IIO Accepts Recommendations from Coroner’s Inquest into the death of Tony Du
INFORMATION BULLETIN
Independent Investigations Office
For Immediate Release
Surrey – The Independent Investigations Office of B.C. (IIO) today announces that it accepts the jury’s recommendations in the B.C. Coroner Service’s inquest into the officer-involved shooting death of Phuong Na (Tony) Du in Vancouver, on November 22, 2014.
The first recommendation is that the IIO should automatically release its files to the involved police service agency at the conclusion of the IIO investigation. This will help the police agency determine whether any of its existing practices, procedures, or policies should be changed or improved.
The IIO’s Chief Civilian Director Ron MacDonald is committed to releasing IIO investigative files to the appropriate agency at the conclusion of each matter, subject to potential privacy and other related issues.
The second recommendation is the IIO should assess and improve policies around information provided to affected families, to ensure that information is released to them as soon as possible.
“The IIO continuously strives to improve our information sharing with the families, and since the time of this investigation we have augmented the services we offer to affected persons and their families.” says MacDonald. “In this case, we regret the Du family was not updated as frequently as they should have been. Moving forward we will do better to ensure families and affected persons receive more information about their case.”
Background
The IIO is the independent civilian oversight agency of the police in British Columbia. It investigates all officer-related incidents that result in serious harm or death, whether or not there is any allegation of wrongdoing.