Former mayor Colin Kinsley testified he had "little interest" in a report regarding a complaint by two civilian employees about the working environment at the Prince George RCMP when the trial into whether city councillor Brian Skakun leaked the document to the media resumed Tuesday.
Kinsley told the court he vaguely recalled the report, written by labour lawyer Kitty Heller but "probably just perused it" when it was presented to city council during an in-camera meeting on May 12, 2008.
However, Kinsley said he did take note during the council meeting of a statement in the cover letter that Ann Bailey, the top civilian manager at the detachment, was in a conflict of interest because of her personal relationship with Prince George RCMP Supt. Dahl Chambers.
Kinsley said he found the finding troublesome.
"The discussion I recall having with this was that first of all it was my understanding she (Heller) wasn't hired to comment on that and second of all, Supt. Chambers was employed by the federal government and Ms. Bailey was an employee of the City of Prince George and further, Ms. Bailey reported to the inspector in charge of operations and Supt. Chambers was in charge of the administration of the Prince George RCMP detachment," Kinsley said.
Skakun is accused of breaking freedom of information and protection of privacy legislation by leaking the report to CBC, which posted it on its website for a day in August 2008. Three days of testimony was held in October and another four days of provincial court time is booked for this week.
As a rule, Kinsley said he made a point of leaving personnel issues to city administration.
"My approach to the mayor's position is one of policy setting and in all aspects financially or where capital (was involved) and employment issues and those kinds of things were, in my view, best dealt with by the people who were paid to do that," he said.
At the behest of council, Kinsley said he hand-delivered a letter to then Attorney General Wally Oppal on Nov. 3, 2008 asking that the leak be investigated.
That investigation was later carried out by RCMP Insp. Ray Noble, who testified during the first day of the trial.
Kinsley was also asked to recollect his Nov. 21, 2008 meeting, near the end of his term as mayor, with city manager Derek Bates and Coun. Debora Munoz, who alleged Skakun confessed to her he leaked the report.
According to Kinsley, Munoz had been waiting for a visit from Noble to provide what she knew about the document leak, but when that didn't happen, she approached Coun. Murry Krause, who quickly advised her to speak to Bates and Kinsley about the matter.
During the subsequent meeting, Munoz also said Skakun felt like killing himself. Asked by defense lawyer Jon Duncan what steps he took to help Skakun upon learning he may be suicidal, Kinsley said he did nothing because the information was already weeks old.
Asked if he thought of forwarding the information to the attorney general's office, Kinsley said it never crossed his mind.
Following Kinsely's testimony, a cross examination continued of human resources manager Sandra Caffrey, who formerly took the stand near the end of the first three days of testimony in October.
Caffrey said the complainants who initiated the Heller report - Sheri McLean-Smith and Linda Thompson - were given chances to read the report once it was completed in February 2008, but were not allowed to take it out of the office.
They were able to look at the report in a glass-enclosed office kitty-corner to Caffrey's where she could keep an eye on them, and Caffrey did not recall saying they could simply leave it at the front desk after they had finished with it.
McLean-Smith had a laptop with her, which Caffrey said concerned her.
In earlier testimony, corporate services manager Kathleen Soltis stated the copy posted on the CBC website had markings indicating it was a copy presented to city council during the May 2008 closed-door meeting.
Coun. Don Bassermann and city manager Derek Bates are expected to take the stand today and Bailey is scheduled to testify this afternoon via a video link from Surrey. According to her affidavit, Bailey resigned from her position four years before she qualified for retirement because of the grief she suffered when the report was made public. She successfully won an undisclosed amount of compensation from the city as a result.
With the trial entering its fourth day of testimony after three days in October, Judge Ken Ball said he will do all he can to ensure all relevant testimony is heard by the end of this week.
Ball also shot down Duncan's continued attempt to introduce documents detailing the original complaints, ruling they're not relevant to whether Skakun leaked the 31-page report by Heller.
