, and is located on the 6th floor of City Hall.  The office is functioning with the addition of some new equipment allocated to the department during 2001, including a Canon scanner for photo lineups, an H.P. LaserJet 2200 printer, a new Dell Pentium 4 computer, and a Dell Pentium 3 Laptop.

This year, Captain Myers and Sergeant Boudreaux completed courses for additional training in Managing the Discipline Process, Police Supervisions in a Changing World, and Ethics for the  Police Mid-Manager.

The Mayor's Community Relations Commission which has been in place since last year continues to work with Internal Affairs in a recommending capacity in reviewing completed cases.  At their request, the Commission has reviewed approximately 17 cases for the year 2001.

During 2001, the Canton Police Department's Internal Affairs Unit received 88 complaints, each generating a case for investigation.  As each new case comes into the Department, information about the complaint, including the date filed, alleged charges against the officers as well as maintaining the current status of that investigation are updated.  This report is then forwarded each month to various department heads including the Chief of Police and the City Safety Director for their review.

To get a better ideas of the case load reported during the past year, the following statistical graph will show the flow of cases to Internal Affairs as they occurred month to month.

While the actual strength of officers within the Police Department was at 190, there were 70 Canton Police Officers named as "Focus Officers" in Internal Affairs cases.  There were also civilian employees within the City who were investigated and charged as well.

The cases are grouped into two separate varieties.  1) Departmental, when an employee or officer is filing against another employee or officer; 2) Citizen, when a citizen is the complainant against the employee or officer.  The latter of the two being the largest with 91 charges filed, and 17 departmental charges filed with the City of Canton.  This was a total of 108 charges as a result of the 88 cases handled within Internal Affairs during 2001.

One case may contain two or more charges against an officer.  For example, one complainant may accuse an officer of both police misconduct and deportment in the same case.  Each charge implied is then thoroughly investigated, and a recommended disposition is presented to the Chief of Police for review and final approval.

The outcome, or disposition of each charge is set into six basic categories:

• Sustained - The allegation is supported
• Not Sustained - Insufficient evidence to either prove or disprove the allegation
• Unfounded - The allegation was false or did not occur
• Exonerated - The alleged act occurred but was justified, legal and proper under the circumstances
• Referred - To be decided by another authority
• Baseless/Frivolous - Allegation holds no merit or is senseless in nature

As a result of the 108 charges against City Personnel, below are the year 2001 dispositions based on these categories:

Any focus officer with charges that were sustained received the following disciplinary actions:

The graph below shows an overview of findings for the year 2001 cases investigated by Internal Affairs.

Complaints that are filed with Internal Affairs are precipitated by alleged conduct of an officer while on or even off duty.  Many such cases are when an officer comes into contact with a citizen, and that citizen is detained or arrested.  The number of charges filed during the year as a result of someone being arrested or cited is 28.

Previously, excessive force and racial profiling against officers have been an issue as it relates to both the public, and city officials as well.  Internal Affairs has received 13 use of force and 2 racial profiling allegations out of a total of 108 charges during 2001.  Each official case with Internal Affairs consists of one person who is the primary complainant.  This department has seen a variety of persons coming in to file complaints in the past year.  A breakdown of the 88 complainants includes:

• Black Males............24

• White Males............41

• Black Females.........12

• White Females.........11

The overall percentage of persons who have filed cases with Internal Affairs is detailed in the below pie chart.

Captain J.W. Myers, O.I.C                                                 Sergeant G. Boudreaux

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