Toronto cop charged with assault after 2010 arrest: SIU
Posted June 6, 2013 9:07 am.
Last Updated July 20, 2016 3:31 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
A Toronto police officer has been charged with assault causing bodily harm relating to an arrest in the spring of 2010, Ontario’s police watchdog says.
The Special Investigations Unit (SIU) says there were “reasonable grounds” to believe that Const. Christian Dobbs committed a criminal offence during the incident in which Rudolph Raymond Costain, 30, suffered head injuries.
The SIU began its probe in March after learning about the incident through media reports.
Toronto chef Costain was arrested by officers for drunk driving, assault while resisting arrest and other charges on April 12, 2010, in front of the King Edward Hotel in downtown.
During the arrest, he was struck a number of times by an officer and was taken to St. Michael’s Hospital for treatment of head injuries, the SIU said.
At his trial, Costain and his lawyer Leora Shemesh argued that the charges should be stayed because Dobbs used excessive force and violated Costain’s constitutional rights.
In March, the judge in the case stayed the charges and ruled that the force used by police was “unnecessary, unjustified and excessive.”
Dobbs is expected in a Toronto court July 17.
