The province's police watchdog has determined there is no way to know for sure whether a frequent 911 caller's broken fingers were the result of a handshake with a London police officer.
The Special Investigations Unit (SIU) had been probing the matter since last September.
London police had gone to the 37-year-old man's home, an apartment building in the area of Wharncliffe Road South and Commissioners Road West, during the early hours of September 11. The purpose of the visit was to speak with the man about misusing the 911 emergency call system after the man reportedly made 31 calls to the number asking police to do a wellness check on his daughter who was staying with his ex-wife.
The wellness check was done and the girl was determined to be fine.
However, the man was not satisfied with the police assessment. During the numerous 911 calls the man made allegations against his ex-wife, argued with the dispatcher, and even threatened to wait outside police headquarters to see her leave in order to get her licence plate number, the SIU found after reviewing recordings of the calls. The man also referred to each dispatcher he spoke with in a derogatory manner and when cautioned not to swear at dispatchers he allegedly said it was his right under freedom of speech legislation.
Two police officers went to the man's home and, while speaking with him beside the apartment building's front door, warned he would be arrested for mischief if he continued making such calls to 911. A third officer, who had been called to the scene, arrived and shook the man's hand. While doing so the officer warned the man about the 911 calls and asked if he understood. The man said he did and police left.
Later the man went to hospital where he was diagnosed with two broken fingers.
The man alleged the officer caused the breaks while shaking his hand. The officer admitted he shook the man's hand "firmly" but denied that he tried to hurt the man or used excessive force. The two other officers who witnessed the encounter also told SIU investigators the handshake was assertive but not abusive and that they did not hear the man call-out in pain or ask the officer to release his hand.
Medical evidence in the case was equivocal, according to the SIU.
"While it does not appear that a forceful handshake could be excluded as the mechanism of injury, the pathologist asked to review the matter could not ascribe the injury to a handshake," SIU Director Joseph Martino wrote in his final report. " I am not satisfied the evidence of excessive force is sufficiently cogent to warrant being put to the test by a court. As such, there is no basis for proceeding with criminal charges in this case."
