In the more than two years that Insp. Peter Lambertucci has been an RCMP liaison officer (LO) posted abroad, he says he's never done the same thing two days in a row.
One day he might be working on a drug investigation, the next it could be a human smuggling, a homicide investigation or a national security threat.
"One of the challenges is you have to come into the job with a breadth of skills," says Lambertucci. "Layer one is you really have to understand all the elements of a criminal investigation."
As a part of the LO network, he's there to support the RCMP and other Canadian law enforcement agencies in advancing investigations at home that have a nexus abroad and to support criminal investigations there that have a Canadian connection.
One International
After almost two years as the LO in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Lambertucci has been reassigned to a new post in Canberra, Australia, which was one of the 18 countries that was a part of his area of responsibility (AOR) from Kuala Lumpur.
"With the opening of Australia this summer, it allowed us to sever part of the AOR, with Canberra and Kuala Lumpur now splitting the countries," says Lambertucci.
LOs work out of the Canadian Embassy, Consulate or High Commission in the country in which they're based. They work closely with Canadian partners like the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development (DFATD) and Canada Border Services Agency.
The Canberra office is one of four new international posts that the RCMP opened in 2014 on a trial basis as part of its new strategy, One International, that aims to increase the RCMP's reach, visibility and influence abroad.
"We want to have a strong presence on the global stage," says C/Supt. Eric Slinn, director general of Federal and International Services at the RCMP. "Communication has made our world smaller and it's becoming, in one sense, increasingly difficult to fight organized crime and national security threats at home. Now you have to take the fight to them."
The new posts, in Canberra, Australia, Ankara, Turkey, Panama City, Panama and Nairobi, Kenya, were strategically chosen, key areas where having LOs will help Canadian law enforcement agencies at home.
In a first for the RCMP, there are now 10 criminal analysts posted around the globe. Each analyst works with an LO, and sometimes more than one depending on their AOR, and in a few posts, are directly embedded with a local law enforcement agency.
"We thought there would be great value in putting criminal analysts in theatre with the LOs, doing the analytical work and then building their own network," says Slinn. "Getting information at the source, that was key. It's the same old idea that you have to be there to get something."
International analysts tap into intelligence
From London to Dubai, 10 RCMP criminal analysts have been deployed as part of a pilot project to track transnational terrorism and organized crime in key areas that affect the safety of Canadians back home.
"By sending criminal analysts abroad, they can tap into this intelligence at the source and send it back to Canada," says C/Supt. Warren Coons, the director general, National Intelligence Co-ordination Centre.
Kathleen Macoomb is the analyst deployed overseas, or ADO, in Mexico City, Mexico. From the information she gathers, she looks for links, patterns and trends.
"I can connect files in my area of responsibility (AOR) that have a nexus back to Canada," says Macoomb. "The liaison officers are very busy, but I'm able to focus on the different files they're working on, as well as my own, and find any connections within them."
The ADOs build a strong network of partners in their AOR. Through face-to-face conversations, they're able to nurture relationships and build trust that facilitates information exchanges.
"With the partners in my AOR, if they have information regarding individuals, trends, drug routes, then I can bring that back to Canada as investigative leads or strategic information," says Macoomb. "If we're not there, we won't have access to that information. We may only ever know the Canadian side or we may never learn about a specific topic at all."
These opportunities to work with international partners assist the RCMP in finding key connections in organized crime and terrorism files that benefit Canada's national security, as well as contribute to international law enforcement investigations ongoing in their AOR.
So far, the ADO pilot project has surpassed expectations, says Debbie Counsel, the ADOs' supervisor.
"If you look at drug trafficking, we might have picked up a controlled delivery of drugs on Canadian soil, but we didn't know the source. Our analysts abroad have been able to articulate what that connection is, who the sources are and where they're located," says Counsel. "The doors have been opened to a whole new conduit of information."
— Deidre Seiden
Sgt. Marc Labonté, the LO for the new post in Turkey, has wanted this to happen since his first LO position in Morocco several years ago.
"At that time, I was covering 26 countries, it was information overload," says Labonté. "I said if I could have a partner with me, I'd prefer to have an analyst because of their ability to take information, see trends, create charts and develop reports. Now to do that locally here in Turkey, we can gather and give National Headquarters the information needed with the local perspective of the analyst."
The 14 new posts increases the RCMP's international footprint to 51 resources posted abroad, which is one more than Slinn's original goal of 50.
"If we're going to take the fight offshore, which I think we have to do, we're going to have to increase our presence out there," says Slinn.
Building relationships
Increasing the RCMP's presence is just the first step. Once the LOs and analysts are there, it's their job to hit the ground running.
One of the key messages that LOs learn in pre-deployment, the training they receive before they leave for their new position, is to go to their post and meet the right people.
The RCMP International Liaison Co-ordination Centre (ILCC) provides support to the LOs, with each one assigned to a desk officer.
"Their main job is to network," says S/Sgt. Richard Marcotte, a desk officer responsible for the Asia Pacific territory. "An LO receives a lot of requests. They'll get the job done if they have the right contacts and the right people in place."
Then they have to multiply this by up to 21 countries, depending on how many countries fall under their AOR.
