Edmonton Police Watch

EDMONTON JOURNAL

EDMONTON – An Edmonton police officer facing charges of deceit and neglect of duty resigned Friday, effective immediately, during a police disciplinary hearing.

The charges against Cst. Janelle Brown stemmed from an alleged credit-card fraud case dating to September 2005, in which she was the investigating officer. Brown originally pleaded not guilty to the charges in July, but changed her plea Friday during the hearing when an agreed statement of facts was entered into evidence as an exhibit.

According to that statement, Brown was assigned to downtown division Sept. 30, 2005, when she was dispatched to a call about a credit-card fraud at a private parking lot, and was joined there by another officer.

The owner of the lot identified three suspects who had been using stolen or altered credit or debit cards to purchase parking tickets from a dispenser at the parking lot, then reselling them for cash to other parking-lot users.

After taking details, Brown gave the owner a file number and confirmed she would be in charge of investigating the complaint. When Brown filed the paperwork a week later, however, she referenced the matter as a “suspicious-person” case instead of a credit-card fraud.

She also incorrectly noted the address of the parking lot, as well as the name of the complainant.

While more than one suspect was identified to the officers attending the call, none of them matched the descriptions Brown noted in her report.

Moreover, the officer’s narrative contained no reference to the complaint of fraudulent credit-card use lodged by the owner of the parking lot.

In the ensuing weeks, the parking-lot owner made three attempts to contact Brown, leaving voice-mail messages each time.

Brown did not return any of the calls.

On Nov. 17, 2005, the owner left another voice mail expressing her frustration that Brown had not called back, adding that she — the owner — had amassed more information about the ongoing fraudulent use of credit cards at the parking lot.

Brown finally phoned the owner shortly thereafter, apologizing for not being in touch sooner, saying she had been busy. She advised the owner that a “sting” operation was being discussed to catch the perpetrators and would likely be carried out within the week.

During that call, Brown asked the owner about the additional credit-card information she had compiled. The officer then provided the owner with a fax number and asked her to forward the information to her, which she did.

Despite further efforts by the owner, there was no further contact or discussions with Brown.

Finally, on Dec. 14, 2005, the owner contacted the economic crimes unit to discuss the investigation and was referred to a detective in the unit, who e-mailed Brown asking for a copy of her report. Brown did not respond to the detective’s e-mail, nor did she respond to a followup e-mail sent several weeks later.

Both e-mails, concluded the agreed statement of facts introduced Friday, had been successfully sent to Brown’s police department e-mail account and had been opened.

Brown had been a member of the department since September 2002.

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