Calgary police fire officer who slammed handcuffed woman on ground
Const. Alex Dunn convicted of assault causing bodily harm
The Calgary police officer who was convicted of assault causing bodily harm after throwing a handcuffed black woman to the ground has been fired.
Const. Alex Dunn, who had been with the Calgary Police Service for 14 years, was dismissed Thursday, six years after he slammed Dalia Kafi on the floor of the arrest processing unit.
The dismissal won't take effect until the appeal period has expired or an appeal has concluded, according to the Calgary Police Service (CPS). Until then, Dunn remains suspended without pay.
On Thursday, following a disciplinary hearing, retired superintendent Paul Manuel issued his decision, finding Dunn guilty on two counts of discreditable conduct under Alberta's Police Act.
"My client was very shaken and upset, not so much at the decision, some of the reasoning behind it," said Dunn's lawyer, Alain Hepner, in an interview following the ruling.
Calgary police would not provide CBC News with a copy of the decision and Hepner did not expand on Manuel's reasons.
Hepner says he is going to let the matter "settle for a while" before he decides whether to appeal Manuel's decision to the Law Enforcement Review Board (LERB).
Video evidence
In June 2021, Dunn was handed a 30-day conditional sentence, which meant he served his time at home — 15 days under house arrest, 15 days under a curfew.
The Crown appealed, and Justice Nancy Dilts ruled the suspended officer should have been handed a 30-day jail sentence followed by six-months probation.
But because of the passage of time and the fact that he'd served his original sentence, Dilts issued a stay of that jail sentence this summer.
Kafi was arrested and taken to the arrest processing unit in 2017 for allegedly breaking a curfew.
Once there, he tried to remove a scarf from her head to take a photo but she ducked away from him.
A security camera showed Dunn throwing the woman down, her hands handcuffed behind her back.
The victim's head can be seen bouncing off the ground with a pool of blood quickly forming, and she appeared to be briefly unconscious.
During the trial, the Crown said Kafi suffered a broken nose, which required surgery, and a split lip, which needed stitches.
In 2016, Dunn pleaded guilty to two charges of insubordination for breaching CPS policies related to accessing a civilian's information for personal reasons and the home storage of his service firearm. He was docked four days' pay.
He was also subject to an internal police investigation after CBC News published a photo of the officer in blackface at a 2012 Halloween party.
For more stories about the experiences of Black Canadians — from anti-Black racism to success stories within the Black community — check out Being Black in Canada, a CBC project Black Canadians can be proud of. You can read more stories here.
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