There is no excuse for mistakes made by two Vancouver police officers involved in the tragic death of a native man who died, soaking wet and cold, in an alley, a retired officer testified Tuesday at the public inquiry into the death.

But Don Boutin said Frank Paul's lifestyle has to be taken in to consideration.

"To live that way continuously, you place yourself in a heightened state of personal jeopardy,'' Don Boutin, a now-retired Vancouver police sergeant told a public inquiry into Paul's death.

"The odds are that the system will fail and it failed in this instance.''

Paul, a 48-year-old Mi'kmaq and chronic alcoholic, was found dead of hypothermia in an alley behind a Vancouver detox centre on Dec. 6, 1998, a few hours after a police officer left the homeless man there.

Const. David Instant tearfully testified earlier in the inquiry that Paul was refused admission to the city drunk tank the night before.

Instant said he then dumped Paul in the alley, where he was found dead of hypothermia a few hours later.

Instant also testified that Sgt. Russell Sanderson ordered him to get Paul out of the drunk tank, telling him the man had a condition that made him appear drunk when he wasn't.

As a video recording viewed at the inquiry shows, Paul was so incapacitated that Instant and a corrections officer had to drag his limp body out of the facility, leaving a wet streak on the ground from Paul's soaking-wet clothes.

In the report he wrote after reviewing the report of the police department's internal discipline section, Boutin said there were "mitigating observations.''

Lawyer Steven Kelliher, acting for the Paul family, seized on the term during his cross-examination.

"How does Frank Paul's lifestyle constitute mitigating circumstances for (Instant and Sanderson)?'' asked Kelliher, as about a dozen lawyers representing other individuals and agencies looked on.

"Errors were made by Const. Instant and Sgt. Sanderson,'' said Boutin. "People make mistakes and if you consistently put yourself in jeopardy (like Paul), I think it's reasonable to assume someone is going to make a mistake with you.''

Kelliher said that individuals like Paul who are in the "greatest jeopardy,'' require a higher, rather than lower, standard of care.

Boutin said everyone who comes in contact with police should expect a high standard of care.

"You said (Paul's) lifestyle was a mitigating factor,'' said Kelliher.

"It was not mitigating for the two officers,'' said Boutin. "People make mistakes and eventually someone will make a mistake.''

Lawyer Cameron Ward, acting for the United Native Nations Society, asked Boutin about Instant's decision to drop Paul in the alley about a block from a detox facility.

Ward suggested that Boutin said the reason was that Paul would be safer there.

"The rationale was nonsense,'' said Ward, noting that there was much more traffic around the area where Paul normally hung out than in the isolated alley.

"The consideration was that people were attending detox, so if Frank Paul was in difficulty they would likely witness that,'' Boutin said.

"That was nonsense,'' Ward responded.

"That was the observation of Instant,'' said Boutin.

Kelliher also asked Boutin if he thought Paul's death was his own fault.

"No,'' Boutin replied sharply. "I am saying his lifestyle constantly placed him in jeopardy, with or without police involvement.''

Boutin denied a suggestion from Kelliher that the two officers "turned a blind eye'' to Paul's plight.

"I don't think it happened,'' Boutin replied. "There was no intention by the two officers to harm Mr. Paul or the Crown would have charged them criminally.''

The inquiry has heard Paul's relatives in Maine and the community of Elsipogtog, N.B., where he grew up, were told the homeless man was hit by a cab and that his body was found in a ditch a month later.

The family was never told Paul was in police custody just before he died.