With half a century of service, when it comes to financial crime Sergeant Bernie Martin has seen it all
By Ian Lordon
Careers
Over 50 years ago Sergeant Bernie Martin made the decision to join the RCMP, and hasn’t looked back since.
Image by Martine Chenier
December 5, 2024
Content
The life of an RCMP officer is always full of surprises, even after 50 years.
Sergeant Bernie Martin, who has been policing for so long he might think otherwise, was reminded of this in October when Commissioner Mike Duheme unexpectedly presented him with a certificate recognizing his golden anniversary as a member.
"It wasn't me, sir!" Martin replied when the Commissioner interrupted a meeting at headquarters in Ottawa and called on the veteran financial crime investigator to come forward and accept his well-earned honour. Martin's denial may have veered a little from the RCMP core value of 'take responsibility,' but he has more than made up for it by serving with excellence since 1974. "When you joined I was nine years old," the Commissioner marvelled. "Talk about corporate knowledge."
Troop 25
Martin himself was barely out of his teens when he joined the RCMP, only a young man of 20, but he well remembers the fall morning when he left his home in Truro, Nova Scotia to become a Mountie.
"November 4," he recalls later. "It was a Monday just like it is this year. I got up Monday morning, my parents drove me to H Division headquarters on Hollis Street in Halifax. There were three of us who showed up, a friend of mine and another guy I didn't know before. We swore in and went to the airport and flew to Regina. Simple as that."
Regina, Saskatchewan is home to the RCMP Academy, also known as Depot Division, where new recruits still go to learn the ropes of policing. Although the curriculum half a century ago wasn't exactly what it is today.
"When I was in Depot, you had to learn how to type. I think it was 40 words per minute," Martin says. "They had these old Underwood typewriters that were beaten and skipped, and they would charge you for the missed spaces the machine made for you."
Once he had mastered the Underwood and successfully completed the rest of his training, Martin's first posting was with Ontario's O Division in Windsor where he spent two years before joining what was then Toronto Commercial Crime. From there he moved to nearby Chatham, the city where he would live for the bulk of his career and now calls home.
"They sent me there for six months to a year. Don't expect to spend a year they said. That was in 1981," he remembers. "They called it general investigation. Then they called it federal enforcement."
Martin joined a small detachment of only four officers. And while the size of the staff was modest, its mission was not. The enforcement mandate for an RCMP officer in the seventies was far broader and more varied than it is today. It demanded resourcefulness and adaptability.
"There were something like 69 acts that we enforced. Everything from migratory birds, citizenship and immigration, Bank Act and Income Tax Act. Drug squads. Customs and excise. Canada Shipping Act and small vessel regulations. We ran boats on the lakes and rivers and enforced that. But a lot of that stuff got parsed off to other agencies over the years," he says. "It's an experience that someone going to O Division today would never get. You solved your own problems."
After a few years Martin met and married his wife Ruth and launched another successful and enduring partnership. One that brought him a daughter and two sons, and later, eight grandchildren.
"I spent my first five years single so she knew what she was getting into when we started out," he laughs. "My wife and I are at 44 years."
It wasn't until 1994, when Martin already had two decades of service behind him, that he began investigating proceeds of crime cases, a specialization that suited him so well he still can't bring himself to give it up in 2024.
"I was seconded to an anti-smuggling initiative that the government had set up in February of 1994. Proceeds of crime was part of it and I was sort of sub-seconded to proceeds of crime in July of 1994 and I've been there ever since," he says. "Proceeds of crime wasn't about numbers, it was about crime that made money. And you got to take that money away if you figured out how they were doing the crime and put them in jail for it. I realized there were good investigations to be done here. It's thinking and connecting the dots, and that became fun."
'Godfather' of Financial Crime
So much fun that today, another 30 years later, Martin has earned renown among colleagues in the world of financial crime investigations.
"With his 50 years of investigative experience, Sergeant Martin is recognized by many within our program as the 'Godfather of Financial Crime'," says Superintendent Adrienne Vickery, Director of Federal Policing's Financial Crime unit.
To Vickery and colleagues, Martin's unrivalled experience is a tremendous resource. "He is recognized by his subordinates, peers and supervisors as a leader and mentor, always investing the time to develop those around him," she says. "His contribution to the RCMP and to the financial crime program is legendary."
Incredibly, even after 50 years and climbing, Martin is only fourth on the all-time list of longest serving members in the RCMP's modern era. The top spot belongs to Inspector Paul Cheney who retired in 2019 after a remarkable 54 years.
But Martin says he isn't interested in setting records, it's his passion for the job that keeps him coming back. And for the foreseeable future, he has no plans for anything else.
"I lack hobbies," he laughs, admitting he never set out to chalk up half a century in uniform when he left his home in Truro that November morning. "It just happened. It's not a goal I'm seeking to achieve. I don't want to be the pinnacle up there. If I wake up in the morning and there is something that I would rather do, then maybe I'll retire and stay home."
Maybe.
