Who could have imagined that the RCMP, those clean-cut men in red, steal dynamite and destroy private property, break and enter, wiretap at will and generally behave as if the law of the land applied to everyone but themselves?
Jeff Sallot, who covered the McDonald Commission of Inquiry Concerning Certain Activities of the RCMP for a year, has written a gripping account of the force's illegal activities. Burning down a barn in Quebec to prevent separatist meetings, breaking into offices and stealing Parti Quebecois membership files, intimidating people suspected of FLQ affiliations into informing on their friends and repeatedly opening private mail in flagrant violation of Canada's laws on personal privacy - Nobody Said No tells it all. It is the story of a police force that took the law into its own hands and of a government that looked the other way.
Nobody Said No documents in absorbing and dramatic detail the testimony of hundreds of witnesses. It shows how the Mounties planned and executed their illegal dirty tricks and tells of the intricate political manoeuverings undertaken to cover up these activities for so many years.Based on official documents and testimony, Nobody Said No reads just like a spy thriller - except that every fact, every detail, every dirty trick is true.

JEFF SALLOT is a reporter with the Globe and Mail .

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