Constable Ali Mirza
Born and raised in Pakistan, Ali Mirza immigrated to Canada in 1988 at the age of 16. He became interested in the RCMP a year later, living in Ottawa, when he watched the Musical Ride. (a touring production in which RCMP members demonstrate their riding skills). But his parents had other plans for him. “I’m the only son in the family and a lot of times the culture is such that they’d prefer the only son to do something that’s more professional,” says Mirza. “Also, considering the history of Pakistan and India, they perceived a job in the police services as not the most desirable. Back in the homeland, the police have their role to play in corruption, so there’s not a lot of respect for them.”

So, like the good son, off he went to university to study as a mechanical engineer. It quickly became apparent, however, it was not the path for him. He tried to persuade his parents a few times to let him give policing a go, but to no avail. “I have one of those personalities where I need to be continually excited, for lack of a better word,” says Mirza, 34. “I would have found [engineering] to be too monotonous. I couldn’t imagine myself sitting behind a desk at all times and not having anything substantially different to do.”
But on he slogged. Five years into his studies, he couldn’t take it any more. “When I approached a level where I was pretty fed up with what I was doing, didn’t have any interest whatsoever, I sat down with my parents and told them this is not something I want to do with my life. They have always been quite reasonable, but if they truly believed something was wrong for me to do, reason went out the window. It was basically a direct order: you just do it. You don’t have to be from a specific ethnic origin; sometimes when parents tell you to do something, that’s what you do. I had tried another year and a half of commerce to appease them, even though I had no interest whatsoever. But they were reasonable and understood and now I don’t think there are two more proud parents out there.”

Mirza, who’s been stationed in Surrey for the six-and-a-half years following his training, says his parents’ apprehension is understandable. “The fact is, there’s a lot of uncertainty. It’s a tough job not only for the people who do it, but for their families. When you’re out there in an enforcement capacity, who knows what can happen? It’s important to show you’re capable and able to take care of yourself.”

As for the special needs of the South Asian community, Mirza, who speaks Punjabi, says, “Anybody and everybody needs to be represented, and they need to represent themselves. I do find sometimes people can be more cooperative but it can also go the other way. Sometimes their expectations can be different. They don’t expect you to treat them as a witness or victim or suspect; they may expect to be treated differently because it’s a cultural or language thing. Regardless, it’s important to be effective while policing, and sometimes part of being effective is being from the same background and having that knowledge. To me, the biggest thing is to educate others.”

Mirza, who also has a nephew in the RCMP, offers this advice to anyone considering applying to the force: “Do your research; know what you’re getting into. Approach it with an open mind, have no preconceived notions. Know in your heart and your mind that you really want to do this. Everybody thinks they want to help the community and you can say that as long as you mean it, and that means helping everybody. You cannot be biased. You can’t expect someone’s going to give you favours or bring you down based on your background. I haven’t experienced it, and I don’t think I ever will. It’s going to be hard work. It’s not about a power trip. Ultimately, this is one of the best jobs. There are other jobs that pay more but, to me, this is a lot more fulfilling.”

Corporal Nav Hothi
Corporal Nav Hothi is no Marg Helgenberger, but she does the CSI actress’s fictional work in the real world. As forensics identification specialist for the RCMP, Hothi’s Surrey beat is less glamorous than Las Vegas, to be sure, but the process is obviously more realistic. And that can often be a problem.

“Television makes everything seem so easy and so quick with results each and every time,” laments Hothi, who joined the forensics unit five years ago following five years of general duty. “So when I go to a residential break-in the homeowners often think I should find the evidence as quickly as they do on television. I don’t find it frustrating as much as I find it disheartening that people may get their hopes up by watching television. But when you explain that it is television and everything is made out to look a bit better, they understand. But it’s always a little hard on me to have to dash their hopes.”

Hothi says the forensics branch has seen a spike in interest ever since CSI became a runaway hit for CBS, but new applicants are often surprised to learn not only how much more involved the process is, but how different it is north of the 49th. “Because it’s an American program, things are different,” explains Hothi, who studied genetics at UBC before joining the RCMP. “A lot of Canadians who are interested in forensics don’t realize that in Canada, all the crime scene work is done by police officers. [In the U.S.], generally scientists are hired as civilians by the department to work in their unit.”

That’s not to say you need a degree to examine fingerprints and DNA evidence. Hothi says interested officers are assessed for their aptitude and above-average investigative skills before being admitted to the four-year apprenticeship program. They must also be in possession of a strong stomach: forensics specialists are not hunched over a microscope all day but attend actual crime scenes with real dead bodies. “We know what we’re getting into before we apply to the section,” says Hothi, 35. “As a police officer, you deal with death investigations whether they’re suspicious or not, so you learn whether or not you have the ability to deal with those sorts of files even before you apply to it. Some people are able to deal with it better than others.”

