Victoria police sergeant gets 30-day suspension for sexual encounter

A Victoria police vehicle is pictured outside the department's headquarters in downtown Victoria: (CTV News)

Warning: This story contains graphic details.

A Victoria police officer who committed discreditable conduct while off-duty during a trip to Vancouver in 2018 has been suspended without pay for 30 days, according to the B.C. Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner (OPCC).

The discreditable conduct stemmed from a sexual encounter between VicPD Sgt. Brent Keleher and a woman identified only as N.O., where the consent of the encounter was in dispute.

The pair met on May 12, 2018, when Keleher was attending a friend's bachelor party in Vancouver. Coincidently, N.O. – who is also from Victoria – was in Vancouver then visiting a friend.

N.O. and her friend knew the man whose bachelor party was being celebrated, and the two groups decided to meet.

"During the course of the evening, a large amount of alcohol was consumed by all the parties," reads the OPCC disciplinary ruling released on Oct. 5.

As the night was winding down, the group went to the Coast Hotel, where Keleher had already reserved a room for the evening.

In the room there were two beds. Keleher and N.O. shared one bed while N.O.'s friend and another man from the group slept in the other bed.

At this point, there was sexual contact with Keleher and N.O., which included the touching of genitals with hands but stopped short of intercourse.

N.O. told the courts that she was highly intoxicated and did not consent to any of the sexual acts.

Keleher, meanwhile, testified that while N.O. was indeed intoxicated she had consented to the contact.

"Based on her state of intoxication, I found that Ms. N.O. did not have the capacity to consent to any of the sexual activities and did not in fact consent," reads the OPCC decision, penned by adjudicator Wally Oppal.

The Victoria Police Department headquarters. (CTV News)

Keleher had testified that he had an honest but mistaken belief that N.O. had consented to the encounter, but Oppal said that evidence was not credible and at minimum Keleher was "reckless in concluding she had consented to the activities that took place."

N.O. later sought a criminal investigation, but Crown counsel did not authorize criminal charges.

In August of this year, however, the OPCC announced that it found Keleher had committed discreditable conduct as a police officer.

PENALTY DECISION

On Oct. 5, the OPCC announced that Keleher was facing a 30 day suspension without pay, the maximum such suspension possible.

Penalty's for misconduct range from verbal reprimands to dismissal or reducing a member's rank, but Oppal found that dismissal would have been too serious a penalty and that it's generally reserved for only the most serious of circumstances.

"It is not in dispute that the misconduct in this case was serious in that it violated the personal integrity of Ms. N.O.," wrote Oppal.

"However, there are a number of mitigating circumstances that militate towards a suspension rather than dismissal," he added.

Oppal said Keleher has no history of other misconduct as a police officer, and that he was highly respected by colleagues and community members.

VicPD Chief Del Manak described Keleher as a "hard working officer and quality investigator," according to the OPCC, and that he had expressed remorse over the incident.

Keleher's sister-in-law also described him as "a downright nice guy" and that the incident was seemingly out of character, the OPCC report reads.