Manitoba police watchdog clears officer in foot chase that injured teen girl

A Winnipeg police officer who chased a 14-year-old girl from a stolen car and shoved her to the ground when she refused to stop won't be charged, says the Independent Investigation Unit of Manitoba.

The IIU reviewed a complaint and determined the officer didn't use excessive force when trying to stop the teen by pushing her to the ground.

The incident happened on Sept. 2, 2017 in Winnipeg's North End.

Police were called to Magnus Avenue and Charles Street after reports of a stolen car driving erratically in the area.

Police found and stopped the car, arresting the driver and one passenger, both of whom were youths. A third person the 14-year-old girl ran from the vehicle.

The officer chased the girl a brief distance before he caught up and pushed her to the ground using a "hard empty hand,"the officer wrote in his use of force report.

The male officer in questionrefused to be interviewed by theIIU, but a second officer at the scene recalled hearing him say "Stop! Police! Get on the ground" prior topushingthe teen. The second officer didn't see the push, however.

"He was unsure if he lost sight of them because they fell or because they ran out of his field of vision," he toldIIU.

The girl, who broke her left clavicle in the fall,told the IIU she did not hear the officer say anything to her prior to being tackled.

"He kinda just came from behind and wrapped his arms around me and fell," the girl told IIU investigators, adding she felt pain in her shoulder when she hit the ground.

One of the other youths police arrestedtold the IIUin an interviewthe officer grabbed the 14 year old by her sweater and "whipped her to the ground."

The unit, which investigatesall serious cases involving police officers in the province, said though the girl's injury "was not a serious" one by thenormal standards that trigger an IIU review, the unit's civilian director Zane Tessler said they decided to investigate the case anyway.

After looking at the evidence, the unit concluded the officer did not use "unnecessary and excessive force" in trying to apprehend the girl.

"I am not satisfied that there are reasonable grounds to believe [the officer]exceeded the ambit of justifiable use of force in apprehending [the girl]," Tesslar writes.

"[The IIU] determined the officer had a clear duty to take all reasonable steps to apprehend the girl and that, in the circumstances, his actions were reasonable and appropriate."