Hothi, who was born just outside of London, England, and came to Canada before her first birthday, deals with the stress of the job through yoga, keeping fit and volunteering. Every summer she gives her time to the Canadian Cancer Society’s Camp Good Times in Maple Ridge for children with cancer. She was also part of a forensics team that went to Thailand last year to assist with identifying victims of the tsunami.

A more cheerful pursuit was time spent in Torino during the Winter Olympics. In full red serge, Hothi and a colleague were stationed at the British Columbia-Canada Place to meet and greet visitors who had some rather unusual queries. “The first question was always, ‘You must be an actress,’” says Hothi with a chuckle. “They didn’t think a real police officer would come and do this. The second question was, ‘Where’s your horse?’ and the third question was invariably, ‘I didn’t know they had women in the force.’ The federal police of Italy only began allowing women to enter the police in 2005, so they were a little surprised to see a female. “Perhaps if they’d been watching CSI . . .

Sergeant Baltej Dhillon
In his 15 years with the force, Baltej Dhillon has worked on two notorious investigations — Air India and Willy Picton — but being at the centre of the turban controversy before he even got on the streets is perhaps his biggest claim to fame. After being accepted into the RCMP in 1989, he was given a choice: lose the turban or lose the job. His subsequent legal battle was victorious, of course, and in 1990, Dhillon became the first RCMP officer to wear a turban on the job.

Reached in Hawaii, where he was mixing business with vacation, the Malay-born Dhillon says, “It was a surprise to me that [the turban] became an issue. I come from Malaysia, a place where it was never something that was questioned. You would see police officers very commonly wearing turbans and serving law enforcement and armed forces. It was never an issue.”

Although no longer an issue here, during those difficult times when it was, Dhillon, a polygraph specialist, forged on because of how the RCMP handled the few racist incidents he encountered. “It was dealt with very quickly and decisively by the detachment commander at the time, which further strengthened my belief and commitment to this organization,” Dhillon says. “We may all have our own opinions but when it comes down to getting in line, we all snap to attention and follow our orders and get the job done the same way. The fact I’m a sergeant at 15 years working in a very specialized section — there are only 15 polygraph examiners in the RCMP across the country — speaks volumes that I’ve been judged on my experience, my skill, my work ethic and my commitment to my job, not what I wear on my head.”

As a result, Dhillon, who also instructs at the Pacific Region Training Centre in Chilliwack on statement-taking and interviewing techniques, has become a bit of a reluctant role model. “I never asked for that to happen but the universe put me in that position so I accept that role. A lot of the younger, junior members coming into the force look at me as someone who’s led the way, and I think it’s absolutely important in my professional and personal life that I maintain a high standard of living, high standard of respect and commitment both to personal and professional life.”

After spending most of his years on investigative cases, Dhillon, who turns 40 this year, is the guy who will catch you in a lie. “I always had an interest in interviewing people and conducting both witness and suspect interviews. The polygraph is largely that,” says Dhillon, who’s been ferreting out untruths for four years. “The majority of the time is spent communicating and interviewing the person, and the end part of the process is the actual polygraph, which takes about 10 or 15 minutes.”

Dhillon says people will always try to beat the polygraph but it’s become so sophisticated over the years that it’s now 92 to 98 per cent reliable.

After coming to Canada in 1983 at the age of 16, Dhillon had his sights set on the law. He was well on his way, gathering credits at Kwantlen College for law school, when he decided acquiring some volunteer service with a law-enforcement or crime-prevention agency would be advantageous. He signed on as a volunteer with the RCMP and his sights refocused. “The people I worked with maintained a very high level of professionalism and commitment and dedication to their jobs,” Dhillon recalls. “All of that, including the fact that at that time there was a shortage of members who could speak Punjabi and were from the community, all culminated into this realization that this is a place I could serve and be very happy.”

Dhillon, who speaks Malay and Punjabi, says it’s important for Indo-Canadians to be a part of the force because “any police force should be reflective of its community and the people that it serves, to completely fulfill its mandate of being impartial and being able to serve everyone. As far as the organization is concerned, to meet those goals and objectives, it’s important to recruit people from all walks of life. And as far as ourselves as members of the Indo-Canadian community, I think it’s important for us to take on these responsibilities, become part of the mainstream organizations that make up the backbone of the country . . . [because] it’s also our responsibility — I don’t think anybody else is going to step in and do it for us — to ensure that the laws of this country are served and are respected by all, and that everyone is served equally without bias, without prejudice and discrimination. And the only way to do that is to do it from the inside. You can’t stand on the outside and try to bring about that type of change. You must commit, you must join, you must get involved to bring about that type of awareness, education and, ultimately, equal treatment of all people.”

