Kelly Donovan: The Fearlessness of a Police Whistleblower

Kelly Donovan stood before attendees at the 2023 ACFE Women’s Summit, shoulders back and head held high. Carrying the same iPad that she often does, which helps the former Canadian police officer living with Post Traumatic Stress Injury (PTSI) and short-term memory loss, Donovan detailed her story of domestic abuse, police corruption and the on-going fight for whistleblower advocacy and justice. But more than that, Donovan told a story of unbelievable courage and personal sacrifice that revealed the character of a woman and mother who deserves to be heard.

“I knew then, like I know now, that things will never get better unless we have strong, ethical leadership,” Donovan said. “I want nothing more than for you to leave here today inspired to be true to yourself. Colonialism and patriarchy have had their turn, but today is International Women’s Day, and now, it’s our turn.”

A Woman in Policing

The valedictorian of her high school class, Donovan graduated from the University of Western Ontario and entered the banking industry, discovering a passion for fraud and money laundering investigations. While pursuing her first career, and shortly after giving birth to her third child, Donovan’s home life turned bad. Her then-husband, a police officer himself in the town where they lived, escalated years of financial and psychological abuse into two incidents of physical altercations. Getting no support from local police — her husband’s colleague taking Donovan’s statement only warned her to “keep in mind the ramifications of what you’re telling us” — the pair ultimately separated. Donovan used Canada’s freedom of information laws to uncover a haunting revelation that some officers in that investigation lied to defend their colleague, and decision-makers in the precinct chose to do nothing.

“I was called a liar,” Donovan said. “There’s only one thing worse than being victimized, and that’s being denied your existence.”

Donovan made the decision to effect change from within and became a police officer in 2010.

Early in her second career, Donovan remembered learning on the job that, while the police are entrusted to defend the rule of law, some rules are OK for officers to break — Donovan highlighted a veteran policeman starting his day of training a rookie officer by picking up his free coffee from Tim Horton’s. It is this type of inherited organizational freedom within policing that Donovan believes cascades into more and more opportunities to bend the rules.

After five years on the force, some of that time spent working fraud cases that the Fraud Branch could not handle and being commended by colleagues, Donovan earned the opportunity to become a Use of Force instructor, leading weapons and techniques training at police headquarters. Donovan returned to the very same outdoor range where, as an incoming recruit, she witnessed a near-fatal accidental discharge of a fellow recruit. In reliving many of those traumatic details, Donovan began experiencing symptoms of PTSD for the first time.

Despite this, Donovan carried on with commitment to her cause and good intentions.

However, it was during this stretch of her career that Donovan was first exposed to police leadership more consistently. When domestic allegations were made against an officer, the decision to investigate or charge was made by Donovan’s chief, and these decisions were noticeably inconsistent — Donovan recalled being personally informed of an officer facing allegations of dangerous domestic behavior that were completely ignored. This trend pervades the Canadian police ranks, as Donovan noted that the country’s laws do not address domestic violence allegations made against a police officer, let alone include a national mandate like the U.S.’s Violence Against Women Act.

“The statistics are very clear,” Donovan said. “Police officers are two to four times more likely to commit domestic violence than the general public, and yet, we still allow them to investigate themselves.”

Elevating her concerns about the police chief with her police union, Donovan was stonewalled and told, “It’s just the way policing was.” Donovan next filed a complaint with oversight bodies to have her police chief investigated, only to again be met with roadblocks; it turns out, she was prohibited by law to file a complaint against him. Finally, Donovan made her disclosure directly to the Police Services Board who are charged hiring police chiefs, monitoring their performances and are Ontario’s first level of oversight among police.

One week later, Donovan was served a notice of investigation. She, not the police chief who she believed was acting unethically, now faced six charges of misconduct. Donovan lost her role as a Use of Force instructor, was placed on administrative duties and was ordered not to appear before the board again without her chief’s permission. In response, Donovan emailed board members directly and addressed her concerns about having been silenced and retaliated against. That email was shared directly with Donovan’s chief, who charged her with two additional counts of misconduct and ordered her to never contact board members again. While it’s the board’s responsibility to oversee police chief behavior, it is police chiefs themselves who control what information reaches the board.

Donovan was silenced and painted as “the villain.”

