Broudy family alleges assault by Saskatoon Police

Posted By Tyler Clarke, Journal Staff

Nipawin resident Virginia Broudy is sickened by the idea that her daughter Crystal Broudy, a 19-year-old woman who died of complications of cancer on March 29, was brought to tears during her last months due to the actions of Saskatoon Police.

"Our daughter was crying when we told her a couple of days later what had happened," Virginia Broudy emotionally recalls of her typically happy daughter. "She said mom and dad, you should do something about this."

On Feb. 7, the Broudy Family, including parents Virginia and Larry Broudy and their six kids, were in Saskatoon so that Crystal could receive cancer-related surgery.

"We were so happy when everything went well, and we stayed with her all that evening," she said.

By 9:30 p.m. the family left Crystal at the hospital for the evening, and went to Virginia Broudy's brother Roger Pelly's place for the evening, out of necessity. Joining the family at the house were Pelly's seven children.

"That was the only place we had to stay when we took our daughter in," Virginia Broudy said.

Unwinding from a stressful day, Virginia and Larry Broudy went out for an evening of bingo. Roger Pelly also left the house for the evening, leaving his 18, 17, and 15-year-old kids in charge of everyone.

At about 12:30 a.m., the Broudy family alleges that three police officers in two police cruisers arrived at the house, and began knocking on the door. Before Virginia and Larry's son Maurice Broudy made it to the door to answer it, he said the officers had let themselves in.

The three police officers, responding to a call by a neighbor who'd called about kids pelting his house with rocks, proceeded throughout the house in a rough "gang-like" manner, according to Virginia Broudy.

The family alleges that one officer hit Virginia and Larry's two-year-old son Raymond Broudy in the back with his knee, sending him to the ground, while another officer searched through computer files upon seeing another one of the kids sitting in front of a computer.

Virginia admits that although her niece Amy can look boyish, what the officers did next was another inexcusable act.

She said one officer would not believe that Amy was telling the truth when she told them her name, believing her to be a boy, so he pushed her outside in the frigidly cold winter weather, with only a t-shirt and pants covering her shivering body.

"The cop asked her if she was cold, and he said 'good because we can stand out here all night,'" Virginia and Larry's son Roger John recalls.

"I told them they had no right taking her outside," Maurice said, adding that he then tried to call his parents at the bingo hall.

"I tried to call mom, and [the police] hung the phone up on them," he said. Virginia recalls that when Maurice called, she could hear him say the word "police," but not much else before the phone clicked off. Immediately afterwards, Maurice said officers had him pinned against the couch so he couldn't touch the phone again.

It was about this time that Virginia says Roger Pelly arrived back home, to find his daughter Amy being kept outside in the cold. After some more commotion, the police left, leaving Pelly with his upset and badly shaken family. By the time Virginia and Larry got home, the children still appeared to be frightened.

"They're innocent kids, they didn't do anything wrong," Virginia said. Virginia alleges that even the call by a neighbor complaining about rocks being thrown at his house was erroneous.

"He said that the next day that he didn't even remember having called the cops, and said he was sorry," she said, adding that the neighbor was drunk the evening in question, and that there weren't even any rocks on the snow-covered ground for the kids to throw.

Virginia said that in addition to the physical roughness of the police, they were also verbally abusive, saying some things that kids should never hear.

"I'll knock your f-ing teeth out," Roger Broudy recalls police having told him that evening.

"My little brother [Larry Jr. Broudy] was upstairs and hiding. I heard a lot of yelling downstairs," Virginia and Larry's daughter Angel Pelly recalls. "I heard some swearing, and it was the cops swearing a lot."

Larry Broudy is curious as to why police entered the house at all, considering the fact that they didn't have a search warrant, or any evidence of wrongdoing. He said that afterwards, the officers didn't lay any charges or write a report covering what had taken place.

"They didn't have any reason for being there," he concluded.

What disturbs Virginia Broudy the most are the allegations that her two-year-old was hit with a knee in the back, and that her niece was forced outside in the cold in an act of torture for what police hoped would reveal the truth about her name.

"What was that cop thinking?" she asked.

When contacted, Saskatoon Police Services media spokesperson Allison Edwards couldn't find any files regarding anything taking place at the residence the evening in question.

With complaints against police, she said, the release of information to the public doesn't always take place.

"We judge it on a case by case basis to see if it is in the public's interest on disciplinary action," she said.

The person at the Saskatoon Police Services Watch Commander desk had a similar response, saying, "we have to be careful about people's personal lives."

The Broudy family feels that their voices have fallen on deaf ears with regards to this issue. Although Saskatoon Police Services told Virginia about a month ago that they would mail her confirmation that the three officers involved in the incident have received disciplinary actions, nothing has arrived from them in her post box.

"Nobody will listen to you, you can't prove anything," Angel Pelly recalls hearing a police officer say to her family the evening of the incident.

This comment aggravated Larry Broudy when he re-heard it.

"They can't do something like that and get away with it," he said. "Just because they have a badge, they're allowed to do it? If you or I did it, we'd be charged."

Ignored or not, Virginia Broudy said that what happened to her family that evening will stay with them for some time.

"They see a cop and they run away," she said of her children.

During a walk to a grocery store in Nipawin recently, she said that she had to chase Larry Jr. down, after he'd taken off running upon seeing a RCMP cruiser.

"I never want to go back to Saskatoon. I'm too afraid of these city cops," Virginia said. "How could this happen, when we took our daughter there for her surgery... I'm so upset about what they did."

Despite having shared their story with Saskatoon Police Services, the Broudy family has yet to receive any kind of apology for the officers' actions.

Article ID# 1605408