As most people probably know, on June 26 in Toronto, the police attacked and arrested many protesters at Queen's Park, the site designated as an official G20 protest zone. Although the following video is largely unedited, watching only a few minutes of it provides ample evidence of the need for a full public inquiry, something Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty continues to insist is unnecessary. The evidence on the video represents just one more reason he has lost my vote.
Showing posts with label toronto police. Show all posts
Showing posts with label toronto police. Show all posts
Monday, July 19, 2010
Saturday, July 17, 2010
More on G20 Charter Violations
Today, several cities are planning rallies calling for any independent inquiry into police and government behaviour during the G20 Summit. Take a look at this video for yet another reason this is worth caring about.
Saturday, July 10, 2010
How Long Can McGuinty and Harper Ignore the People?
Given the fact that the Toronto Police Board and the Office of the Ontario Ombudsman are each going to launch probes, however narrow, into the violation of Charter Rights at the G20 Summit, the following story about an impending mass rally today at Queen's Park demanding a public inquiry into the fiasco leads one to wonder how long Messieurs McGuinty and Harper can ignore the legitimate concerns of the people. The key, it seems to me, is to keep the issue in the spotlight as long as possible.
Thousands expected at G20 public inquiry rally
Demonstration at the Ontario Legislature to protest police crackdown during the summit
Toronto — The Canadian Press Published on Saturday, Jul. 10, 2010 11:33AM EDT Last updated on Saturday, Jul. 10, 2010 11:38AM EDT
Two weeks after police cracked down on G20 demonstrations in Toronto, protesters will march again.
Thousands are expected to gather at the Ontario Legislature this afternoon to demand an independent public inquiry into security costs and police actions during the G20 summit.
Provincial New Democrat Party leader Andrea Horwath is expected to speak at the rally, which begins at 1 p.m.
Demonstrators are expected to march through the downtown core.
Almost 1,000 people were arrested during the summit weekend, after a group of vandals broke away from protesters, smashing windows and burning police cars.
Demonstrations are also expected in Halifax, Kingston and Montreal.
Thousands expected at G20 public inquiry rally
Demonstration at the Ontario Legislature to protest police crackdown during the summit
Toronto — The Canadian Press Published on Saturday, Jul. 10, 2010 11:33AM EDT Last updated on Saturday, Jul. 10, 2010 11:38AM EDT
Two weeks after police cracked down on G20 demonstrations in Toronto, protesters will march again.
Thousands are expected to gather at the Ontario Legislature this afternoon to demand an independent public inquiry into security costs and police actions during the G20 summit.
Provincial New Democrat Party leader Andrea Horwath is expected to speak at the rally, which begins at 1 p.m.
Demonstrators are expected to march through the downtown core.
Almost 1,000 people were arrested during the summit weekend, after a group of vandals broke away from protesters, smashing windows and burning police cars.
Demonstrations are also expected in Halifax, Kingston and Montreal.
Thursday, July 8, 2010
Adam Radwanski is Still Working the G20 Charter Rights' Violation File
It is reassuring to know that The Globe and Mail's Adam Radwanski is continuing to pursue the very troubling questions that remain regarding the violation of Charter Rights during the G20 Summit in Toronto. Below I am reproducing one of his online columns that demonstrate his ongoing concern about these issues and why they matter. I have put in bold a few of his more salient points:
Why the 'five metres' mattered
Although it got a more positive response than I'd expected, a few people have asked me why I spent so much time last week covering the "five-metre" law that didn't really exist. After all, it wasn't what was used in most of the dubious arrests during the G20, which happened much further away from the security perimeter.
In her Saturday column, Christie Blatchford more or less summed up that line of thinking (though I have no idea if it was even remotely directed at me):
...in Toronto Star lingo, since “the sweeping powers” granted the police via the “secret” law saw them, according to Toronto Chief Bill Blair, arrest exactly one (1) person under the temporary regulation to the Public Works Protection Act, isn’t the angst-ridden, hyperbolic debate rendered, as someone brighter than me remarked recently, nothing but an intellectual exercise?
It would quite one thing if the 1,000 folks who were detained on G20 weekend were detained under the temporary regulation. The discussion would be meaningful.
But when it’s all said and done, it will turn out that most of those detained were arrested for breach of the peace or to prevent a breach of the peace, which is an arrest authority, not a criminal charge.
In my view, it’s a vile authority too, generally speaking easily misused by police, and it may have been misused here as well.
