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(BRENDAN KERGIN / iNFOnews.ca)

A BC Mountie whose honesty and integrity were questioned after she submitted numerous dubious expense claims has avoided any repercussions after her superiors failed to take action in time.

According to a recently published June 4 RCMP Conduct Board decision, Cpl. Coralie Wilkinson was accused of double dipping on her expenses in 2019 when she moved from Prince George to Fort St. John.

Cpl. Wilkinson was given official notice of an RCMP Conduct Board Hearing regarding the allegations, but argued this was initiated after the one-year time period, and therefore should be dismissed.

The RCMP Act states that the Mounties have one year to take action against a member. Past this time period and any accusations will be thrown out.

The decision says that in early 2019, Cpl. Wilkinson was promoted to a corporal position, which required her to move from Prince George to the Fort St. John detachment.

She submitted various expense claims for her relocation to Fort St. John as well as for travel back and forth.

The decision says she'd made an agreement with the Unit Commander, Staff Sgt. Parks, that she could continue to live in Prince George while working on a sensitive investigation, even though she'd been transferred to Fort St. John.

The decision says that at around this time, some of her superiors and fellow officers began to question the legitimacy of some of her expense claims.

A few months after she'd taken the promotion in Fort St. John, an RCMP corporal spoke to the detachment's superintendent about one of her expense claims for a trip.

Supt. Floyd noted, "It appears she has claimed expenses for being in Prince George but also expenses for travel to... Fort St. John… which suggests she was in travel status for both."

The superintendent looked to confirm any prior agreement she'd made with her former staff sergeant but found nothing.

At around the same time, RCMP Cpl. Bandurak, who was working on the special investigation file with her, raised concerns with the superintendent about Cpl. Wilkinson's "honesty and integrity regarding claims she’s submitting."

The decision says Superintendent Floyd discussed the claims with Cpl. Wilkinson, saying there "appeared to be a continuation" of her submitted claims she wasn't entitled to and saw them as "double billing."

The superintendent sent a detachment-wide email reminding all the officers about expenses and approvals.

The decision doesn't say how many expense claims Cpl. Wilkinson submitted or give any indication of how much they were worth.

A year after the superintendent spoke to Cpl. Wilkinson about her expenses, she moved from Prince George to Fort St. John. A few weeks later, she filed a harassment complaint against Supt. Floyd.

There's no mention in the decision of what the harassment complaint was about or its outcome.

Six months later, the RCMP Conduct Board began an investigation into Cpl. Wilkinson's expenses.

Cpl. Wilkinson used the evidence her detachment had about her "curious" expense claims to argue the Conduct Board investigation was initiated more than one year after it knew and therefore was out of time.

While the Prince George detachment argued it needed more than "mere suspicion" to trigger a formal investigation, the Conduct Board disagreed.

Supt. Floyd said after she filed a harassment complaint against him, he was prompted to review the claims and realized the "scope of questionable and irregular expenses."

However, the Conduct Board didn't buy it.

"I find that Superintendent Floyd had obtained sufficient information by the end of May 2019 to know that (Cpl. Wilkinson) appeared to have contravened the (RCMP) Code of Conduct by filing inappropriate expense claims," the Board ruled. "I find that the conduct hearing against the (Cpl. Wilkinson) was initiated outside of the one-year time limitation period."

Ultimately, all allegations against the corporal were dismissed.

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