Uncover - S11: "Carrie Low VS." E2: Aftermath

Episode Date: November 5, 2021

Carrie tries to launch a complaint against police but is thrown a surprising curveball. For transcripts of this series, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/uncover/carrie-low-vs-transcripts-listen-1.6218432

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The story you're about to hear includes details of sexual violence. The content may be distressing for some listeners. Please take care. listeners. Please take care. Months are passing by. Carrie says she can't sleep. She's terrified to leave her home and feels anxious everywhere. On the bus, walking, going to work. She never feels safe. It's made me question a lot of different things. Society, people, organizations. My safety, you know, my safety in the world, the safety for my children. It's done a lot of damage.

I've now developed mental health issues, PTSD, you know I'm now on medication to treat things because at one point I wasn't sleeping for months. I was averaging 12 hours a week, night sweats, nightmares and I had to leave my job. I've been in the industry for over 20 years and it got to a point that I had to leave my job. I've been in the industry for over 20 years, and it got to a point that I had to leave my work and haven't been able to go back. So it's been a struggle emotionally, mentally, physically, financially. It's changed my life. The aftermath of an attack involving sexual violence is something like a tsunami, a massive force that, in a matter of hours, can wipe out every foundation and pillar of familiarity,

changing the very landscape. For Carrie, what remains is a sense of danger. My anxiety and hypervigilance, slam of a door, someone screaming would put me into panic. So it's been tough. I have been going through therapy, but unfortunately I haven't been able to deal with the actual trauma itself because it's been so focused on the aftermath and how things were handled by the police. I'm Maggie Rahr and this is Carrie Lowe versus episode two, Aftermath. Cases like Carrie's are extremely rare, not for the fact of their existence,

but the fact that she reported to police. Statistics Canada's latest numbers on crime and public safety show that just 6% of all sexual assaults disclosed by survey participants were reported to police. Sexual assaults are vastly underreported, the agency noted, and the least likely to be reflected in official data. That's a pretty strong signal that there's no faith and trust in that system. I think that there's a big discussion in Canada right now,

and not just in Canada, about whether or not the legal system can ever be an adequate remedy for sexual assault. Right now, I think it's fair to say that we have de facto decriminalized sexual assault based on how few sexual assaults ever actually make it into the criminal justice system. Sunny Mariner is an advocacy expert who has spent 25 years working with sexual assault survivors on the front lines and working with police.

She led a pilot project to ensure every report of a sexual assault is thoroughly investigated before it is dismissed. Reporting a sexual assault doesn't guarantee a day in court. In 2017, the Globe and Mail newspaper used internal police data to show that one out of every five allegations of sexual assault reported to police were deemed baseless or unfounded and dismissed. Hundreds of those cases have since been reopened. For the first 16 years of my work, not a single survivor that I work with had a case that progressed to charges. Most of them started from a position of believing if you're sexually assaulted and you go to the police and you report it, they're going to be behind you and investigate the crime and put somebody in jail for committing this crime. And so when you take that away from somebody, what happens is they don't just lose their belief in that moment,

they lose their belief in systems in general. Mariner says that of the survivors who do report to police, most underestimate how grueling the process will be. She also says the number one reason they say they come forward is to protect others. Survivors don't go forward to report to the police because they feel like spending the next five or ten years of their lives battling the police. The vast majority of survivors I work with, they absolutely will never go forward with that battle because it's not something they ever wanted and not something they were even prepared to do. Because it's not something they ever wanted. And not something they were even prepared to do.

This was a horrific crime. A crime that traumatizes women for a very, very long time. That's Emma Halpern. She has believed Carrie from the beginning and watched this unfold in real time. And I worked with Carrie, as you know, for a year and watched the crime take its toll on her. I watched her have to quit her job because she just couldn't work. I watched her... Halpern runs the Elizabeth Fry Society of Mainland Nova Scotia,

where she works with women and gender-diverse people navigating the criminal justice system. Halpern becomes one of Carrie's main supports. You know, I met with her after she hadn't slept for days because of reoccurring nightmares, you know, telling me that she was losing her hair, watching her lose weight, having her come in unable to talk some days because the trauma was so pronounced in her physical being. And yet, there she was, also trying to navigate this impossible maze of a system and trying to figure out how to get this crime solved herself, which was beyond the scope of what should be ever expected of anyone,

let alone someone who'd just been through such a tremendously difficult trauma. who'd just been through such a tremendously difficult trauma. In the early days of the investigation, many questions were hanging over Carrie. No one was going to the site of where the crime happened, despite her being able to very clearly pinpoint where that was. No one came to pick up her clothing. These were all things that baffled myself and baffled others who were working with her because it just seemed so odd to be quite frank like it just it we couldn't understand why these barriers kept coming up as she moved through this process so for a long time

I was a battle inside my head is this right is this wrong you know should I continue shouldn't I continue yes I should fight for this or... and I took major steps along the way like getting a supervisor involved, then getting the, you know, that super supervisor, you know, involved. So when I met with Emma, it was a turning point that I finally was able to get another person's perspective who has dealt with these kinds of things and other things in the justice system. And she confirmed that everything that was going on was not right. Em was not okay.