But the point is, it wasn’t under the new secret sweeping power, which was only partly secret and not very sweeping. It was under long-established common-law police authorities, such as arresting people for breach of the peace or to prevent a breach of the peace that has yet to take place, that most people were picked up.
You want to be angry about something, be angry about that.
Minor quibbles aside (it seems likely to me that at least two people were arrested under the new law), this seems as good an opportunity as any to explain why holding the province to account over the Public Works Protection Act is more than just an "intellectual exercise."
Admittedly, it happens to be the post-G20 angle I'm best-positioned to cover. Provincial politics is my beat, and this - unlike most of the other things that happened both inside and outside the perimeter - is where Dalton McGuinty's government played a role, and deserves to be held to account. That's especially important because, as I explained toward the end of one of my columns last week, the Liberals' lax handling of the police file has not been restricted to the G20.
But beyond that, it seems to me that the abdication of provincial responsibility in announcing and interpreting the temporary law speaks to a broader phenomenon: the choice of governments, through both their actions and inactions, to give police gratuitous leeway in securing these kinds of international summits.
I wrote about this in the week leading up to the summit, and my former colleagues on the editorial board followed up on it last week. I'll spare you a full rehash of those arguments, and leave it at this: When given a chance early last decade to set out parameters for what police can and can't do to ensure the security of events like the G20, the federal government instead wrote legislation that basically told the police to do whatever they want.
So the message from governments to police, even before the saga over the provincial regulation, was that politicians preferred a no-questions-asked approach to security. Then McGuinty's Liberals took it to new extremes - leaving it to the police to announce a temporary law that could lead to arrests, then failing to publicly correct them when they misinterpreted and misrepresented that law.
As it happened, the province got lucky. If more of the action had been closer to the perimeter, the consequences would have been much greater.
But to some degree, the Liberals' blind faith in the police - including the Premier's unqualified support for Chief Bill Blair in the middle of the controversy - had to reinforce the sense that they had free rein to do as they saw fit, whatever part of downtown Toronto they happened to be in.
Was it the most important story out of the G20? Almost certainly not. But these things didn't all happen in isolation. And if there's any hope that our governments will take more responsibility for the liberties/security balance before the next big international event rolls around, it's necessary to underscore how little responsibility they took this time.
Why the 'five metres' mattered
Although it got a more positive response than I'd expected, a few people have asked me why I spent so much time last week covering the "five-metre" law that didn't really exist. After all, it wasn't what was used in most of the dubious arrests during the G20, which happened much further away from the security perimeter.
In her Saturday column, Christie Blatchford more or less summed up that line of thinking (though I have no idea if it was even remotely directed at me):
...in Toronto Star lingo, since “the sweeping powers” granted the police via the “secret” law saw them, according to Toronto Chief Bill Blair, arrest exactly one (1) person under the temporary regulation to the Public Works Protection Act, isn’t the angst-ridden, hyperbolic debate rendered, as someone brighter than me remarked recently, nothing but an intellectual exercise?
It would quite one thing if the 1,000 folks who were detained on G20 weekend were detained under the temporary regulation. The discussion would be meaningful.
But when it’s all said and done, it will turn out that most of those detained were arrested for breach of the peace or to prevent a breach of the peace, which is an arrest authority, not a criminal charge.
In my view, it’s a vile authority too, generally speaking easily misused by police, and it may have been misused here as well.
But the point is, it wasn’t under the new secret sweeping power, which was only partly secret and not very sweeping. It was under long-established common-law police authorities, such as arresting people for breach of the peace or to prevent a breach of the peace that has yet to take place, that most people were picked up.
You want to be angry about something, be angry about that.
Minor quibbles aside (it seems likely to me that at least two people were arrested under the new law), this seems as good an opportunity as any to explain why holding the province to account over the Public Works Protection Act is more than just an "intellectual exercise."
Admittedly, it happens to be the post-G20 angle I'm best-positioned to cover. Provincial politics is my beat, and this - unlike most of the other things that happened both inside and outside the perimeter - is where Dalton McGuinty's government played a role, and deserves to be held to account. That's especially important because, as I explained toward the end of one of my columns last week, the Liberals' lax handling of the police file has not been restricted to the G20.
But beyond that, it seems to me that the abdication of provincial responsibility in announcing and interpreting the temporary law speaks to a broader phenomenon: the choice of governments, through both their actions and inactions, to give police gratuitous leeway in securing these kinds of international summits.
I wrote about this in the week leading up to the summit, and my former colleagues on the editorial board followed up on it last week. I'll spare you a full rehash of those arguments, and leave it at this: When given a chance early last decade to set out parameters for what police can and can't do to ensure the security of events like the G20, the federal government instead wrote legislation that basically told the police to do whatever they want.
