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Petti Fong

Vancouver
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police  sergeant was first defensive, then downright chippy when asked to comment on the latest arrest of  an officer for drink-driving.
How many media people have been arrested for drink-driving? he retorted.
Plenty, no doubt. But fair or not, the subject of police behaving badly has been a recurring theme in Greater Vancouver this year.
And last week was probably the worst yet. It began with the RCMP admitting that one of their own was being investigated after his involvement in a fatal crash in the Vancouver suburb of Delta  on October 25.
While Corporal Benjamin Monty Robinson  hasn't been formally charged, police in Delta are recommending that he face charges of  impaired driving causing death,  after he reportedly failed a breath test.
Corporal Robinson, a Mountie from nearby Richmond, was off duty at the time of the crash that killed 21-year-old Orion Hutchinson,  whose motorcycle slammed into his Jeep.
It isn't the first time in the news for Corporal Robinson - he is one of four officers still under investigation for the death of Polish immigrant Robert Dziekanski,  who died after the officers shot him with a taser at Vancouver's airport.
Bad news for Corporal Robinson, but a tragedy for  Hutchinson's family. It was left to Hutchinson's grandmother, Faye Daly, to put the family's emotions into words, after his mother, stepfather and sister were too overcome with grief to speak to the media.
'It is impossible to encapsulate in a few brief words the astounding complexity of this young man, the intensity of his mind, the depth of his spirit,' said Ms Daly. 'We cannot believe he's not coming back to us.'
By the end of last week, the RCMP and a  municipal police force had been forced to acknowledge that two other officers were facing charges of impaired driving as a result of earlier incidents.
Compounding the situation was the fact that both of the police officers were school liaison members who  worked regularly with students and  were supposed to set a good example.
One incident involved a  New Westminster  officer who was arrested for allegedly crashing an unmarked police car into a highway sign in North Vancouver two weeks ago. The arrests of the police officers  have undermined a decade's work of educating the public about drinking and driving, according to Bob Rorison,  the Greater Vancouver representative with the group Mothers Against Drunk Driving.
'This is very harmful to everyone, harmful to the police out there because a few bad apples destroyed their credibility, harmful to the public because they don't have respect any more for the police and harmful to students who used to look up to these officers,' he said.
Police were quick  last week to respond to these latest black marks against the force. 'The public does have every reason to be upset, because one impaired-driving charge is one charge too many,' said Corporal Peter Thiessen, a spokesman for the RCMP.
The fact that the cases  involve police officers  was certainly a cause for concern, said Corporal Thiessen.
'It is concerning to the officers on the street working in the community that fellow officers are conducting themselves in this manner.'
The bigger problem will be how to make amends with a public that is quickly growing tired of police behaving badly.
Tomorrow: New York



Police come under fire after officers arrested for drink-driving