(JENNIFER STAHN / iNFOnews.ca)

A Kamloops RCMP officer is not going to be charged for knocking a teenage robbery suspect off his bike in 2021.

A suspect in an armed robbery and theft from a liquor store fled from police on a bike around 7:23 p.m. on Dec. 3, 2021. There is no evidence that would convict the arresting officer of any crime, according to a statement from the BC Prosecution Service.

The unnamed officer chased the suspect into Riverside Park and hit the suspect's bike with their police SUV and the suspect ended up with “a serious laceration to his groin area.”

The crash happened when the suspect was riding at 15 km/h and the officer was driving at 23 km/h.

There had been a report about an armed robbery outside of a London Drugs where two male suspects used a “small gun” to take someone’s wallet. Less than two minutes after the armed robbery, a call came in about two male suspects who stole a “12 pack” and “boot kicked” a door at a liquor store 100 metres away.

The descriptions police had were that a liquor store theft suspect had been wearing white tie-dyed pants, and a suspect in the armed robbery was wearing a black hoodie.

When officers arrived on the scene they saw suspects on bikes matching the descriptions from both crimes, and the 911 dispatcher told officers the two crimes might be related.

The suspect that the officer injured had been wearing tie-dyed pants and a black hoodie with the hood up. He reportedly had the frame of an adult so police couldn’t tell how old he was.

The suspect didn’t stop for police when they turned on their emergency lights, nor when they told him to stop.

The chase involved at least three officers and there is dash camera footage of the whole thing.

After chasing the suspect into Riverside Park, the officer decided to end the chase by knocking the suspect off his bike by hitting the rear tire. Even though the suspect was injured, he got right up again and was arrested.

Police realized the suspect was 15 years old after he stood up following the crash. The cut in “his groin area” was treated with sutures in the hospital.

B.C.’s civilian police watchdog, the Independent Investigations Office, said there were grounds to think the officer might have broken the law during the arrest, so the case was forwarded to the BC Prosecution Service.

The BC Prosecution Service reviewed the evidence, including the dash camera footage, and decided a court would be unlikely to convict the officer for assault or dangerous driving.

The service said the officer had used a reasonable amount of force to end the chase, especially since the suspect might have had the gun that was used in the robbery. The service also said driving through the park and knocking the suspect over made sense since the park was nearly empty and the chase could have ended up back in a busier area.

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