The New Westminster Police Department is the police force for the City of New Westminster, British Columbia, Canada. It occupies the lower floors of the former Federal Building and Post Office at 555 Columbia Street, at the corner of 6th Street.[2] The force has around one hundred members; Dave Jansen has been Chief Constable since June 2020.[3]
The force was created in 1873 when the city council hired as its first constable Jonathan Morey, a former sergeant with the Royal Engineers, Columbia detachment, who stayed behind after the detachment was disbanded in 1863.[4][5] Other residents were temporarily deputized when needed; by the 1880s, as the number of constables increased, badges and uniforms were introduced and patrol routes and a budget instituted; the budget was reduced after a fire destroyed much of the city in 1898.[4]
From 1901 to 2001, except for a period in 1970 during renovations, the New Westminster Police Department was at the New Westminster City Hall. It was professionalized in the early 20th century and reorganized during the 1920s, when it also adopted the then new system of single fingerprint identification and was the first Canadian police department to use a modus operandi system. In 1977 the department established a Community Services Division, one of the earliest in British Columbia; in 1991 it opened a Community Police Office in the former Canadian Pacific Railway station.[4]
In 2001 the department moved to its own building and opened the New Westminster Police Museum, including materials assembled by the former New Westminster Police Historical Society and by Detective Constable D.E.A. "Ted" Usher, who published a book on the history of the department in 2000.[4][6]
On January 21, 2009, three off-duty police officers were arrested and detained overnight after being alleged to have racially abused, assaulted and participated in a robbery in downtown Vancouver against Firoz (Phil) Khan, a newspaper deliveryman.[7] The police constables came from the Delta Police Department, West Vancouver Police Department and New Westminster Police Service. On January 26, 2009, the Vancouver Police Department recommended to Crown Counsel for criminal charges to be laid against NWPS member Jeffrey Roger Klassen for assault and possession of stolen property and the WVPD officer Griffin Gillan for robbery. At the same time, the DPD officer was cleared of any wrongdoing.[8] Constable Jeffrey Klassen was conditionally discharged from the NWPD and sentenced to 1 year probation and 100 hours of community service after being found guilty of assault in April 2011.[9]
^Usher, Dale E. A. (2000). Policing the Royal City: A History of the New Westminster Police Service. Coquitlam, British Columbia: Dale E. A. Usher. ISBN9781550567854.