After 12 months spent reaching out to parties within the Canadian government, as well as on-going retaliation from that same police chief, Donovan began investigating cases of whistleblower retaliation within Canadian police ranks, as well as a full analysis of Canada’s limited whistleblower laws. It was during this time that a $167 million class action lawsuit was filed against Donovan’s police service by a group of women, alleging systemic gender discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual assault. While Donovan did not have a claim in the lawsuit, it further fueled her into speaking out about what was going on.

In June 2017, Donovan chose to resign after six years on her own terms. Refusing to sign a strict Non-Disclosure Agreement that would prevent her from speaking out, Donovan agreed to resignation terms that allowed her to speak freely about her experiences and retain critical worker’s compensation for treatment of her PTSD. In return, she would not pursue legal action against the department.

Donovan left policing with confidence her story could effect change. While she continued that fight to see change happen, her entanglement with police was far from over.

The Courage of a Whistleblower

After resigning, Donovan started a business that encouraged companies to establish whistleblower hotlines. Soon after, she publicly released the 93-page report she had begun working on during her final year as a police officer — this collection of silenced police whistleblower cases became her first book. Donovan was doing well, and throughout the fall of 2017, her health improved and her business expanded.

That’s when police retaliation invaded her civilian life.

The $167 million class-action lawsuit previously filed against her former police department was thrown out, as the department used Donovan’s story as an example of how they “handled complaints from female members appropriately.” Soon after, her claim for PTSD treatment was appealed by the department, and police filed additional claims against her with the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal, citing that their agreement was being violated every time Donovan spoke publicly about her experiences. That application asked for significant damages “for the harm I’d caused to their reputation,” demanded Donovan take down her business website, stop selling her book and retract all public allegations she made. The mounting pressure caused Donovan’s health to spiral as she battled feelings of depression, hopelessness and, at times, suicide. She was unable to work consistently and was ultimately forced to sell her home and move her three children into her parents’ house.

In 2018, Donovan filed a lawsuit to have the case against her dismissed, citing breach of contract and Canada’s Anti-Slap Law; the judge ruled that courts could not dismiss tribunal matters due to jurisdictional issues. After Donovan successfully appealed the decision, it was countered with another motion to dismiss the case for the exact same reason as before. This duplicate motion was accepted, and her lawsuit was dismissed two years later, resulting in Donovan having to pay the police department’s court costs and fees.

In Canada’s legal database with records going back to 1877, Donovan has not been able to find another litigant that was allowed to file duplicate motions and succeed. Not one.

“I never imagined how much my gender would limit my access to justice,” Donovan said. “But in the end, it became obvious to me: only female judges would ask me clarifying questions, and when I won at the Ontario Court of Appeals, it was before a panel of three female judges. If there was even one male judge present, not only did I not feel heard, but the unsuccessful written decisions did not even adequately represent my arguments.”

Ultimately, the tribunal threw out three-fourths of Donovan’s claims in the lawsuit. She was no longer allowed to pursue legal action in court, and now, her case before the tribunal cannot proceed. As of September 2022, lawyers defending the police department have been paid more than $560,000 in cases opposing Donovan — though, as Donovan pointed out, that figure is higher today.

The police chief Donovan reported has since been promoted to deputy commissioner within the federal Canadian Mounted Police service.

After Donovan addressed Ontario legislature in 2018, police laws were changed to allow officers to report misconduct, as well as provide limited protections from reprisal. Though this small victory pales in comparison to the country’s poorly structured whistleblower protection laws – Donovan cited a study of whistleblower protections of 61 countries in which Canada was tied for last place — the war on whistleblowers in the country continues. Look no further than the infamous SNC-Lavalin allegations that landed squarely at the feet of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

“It will take ethical, courageous leaders within our organizations to stand behind those challenging abuses of power that betray public trust,” Donovan said. “Once we stop letting powerful people cover up their crimes, and we start amplifying the voices of those brave enough to come forward with issues, we will inspire a generation of ethical leaders. We cannot let anyone force us to move our line in the sand, and we must be self-aware enough to look at ourselves and see if we’re doing the very same thing.”

Kelly Donovan’s story serves as the benchmark for courage and stands to empower ethical decision-makers everywhere to fight for what is right.

“I define my success by my ability to maintain my ethics. The police service couldn’t buy my silence in 2017 because I knew that these issues were important matters of public interest, and I was not going to cover them up just because they wanted me to,” Donovan said. “Six years later, they still can’t buy my silence. This fight has almost destroyed me, but I know that I cannot give up. Just by surviving to fight another day, I know that I’m succeeding.”