Ontario's highest court has ruled that police involved in an SIU investigation are not permitted "to have lawyers vet their notes or to assist them in preparation of their notes." 

A three-judge panel further ruled on Tuesday that the two families who brought the matter to court are entitled to $100,000 in legal costs paid to them by the Attorney General and a number of police bodies involved in the case. 

"The courts are telling us they have a right and duty to curtail police impunity in so far as the law allows it," said Rachelle Sauvé, a spokesperson for the Justice for Levi campaign and a friend of the Schaeffer family, one of the families that brought the matter to court.

Levi Schaeffer was shot and killed by an OPP officer on June 24, 2009. But the exact details of his death may never be known, due to the fact that the officer who shot him and three other officers were instructed by a supervisor not to write their notes unil they had spoken to a lawyer, only doing so two days later.  

Ontario's Special Investigations Unit, which examines cases where someone is injured or killed in an encounter with police, looked into Schaeffer's death but did not file any criminal charges.

Sauvé said the court ruling was a victory but that more had to be done to prevent police impunity. "It should never ever have been left to a family of someone who lost their loved ones to bring this matter to the courts."