And that she validated those gut feelings that I had. And I finally at that point felt I knew I was doing the right thing. And this wasn't okay. Carrie did everything quote unquote right. She went immediately following the assault to the hospital to get a rape kit with the same nurses. She reported right away. She called the police. She kept very meticulous notes. All of these things are unusual in terms of our experience, in terms of working with victims, and her willingness and interest to work with the police to identify the perpetrators, to be able to find some justice.

She was a very active participant in working towards bringing the evidence forward to solve this crime. Carrie's case is still an open investigation. Because of this, no one that I've contacted from the Sexual Assault Investigative Team, also known as the SAIT unit, will speak to me about her case. To try to get a baseline understanding of how an investigation might unfold in the early hours and days after police receive a report such as Carrie's, I contacted a retired police detective who worked in Halifax.

police detective who worked in Halifax. Okay. It's Dave Worrell, W-O-R-R-E-L-L. 35 years, probably most of which was done in criminal investigations, detective with the sergeant rank. The time I was there, most recent, had some very good investigators in it. The time I was there, most recent, had some very good investigators in it. And I know from knowing a couple of them that they were dedicated to doing that job. Dave Worrell retired in 2015.

He spent 16 years working in major crime, investigating homicides and sexual assaults. He was also a duty supervisor. I asked him, in his experience, what would happen when a sexual assault is first reported. Your first priority is always the welfare of the victim. Your second priority is, is she safe? Like, is there any suspects identified or whatever? And then your third issue is the crime scene. The crime scene and or the collection of evidence. The evidence that we are aware of in Carrie's case is the rape kit, the clothes she was wearing, and the toxicology labs, blood work that Carrie had done to determine

whether or not she'd been drugged. She identified three potential crime scenes. The bar, the vehicle, and the trailer. Next, Worrell says there are a series of communications that should take place. He's there, he's talking to the victim, and he just determined that she was sexually assaulted. At that point in time, that's when the call should have been entered in the system. If that doesn't happen, you know,

there's no call, there's no record of it. The first responding officer was Constable Novakovic, who spoke with Kerry at the hospital. Halifax Regional Police, in a written summary of a disciplinary review, state that Novakovic did log the rape kit into police property and completed a report. Then it notes Novakovic asked for extra time to submit those details into a national system investigators use to identify links in violent crimes. Police note that report went in on June 26th. Worrell lays out what he thinks should happen next. When that first responder at the hospital had contact with the victim, at that point he should have called or she should have called, we called it a complaint, but that issue to dispatch,

they would automatically take out, I want to say take out a file, it's all inputted into the records management system, and from there it would go to either the watch commander that's on duty or, depending on where it happened, the sergeant supervisor. At that point, the sergeant usually conversed with the staff sergeant, the watch commander, to determine if a detective or sexual assault investigator should be called out right away. At any given time, police may be handling several active cases that all require urgent attention. Worrell says that in his experience, this would have been an ongoing discussion within police leadership in the department. He says when a sexual assault is reported, priority is determined by the duty supervisor and or the watch commander.

I often refer to it as like a triage. As a supervisor, before those files are assigned, you have to decide what needs to be done right away, like today. During his time with Halifax Regional Police, Worrell says detectives worked regular business hours, Monday to Friday, 9 to 5. Worrell says there was always a detective on call. Kerry presented to the hospital on a long weekend. Halifax Regional Police's 2018 policy on Investigations, states that the watch commander must contact the SAIT unit immediately

if they determine the victim or the public is in danger, increased investigation is needed to gather evidence, or there is any other urgency to the file. During the day, that means a direct call to the unit. After-hours calls must be approved by a duty officer. According to Kerry's notes, she followed up by telephone with Constable Novakovic the day after she met with him at the hospital.

Her timeline shows she had pinpointed the location of the trailer. She also told him that she believed articles of her clothing were still there. I share this information with Worrell. He says in such a circumstance, he would expect the police to take steps to immediately secure the site. Top of the order would be to secure that trailer, whether it means having an officer, a patrol officer, come and sit on that trailer. And in the meantime, most likely the detectives would be getting a warrant, search warrant.

