OTTAWA — Ottawa Police Service (OPS) officers are effectively being warned against exercising their discretion to inquire about potential criminality related to "controversial" and "political" matters, a lawyer told the Western Standard.Bath-Sheba van den Berg, a lawyer representing Const. Helen Grus, a detective with the OPS found guilty of discreditable conduct in March of 2025 following an internal professional disciplinary tribunal, said the OPS's persecution of her client would undermine police officers' willingness to take initiative with inquiries involving informal orthodoxies of political nature, including those revolving around "COVID-19 vaccines" marketed as "safe and effective" by all levels of Canadian government and ancillary institutions.Discreditable conduct is a broad charge within the context of the OPS's internal disciplinary processes which includes any behavior deemed to undermine the reputation of the OPS in the eyes of the broader public.Grus was determined to be guilty by Chris Renwick, a retired OPS police officer and tribunal officer who oversaw the disciplinary hearing as a de facto judge. Her disciplinary tribunal for discreditable conduct began in August of 2022, and neared its conclusion this past week. The past week's proceedings were composed of the penalty phase of the disciplinary tribunal, in which the prosecution, representing the OPS, is requesting a 24-month demotion and associated pay decrease of about $15,000 per year.Beginning in June of 2020, Grus inquired about a possible link between "COVID-19 vaccines" and an increase in infant deaths brought to the attention of the OPS following the roll-out of these mRNA-based injections. At the time, Grus worked in the OPS's Sexual Assault and Child Abuse (SACA) unit, which investigates certain infant deaths under certain circumstances. She noted that there had been a doubling and tripling of yearly baby deaths known to the OPS in 2020 and 2021 relative to previous years.Her inquiry — which involved querying the OPS's Records Management System (RMS) and contacting parents of the descendant infants — was determined by Renwick to amount to an "unauthorized project and investigation" launched by Grus for "personal reasons" as part of his determination of her guilt on the charge of discreditable conduct. The penalty phase of the disciplinary tribunal is tentatively scheduled to resume and conclude, remotely, on June 18. Renwick will then issue his decision regarding what penalty, if any, will be applied to Grus."This decision tells us that we don't know what good [policing] looks like, anymore," van den Berg stated, "but we sure know that police officers are not allowed to use their discretion to protect us the public and to preserve life. They have to be aligned with political objectives, and that fundamentally means that our policing is no longer independent."Across the course of the week's penalty phase, which ran between Tuesday and Thursday, prosecutor Jessica Barrow cited precedents from previous disciplinary tribunals in which police officers were found guilty of discreditable conduct to justify the OPS's requested penalty of a 24-month demotion and related pay decrease for Grus.The precedents cited by the prosecution during the week's hearings involved police officers who had violated their police authority for personal benefits, including two police officers who failed to take notes and file reports following their response to a bar fight which involved two off-duty police officers who were their colleagues, and presumably their friends.Another precedent cited by Barrow involved a male police officer who used his access to a police database to identify the owner of a vehicle he observed being parked near his female lover's dwelling. The officer then proceeded to threaten the male owner of the vehicle following his determination that the vehicle's owner had some romantic and/or sexual relationships with his lover.Barrow also cited a precedent in which two male police officers were found guilty of discretable conduct for engaging in sexual trysts while on duty and in uniform, occasionally within their patrol vehicles. "It's actually disturbing that the prosecution is relying on case law about an officer that got (oral sex) in his patrol car while on duty," van den Berg remarked during Thursday's hearing, emphasizing that her client did not receive any personal benefits from her inquiry into potential links between "COVID-19 vaccines" and infant deaths..Grus had spent nearly $400,000 across the entirety of the four-and-a-half year disciplinary tribunal, she testified on Tuesday. Most of this sum was composed of legal costs. She also experienced a months-long unpaid suspension during this time. The Ottawa Police Association, the professional union representing OPS officers, refused to provide financial assistance to Grus to cover her legal fees.In another previous example of a discreditable conduct finding, Barrow's submissions included a reference to a police officer who was determined to have used his authority over procurement to steer financial contracts to his neighbor..The OPS's persecution of Grus amounted to a "reprisal for whistleblowing," van den Berg stated on Tuesday. During a Tuesday film screening in Ottawa of a documentary entitled, Silencing Detective Grus, she shared her and her client's intention to appeal the forthcoming decision from Renwick if it is not to their liking. Such an appeal process can potentially end up at the Supreme Court of Canada.Grus has been with the OPS for 23 years, and her performance reviews all graded her as either "meeting" or "exceeding" the expectations for her professional competencies.
