OTTAWA—An Ottawa Police Service detective accused of discreditable conduct after probing the COVID-19 vaccination status of the mothers of deceased infants testified at her hearing that she was upholding her oath as an officer when conducting the investigations.
“My duty as a police officer is to preserve life and property, to preserve the peace. And if I see any one of those situations arising where I need to step in and preserve life, I will do something. And that’s what I did, in good faith, as a police officer,” Constable Helen Grus testified at the Ottawa Police Service (OPS) building in Stittsville on May 27.
Const. Grus, a detective with the OPS sexual assault and child abuse unit, is accused of discreditable conduct for conducting an “unauthorized project” between June 2020 and January 2022 by looking into the sudden deaths of nine infants. Const. Grus is alleged to have accessed Ottawa police files and then contacted the coroner’s office to learn the COVID-19 vaccination status of the parents, as she believed there could be an association between the two.
On Jan. 30, 2022, Const. Grus also allegedly contacted the father of a deceased infant to inquire into the COVID-19 vaccination status of its mother, without the knowledge of the lead detective. While Const. Grus was suspended without pay from the OPS on Feb. 4, 2022, she was ordered to return to work with restrictions during an Oct. 11, 2022, OPS internal hearing.