"If the LO has a contact already, they can make a phone call," says S/Sgt. Eric Lalancette, a regional co-ordinator with the ILCC. "If they don't, then they're going to go in person and network and try to find the answer or information that's being sought by the unit back in Canada."
And the very foundation of these partnerships is built on trust.
"If you can gain the trust of those other law enforcement agencies, they'll start exchanging information," says Slinn. "You'll start exchanging information and you'll start to see how those reciprocal relationships with trust flourish and solve a greater amount of crime."
Advancing operations
Since Lambertucci already had a network established in Australia, he worked on building stronger relationships and growing that network. It's his favourite part of the job.
"From a relationship basis and understanding that as an LO your work is as good as the relationships you can form, it's just a really great feeling when you have successes and you're bridging relationships and building partnerships to do that," says Lambertucci.
If it weren't for LOs, a lot of investigations that have an international component would either take much longer or would come to a standstill. They're tasked by every division of the RCMP and serve all other Canadian law enforcement agencies as well.
In 2011, Cpl. Trent Marshall, alongside a team of Federal Serious and Organized Crime (FSOC) officers based in Kelowna, B.C., began an investigation into an organized crime group operating in British Columbia that was exporting marijuana and importing cocaine. The investigation also included conducting an undercover operation in Mexico City, Mexico.
Arrangements were made through the LO's office to put the investigators from Canada in touch with the right authorities in Mexico City, enabling the undercover operation to take place.
"We went through a very detailed operational plan process in order to carry out the undercover operation in a foreign country," says Marshall. "That undercover operation was so successful that we subsequently conducted two additional undercover operations in Panama and, once again, the LO's office out of Columbia (responsible for Panama) helped us facilitate it."
It wasn't the first time Marshall successfully worked with the LO in other countries. In 2010, liaison officers in Brazil and Mexico helped an FSOC investigation involving a large amount of cocaine that was being imported in a commercial fruit grinding machine from Argentina. It led to the conviction of three men on several charges.
At home and abroad
At the very root of what Lambertucci, Labonté and all the LOs do is information sharing, which is done through Memorandums of Understanding and through informal, face-to-face conversations.
It's a reciprocal relationship; whatever they're allowed to share, they will share with their partners abroad. Most RCMP LOs are part of an LO group or association that allows them to regularly meet with their counterparts, like the American, Australian and British LOs, as well as the local partners.
"If you have a good relationship with your partners, they'll let you know when they know about a Canadian there," says Marcotte. "That's how you're going to find out the information, through police contacts. If it's not the locals, another partner will tell you that there's a Canadian group or person here operating."
That's when the LO will open an investigation, which is something that Slinn hopes to see more often. He'd like to see LOs move from being task-driven to mission-driven.
He likens this to front-line police officers being dispatched to a call versus the times when police officers aren't being dispatched, they often do something proactive, like set up a checkpoint to make sure that people are wearing their seatbelts.
"Taking into consideration the type of criminality that's typical in their AOR, like the Middle East, is more around national security issues, I want our LOs to look for opportunities to advance operational files in that area," says Slinn.
While LOs play a significant role abroad, they don't have jurisdiction outside of Canada, once again relying on their partners to help.
The relationships work two ways. Canada shares information with their partners and helps the foreign agencies with investigations that affect Canada, but they also offer capacity building to the nations that benefit from it.
It's a way for the RCMP to leverage those organizations that they work with and develop trust in one another by offering things like investigative training, forensic interviewing, surveillance training, interview techniques and ship boarding and searching.
They do what's called a needs assessment mission, which is done in concert with DFATD. Then they meet the partner agencies and ask, "What can we do to help you?"
"We never want to tell them what we think they need," says Lambertucci. "We always want them to work with us, and by helping them there it helps us back home."
Challenging but rewarding
To be successful, the LOs have to learn the laws and the culture of the country they're in and knowing the language is an asset. They also have to learn the operating procedures and policies of the local police as these can be very different from those in Canada.
"Our LOs are expected to have a variety of operational experiences," says Insp. Rich Baylin, officer in charge of International Operations and Policing Development. "Expertise in areas such as major crime, drugs, financial crime and national security are essential given the type of investigations an LO is expected to support."
Their decision making has to be sound and it has to be with confidence. "It has to be of a certain level of knowledge, skills and abilities — what we call the KSAs — to make decisions on a day-to-day basis," says Lambertucci.
While they have the support of the ILCC and the network of other foreign LOs that they can turn to if they have questions, for the most part, it's just them.
It's not an easy job, but it's an important job. "That's what makes it great," says Labonté. "You get to experience different cities and cultures, and even the way that different police forces work."
And Canada is a safer place for it.
"Without our LOs liaising for us between the countries they work in, we wouldn't be getting the assistance that we're getting right now from our partners abroad," says Lalancette.
It's the relationship an LO has with his local partners and network, like police and prosecutors, that make them instrumental in Canada's ability to carry out criminal operations abroad.
"We're not police when we go there," says Marshall. "We need their contacts. We need to work with our partners on a far more regular basis so that we can essentially stop crime where it's starting as opposed to doing it far down the line back here in Canada."