Dhillon feels so passionately about these ideals that if his two daughters, 8 and 14, showed interest in police work, he’d be the first one to welcome them into the fold. “I would support them 100 per cent. I’d be very proud if that was their career choice.” And why not? Dhillon’s brother-in-law, nephew and wife’s cousin are all fellow RCMP officers; his sister is a public servant with the RCMP; and his sister-in-law is the office manager with the Surrey RCMP. “We could start our own detachment,” he says with a laugh.

Dhillon keeps his spirits high and stress low through exercise (he runs up to eight kilometers four times a week), yoga and meditation. In fact, he’s studying to become a yoga teacher. “You are dealing with probably the most evil side of humanity at times, and the most sad and desperate times of a human being,” he says of the more challenging side of the job. “You need broad shoulders to carry that and to deal with those things. I’ve found over the years exercise and commitment to my faith has allowed me to keep a balanced lifestyle.”

As for the future, Dhillon is planning to enter the officer candidate program, with an eye to serving as an inspector in the commissioned ranks. “Regardless of what the future brings,” he says, “I’ve already gone beyond where I thought I would be when I first joined. Everything from now on is gravy, really. I’ve had an opportunity to travel the world, to meet members in all kinds of different police forces, to work on very interesting cases. But the most important things that have stayed with me the longest are those people whose appreciation you see in their eyes when you’re able to help them in their time of need. That is the most cherished and rewarding part of the job.”

Inspector Amrik Virk
Coming from a long line of soldiers who served in the British Army, it’s not surprising Amrik Virk was drawn to the RCMP. But there was perhaps also a response to racism that steered him there. “Being an immigrant, when you’re young, people always say, ‘Go back to where you came from.’ Well, when I have to assert that this is where I belong, this is who I am and this is the nation to which I owe my allegiance, I thought, what better way to do that than by being in uniform. You can’t tell me I’m from somewhere else when I’ve got Canada written on the side of my arm.”

Virk was born in the Punjab and came to Canada when he was five. He grew up in Williams Lake and, although it was long his intention to join the force, Virk felt it important to first get a university education. After graduating from SFU with degrees in economics and history, he went for his police training in Regina and was posted to Alberta, where he spent 14 years. As the province’s first South Asian RCMP officer, he faced racism both inside the force and out. “A lot of it was from the lower echelons, people who lived on the fringe of society that were going to jail anyhow,” says Virk. “I think you have to handle it with integrity, dignity, professionalism and tact. And you have to be assertive, prove you bleed the same colour blood when you’re in a battle on the streets.”

Virk says he felt some of the backlash aimed at Baltej Dhillon, who succeeded in overturning the ban on turbans in 1990. Although he wore a turban at his wedding, Virk does not wear one on the job but defends his colleagues’ right to do so. “Men in uniform have worn turbans and died for the British empire for 300 years. Members of the Sikh regiment won the Victoria Cross [more often than] any other regiment in the world. If you look at pictures of my grandfather in British uniform, it looks remarkably like the boots and breeches of the RCMP right now. If a turban was good enough then, it’s darn good enough now.”

Although he finds speaking Punjabi to be an asset, Virk says “CQ” is just as important. “At one point we had IQ, intelligence quotient, then there was EQ, emotional quotient, now it’s CQ, cultural competency, a real understanding of the culture, the nuances, values and traditions. Being South Asian may make you able to relate better, as long you have an appreciation of the things that make people tick in the culture.”

Over his 19 years on the force, the 41-year-old father of three has done general duty, worked in aboriginal communities, gone undercover and for eight years was a sniper on the emergency response team. “I was the man in black sitting in the bush with a rifle in my hand,” he says. Today he’s the assistant operations officer for Surrey in charge of eight different areas, including media, victim services, traffic, community and auxiliary policing. He remains amazed at the number of different opportunities within the force. “We’re so diverse in what we do, from log theft to commercial crime to emergency response teams to complex investigations. Overseas, we have liaison positions in every capital in the world. We have members in Jordan training the Iraqi army, we have people in Bosnia, on peace-keeping missions, diplomatic positions. We’re behind the scenes in Iraq, Afghanistan, Jordan — you name it.”

To anyone who wants to be a part of it, Virk’s idea of the perfect candidate is someone who upholds the tenets of the organization. “If you look at the core values of the RCMP — honesty, integrity, compassion, professionalism — it’s somebody who lives and breathes that,” he says. “Somebody who wants to do the right thing, not because somebody’s looking, but at all times. Somebody who’s really committed to being Canadian, to improving their community, who has a real enthusiasm to go out and make things better. That’s the person who’s successful. It’s dignified employment and you’re doing something of value. You can make a lot more money doing something else but that’s not the reason you join the RCMP. It’s not a job, it’s something far, far beyond that.”