London Police Service changing how femicide cases are handled

Fighting back tears, Linda Davidson said, “I didn’t want to do this (get emotional),” as she tries to come up with an answer to how she’s feeling knowing changes are coming to the way London Police handle future cases of femicide.

Davidson has spent this past year advocating for change. Last fall, her daughter, Tiffany Gates, was murdered by her boyfriend, Christopher Charlton, inside an apartment on Proudfound Lane in London, Ont.

“I just don’t think that when your child gets murdered, that you should have to try to justify their innocence,” said Davidson.

Despite the coroner’s report confirming that Tiffany was murdered, London police took months to release additional information, including the offender’s name and that Gates was the victim in this incident.

“Because they didn’t mention him… It left a lot of speculation,” said Davidson. “It’s bad enough you lose a child, you don’t want to fight every step of the way to get them some justice.”

London Police Chief Thai Truong admits this case could have been handled differently and said moving forward a number of changes will be implemented.

“Could we have done things better? Absolutely,” said London Police Chief Thai Truong.

“I’ve spoken to Linda for many, many hours on countless occasions. What she has had to endure, and what she continues to endure, is heartbreaking for any person,”

Current legislation prevents police from being able to release a deceased person’s name who committed a crime if no charges were laid.

“Historically we would never name. Moving forward, we are going to look at every case individually, understand the importance of naming victims and naming offenders, even in cases where the offender has died by suicide and we actually are not permitted to name those offenders,” explained Chief Truong.

Local advocacy groups said this is a step in the right direction.

“Provincially, we have been calling on police services to have conversations and to be able to call it what it is, and to be able to let the community know what is happening,” said ANOVA’s Executive Director, Jessie Rodgers.

“I will say the London Police Service is stepping forward in a way that we’re not seeing other police services do.”

Rodgers said there have been eight cases of femicide regionally so far this year, with two locally, including one last month.

London Police will also implement changes to their service delivery model – including additional training.

“We need to provide specialized training officers to deal with intimate partner violence occurrences,” said Truong. “From the start, you’re going to have specialized investigators take those investigations from start to finish.”

As for Davidson, she said her work is not done. She hopes to continue speaking to young women and girls to help prevent future femicides.