So the message from governments to police, even before the saga over the provincial regulation, was that politicians preferred a no-questions-asked approach to security. Then McGuinty's Liberals took it to new extremes - leaving it to the police to announce a temporary law that could lead to arrests, then failing to publicly correct them when they misinterpreted and misrepresented that law.
As it happened, the province got lucky. If more of the action had been closer to the perimeter, the consequences would have been much greater.
But to some degree, the Liberals' blind faith in the police - including the Premier's unqualified support for Chief Bill Blair in the middle of the controversy - had to reinforce the sense that they had free rein to do as they saw fit, whatever part of downtown Toronto they happened to be in.
Was it the most important story out of the G20? Almost certainly not. But these things didn't all happen in isolation. And if there's any hope that our governments will take more responsibility for the liberties/security balance before the next big international event rolls around, it's necessary to underscore how little responsibility they took this time.
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
A Brief Explanation
Although anyone who happens to read my blog on a regular basis might be wondering if I have somehow lost my balance in that all recent posts have revolved around either news stories, my own commentary or that of others regarding the violation of Charter Rights during the G20, I feel the need to offer a small explanation and justification.
First, I have an almost lifelong interest in politics, especially local, provincial, and national. The entire G20 Summit, whether we are talking about the gathering of heads of state or the actions on the street, were political in nature, in that they affect us on both a micro and macro level.
Secondly, the abuse of authority is something that has preoccupied me since my days as both an elementary and secondary student within the Catholic school system, years during which I and many others were both psychologically and physically abused by nuns, priests, and lay teachers. But that topic deserves its own series of posts, which I may get to one of these days.
The third reason for my seeming obsession with the G20 fiasco is that how we define ourselves as Canadians is in no small part contingent upon the freedoms that we enjoy and far too often take for granted. While all of them are essential rights of citizenship, several of them were curtailed and, I would submit, unconstitutionally violated during the G20 in Toronto: freedom of expression, freedom of peaceful assembly, freedom of association, and freedom of the press.
One of the things I find especially troubling is the fact that many people, while enjoying their freedom of expression, have weighed in on these violations as if their inappropriateness is dependent upon whether or not we agree with the protesters. Several have said that peaceful protesters should have stayed away, that law-abiding citizens move when a police officer tell them to move, etc. Such comments seem to indicate a fundamental lack of understanding of the concept of civil rights. Whether or not we agree with a cause has nothing to do with permitting the expression of that cause, as long as it is done within the boundaries of the law.
And that to me is the crux of the matter: there is ample evidence emerging that countless people committing no crimes were swept up in often violent mass arrests. This fact is not something to be facilely dismissed by anyone, whether you are a Premier, a police chief, a journalist or a private citizen, no matter where you stand on the political spectrum. To do so is to further diminish those rights, leaving them open to the possibility of even worse abuse in the future.
So as long as questions remain and answers are withheld, I will be writing about this topic frequently. As well, I shall continue to reproduce stories from newspapers that I think are relevant, largely because most of those stories tend to be archived after seven days and thus no longer readily available.
Enough said for now.
First, I have an almost lifelong interest in politics, especially local, provincial, and national. The entire G20 Summit, whether we are talking about the gathering of heads of state or the actions on the street, were political in nature, in that they affect us on both a micro and macro level.
Secondly, the abuse of authority is something that has preoccupied me since my days as both an elementary and secondary student within the Catholic school system, years during which I and many others were both psychologically and physically abused by nuns, priests, and lay teachers. But that topic deserves its own series of posts, which I may get to one of these days.
The third reason for my seeming obsession with the G20 fiasco is that how we define ourselves as Canadians is in no small part contingent upon the freedoms that we enjoy and far too often take for granted. While all of them are essential rights of citizenship, several of them were curtailed and, I would submit, unconstitutionally violated during the G20 in Toronto: freedom of expression, freedom of peaceful assembly, freedom of association, and freedom of the press.
One of the things I find especially troubling is the fact that many people, while enjoying their freedom of expression, have weighed in on these violations as if their inappropriateness is dependent upon whether or not we agree with the protesters. Several have said that peaceful protesters should have stayed away, that law-abiding citizens move when a police officer tell them to move, etc. Such comments seem to indicate a fundamental lack of understanding of the concept of civil rights. Whether or not we agree with a cause has nothing to do with permitting the expression of that cause, as long as it is done within the boundaries of the law.