And then at that point, once the warrant's obtained, that trailer would be examined right then and there. So you might be talking, I don't know, five, six hours before that can happen, but it doesn't matter because you've got it seized and you've got an officer sitting on that trailer and he or she can say nobody's come or gone since I've been here. Halifax Regional Police policy also states that the responding officer take possession of any exhibits if a medical exam is conducted, consult with forensic experts on evidence collection, and secure the scene until a SAIT officer can attend. During after hours, the officer should consult with the watch

commander on next steps, the policy states. Worrell says a crucial step would be to secure any additional evidence. Again, when I was in the forensic section, if one of our officers were available, forensic officers, they would want to go right to the hospital and seize clothing, whatever, right away. Remember, Carrie was given a plastic bag by Constable Novakovic and told to put the clothes she was wearing in the evidence bag when she got home.

Worrell says when it comes to the collection of evidence, this could be problematic because it could lead to cross-contamination. Putting everything in one bag might be concerning. You have to think about transfer, fluid transfer from one, say, jeans to a t-shirt that, you know, we want to preserve. Plastic is okay as long as they're not stored in plastic. Like, as soon as the forensic officer got back to their office, those would be opened up and put in the drying machines right away. But even so, they should not be all bundled in one bag, and certainly not depending on the victim to do that herself,

because you're getting into all kinds of continuity issues. yourself because you're getting into all kinds of continuity issues. Carrie's clothes sat in the plastic bag for 10 days before Constable Novakovic picked them up. And according to Carrie, police told her that no one went to the trailer. Police will not say if any officers ever went to that address throughout the investigation. Worrell says this raises serious questions. As a supervisor in sexual assault, or really in any of the units, I'd want to know why. And whether that meant going to the watch commander that was on duty that weekend or whatever.

I'd want an answer of why. Because if for no other reason, you're probably going to have to answer that in court. I'd want to know why. I want answers as to why that didn't happen. Carrie told me that when she was asking why no one was going to the location, she was told, quote, And another time, she says police told her they believed her, so they didn't need to go to the scene. I share this with Worrell.

I've never heard of that. You know, we believe you, so we don't want to gather evidence maybe they don't believe her but they should still be gathering evidence it doesn't matter what the belief is by the investigator there's still a certain process that has to be followed it's like criminal investigation 101 we do not know exactly what took place when Carrie's report went in.

Carrie says she has asked the police several times who the duty supervisor was that long weekend. But no one has told her. In 2017, it felt like drugs were everywhere in the news. So I started a podcast called On Drugs. We covered a lot of ground over two seasons, but there are still so many more stories to tell. I'm Jeff Turner, and I'm back with Season 3 of On Drugs. And this time, it's going to get personal.

I don't know who Sober Jeff is. I don't even know if I like that guy. On Drugs is available now wherever you get your podcasts. After 10 months and no arrests, Carrie is still trying to find out what is going on with her case and if there has been any progress. With Emma Halpern's support, Carrie files a Freedom of Information request. But the request is denied because Carrie's case is an open investigation. Then Carrie discovers she has another option.

She decides to lodge a formal complaint against the police. Because the SAIT unit is jointly run by the RCMP and the Halifax Regional Police, Carrie has to go through two separate complaint processes. First, she files a complaint against the Halifax Regional Police, alleging that police failed to alert the SAIT team in a timely manner and also failed to process her toxicology report for a full year. She also alleges that by failing to attend the scene of the crime and seek evidence, the police did not follow their own policy laid out for sexual assault investigations. did not follow their own policy laid out for sexual assault investigations.

Finally, she alleges a, quote, pattern of conduct amounting to negligence. Kerry files the complaint against the Halifax Regional Police on May 13, 2019, almost a year after she first reported. Emma Halpern tells me that lodging a complaint is no simple matter. I mean, I could probably spend the next two hours here explaining to you the process that we have undergone in support of Carrie as she's made this complaint against the police. There are numerous barriers that we've encountered, and despite the fact that the legislation clearly indicates you can make a complaint against the police as a whole for systemic failures, there's actually no real process to do that. Even though a civilian can complain about the police or a department as a whole,

the form itself only facilitates naming individual officers. only facilitates naming individual officers. And throughout every step, she's been required to identify the officers that have failed her, and yet, because so much of this happens behind closed doors, and it isn't a transparent, investigations aren't transparent processes, she didn't know where the failures were. She could tell there were failures happening. For those who are not familiar with the process, it is tremendously convoluted.

There are multiple forms, multiple forums, multiple people involved. It's unclear, even for those of us who are legally trained, exactly how this process is supposed to unfold. At one point, we actually had a law student go through the website and the regulations and develop a flow chart for us to help us understand the process because it was so difficult and opaque. But then, after following the proper procedure and filing the paperwork, she learns there's a six-month statute of limitations. That means she would have had six months from the date she first reported to police.

