Privacy watchdog wants Ont. police to stop sharing suicide attempts with U.S.

Toronto Police say if Ontario’s privacy watchdog wants information about suicide attempts kept from American officials, she should talk to the RCMP because that force maintains the database that is shared with U.S. officials.

Information and Privacy Commissioner Ann Cavoukian says she was prompted to start an investigation after hearing about four Ontario residents who were denied entry to the United States on the basis of their mental health history.

Cavoukian says she was unnerved by the humiliation and embarrassment felt by the people who were told by American border guards that they couldn’t enter the U.S. because of a suicide attempt.

She says there is no legal requirement that suicide attempts be entered into the Canadian Police Information Centre database and claimed it was the policy of the Toronto Police Service.

But Toronto police spokesman Mark Pugash says that’s just not so, and officers do use discretion about which cases are uploaded to the database.

However, Pugash also says the force feels the information is important for officers to have, and if Cavoukian doesn’t want it shared with American officials then she should ask the Mounties to change who has access to what data.