There will be no criminal charges against Costa Labos, the head of the Montreal police department’s internal affairs department, police chief Philippe Pichet said on Friday.
Labos had been under investigation by the Sûreté du Québec because of allegations he lied to a judge in 2014 to obtain a search warrant to wiretap the phones of former police officer Roger Larivière, as well as to execute a search at the officer’s home.
Pichet says the Montreal force was informed on Friday that the Director of Criminal and Penal Prosecutions has decided not to charge Labos.
“I want to reiterate my full support for chief inspector Labos and all the police officers and citizens who work around the clock to ensure public safety in Montreal,” Pichet said from the force’s headquarters.
Pichet had come under fire by the Montreal police brotherhood for not removing Labos from the position while the investigation was ongoing.
“It’s obvious that with an investigation of this nature against him, (Labos) doesn’t have the credibility or legitimacy needed to assume the role,” brotherhood president Yves Francoeur said in a statement in June. “It’s an absurd and unjustifiable situation.”
But Pichet said on Friday that he always had information, which he could not share, that led him to believe that Labos hadn’t done anything wrong.
“I know it wasn’t easy to understand why we weren’t moving him,” Pichet said. “There was pressure and a lot of questioning, but today we know it was the right decision.”
Pichet wouldn’t comment on why the allegations were made, but said that as head of the force’s internal affairs department, Labos is in a very unpopular position.
“He’s in charge of investigating our employees, and he’s been doing that for a little more than six years now,” Pichet said.
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