Carrie didn't complain in time. The Office of the Police Complaints Commissioner declines to review her complaint. This is when Jessica Rose, a lawyer who works with the Elizabeth Fry Society, joins Carrie's team to try to get that ruling overturned. I am not aware of any other cases where the complainant has made a complaint against an entire police department and then come up against this barrier that we are experiencing. Jessica Rose tells me that Carrie's case could impact future victims of sexual assault. And to not even be able to go to the police in order to find out what they've done and how this has fallen apart is really a failure of women who have experienced sexual assault.

So what we see is that Carrie has been failed in an individual way, of course. It's not just her particular case that needs to be addressed. We see a more systemic flaw or a number of flaws really in the police complaints process that really hinders victims from being able to seek justice when the police just don't act in accordance with their own policies and when they don't adequately investigate crimes. All of this is a delicate matter because Carrie's criminal case is still open. We are cautious as we move forward. We don't want to do anything to compromise an investigation that we hope is still ongoing. Carrie's perpetrators are still out there.

The perpetrators of this crime are at large. And we really are focusing our complaint on the failure of the police complaints commissioner to process Carrie's request. failure of the Police Complaints Commissioner to process Carrie's request. Carrie's fight to have her complaint heard reaches the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia in September of 2019. It also makes national news, prompting a public response from the city's new police chief, Dan Cansella. I am going to be reviewing the investigation in its totality. I'm aware of Maggie Rohrer's story and the issues that are brought up in there, and they're concerning.

And as a result of that, I'm going to be looking into it first with a review and see what I get back from there, and then make a determination on where we go from there. Carrie is hopeful and reaches out directly to Kinsella. She wants to take part in the review. She wants the system to be better for future survivors of sexual assault. Carrie says she did not receive a response. When I contacted the police for comment, a spokesperson for the city replied saying that, quote, Chief Kinsella looks forward to hearing from Ms. Lowe at the conclusion of the investigation,

meaning, in other words, they will not be speaking to Kerry as they prepare the report. Two months later, Halifax Regional Police Chief Dan Kinsella announces the review is complete. He says there are, quote, unquotequote learnings resulting from the review. Kerry says no one ever spoke to her. We asked Halifax Regional Police if any attempt was made to contact Kerry as part of that investigative process, and if they would provide us with a copy of the report.

Kerry herself asked for a copy of Kinsella's report, but they did not share any information with her. A spokesperson from Kinsella's office wrote, I am not in a position to share the internal report. Halifax Regional Police spokesperson, in response to a detailed list of questions about the case, said they cannot comment on matters before the courts. After the incident happened, and when I started feeling things weren't going correctly, I felt here I was the victim of a crime having to basically fight for the police to investigate properly to why aren't you doing this? Why didn't you do that? For me, it feels like a backwards system. When I first met Carrie and reported on her story, her name was published, but we hid her face using video editing. She didn't want anyone to recognize her.

Just two months later, standing outside the Supreme Court, I watch as Carrie makes a decision. When she takes a deep breath, I know that she has chosen to face the media. To be not only named in the news, but seen and heard. Good evening. A Dartmouth woman whose rape investigation has dragged on for a year and a half is taking her case to the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia. But what Carrie didn't know as she stood before them, showing her face for the first time,

was that someone else connected to the case was watching the news. It was RCMP Constable Jarrell Smith, the first lead investigator on Carrie's file, the one who was taken off her case without explanation. After Smith sees Carrie on the news, he contacts her lawyers. He tells them he's been on leave from the RCMP ever since he was taken off her file.

Carrie believed that he had been responsible for the delays and mismanagement in her case. But Constable Smith had an entirely different story. And he wanted to tell Carrie himself. Coming up on Carrie Lowe vs. Tonight, the woman at the center of a flawed rape investigation files a lawsuit. And she has a whistleblower to help her make her case. The original officer on the file.

The latest on the new coronavirus. I can't even explain it. I was blown away. It shattered my whole thinking of how this department is running, how the saint unit works. He told me that my story was a straw that broke the camel's back for him. I'm not going to be one of those people. I will stand here and do my fucking job. And I will die on that hill. This series is produced by Janice Evans and Nancy Hunter

and written by me, Maggie Rahr. Mixing and sound design by Evan Kelly. Our digital producer is Emily Connell. Fact-checking by Emily Mathieu. Special thanks to Danielle Stone. Theme music by Aqua Alta. Our senior producer is Chris Oak, and the executive producer of CBC Podcasts

is Arif Noorani. I was making a move, I was waving goodbye, and he was screaming out, out, out. He was crying. For more CBC Podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.