And that to me is the crux of the matter: there is ample evidence emerging that countless people committing no crimes were swept up in often violent mass arrests. This fact is not something to be facilely dismissed by anyone, whether you are a Premier, a police chief, a journalist or a private citizen, no matter where you stand on the political spectrum. To do so is to further diminish those rights, leaving them open to the possibility of even worse abuse in the future.
So as long as questions remain and answers are withheld, I will be writing about this topic frequently. As well, I shall continue to reproduce stories from newspapers that I think are relevant, largely because most of those stories tend to be archived after seven days and thus no longer readily available.
Enough said for now.
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
A Shocking Story From the G20
I just found a shocking story of a 57-year-old Thorold amputee who suffered incredible abuse at the hands of police while sitting at Queens Park on June 26th with his daughter and two other young people.
Click here to read about it.
Click here to read about it.
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
Police Chiefs and Premiers
I have to confess that my nose is presently feeling quite abraded and raw, not surprising given its strenuous workout in today’s smell tests, beginning with the spectacle of Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair displaying a cache of ‘weapons’ seized from protesters that turned out to be less than claimed. First, an astute CBC reporter asked about the cross bow that was given prominence. Hadn’t that, in fact, been seized from a car before the summit began and determined to have nothing to do with the G20? Well yes, the good chief sheepishly admitted that it shouldn’t have been there, as reported in The Globe and Mail:
A car search last Friday netted a cross bow and chain saw but they were not determined to be G20 related, and no charges were laid. When this was pointed out, Chief Blair acknowledged the items should not have been displayed but said “everything else” was seized from summit protesters.
However, police also included objects taken from a Whitby, Ont., man who was heading to a role playing fantasy game in Centennial Park Saturday morning. As was reported by the Globe on Saturday, Brian Barrett, 25, was stopped at Union Station for wearing chain mail and carrying a bag with an archery bow, shield and graphite swords. His jousting gear was seized by police, but was on display Tuesday, even though he was not charged and police told a Globe reporter it was a case of bad timing.
The critical thinker, of course, would have even more reason after this display to question the veracity of what he or she was being told. But then things got worse. Blair announced that there was no five-metre rule in place allowing police to search bags and demand identification from interlopers who had violated the police’s ‘comfort zone.’ His justification for this alleged lie: “I was trying to keep the criminals out.”
I say alleged lie, because this came only after an announcement from the Ministry of Community Safety made an announcement that “all the cabinet did was update the law that governs entry to such things as court houses to include specific areas inside the G20 fences — not outside.
A ministry spokeswoman says the change was about property, not police powers, and did not include any mention of a zone five metres outside the G20 security perimeter. “
However — and my nose was really starting to hurt by this point — we remember Dalton McGuinty’s statement of support for the police on Friday after word got out about the secret order-in-council suspending some of our Charter Rights:
Premier Dalton McGuinty denies it was an abuse of power for his government to secretly approve sweeping new powers for police.
“I just think it’s in keeping with the values and standards of Ontarians,” McGuinty told the Toronto Star on Friday amid a battery of complaints from opposition parties, city councillors, civil libertarians and regular Torontonians that the new rules were kept secret and, some say, may go too far.
The rules allow police to arrest and potentially jail anyone refusing to produce identification or be searched within 5 metres of the G20 security zone.
“Most Ontarians understand that there’s something extraordinary happening inside our province,” the Premier said. “We’ve tried to limit the intrusiveness to a specific secure zone as much as we can by working together with our police.”
Despite the fact that it was front page news on several of Ontario’s dailies, Premier McGuinty did nothing to disabuse the public about this seemingly inaccurate information, which leads me to conclude a number of limited possibilities:
He is so inept a Premier that, despite the alleged regulation having been passed secretly by his Cabinet, he knew none of the details;
Chief Blair was lying about these special powers, promulgated throughout the media and eliciting mass confusion and outrage. Were this so, wouldn’t it be incumbent upon McGuinty to immediately terminate the Chief, having gone far beyond anything General Stanley McCrystal did to warrant firing?
He was colluding with the police to continue to perpetrate this ‘falsehood,’ a possibility that would justify our asking how committed the Premier is to Charter Rights and basic democracy;
The regulation was as everyone understood it, but because of the widespread revulsion it inspired, the Liberal Government, realizing the potential political consequences to be so very costly, disavowed any relationship to the odious regulation, therefore requiring Bill Blair to ‘fall on his sword’ over this issue.
The fact that the position of Chief of Police is, de facto, a political one, would likely have convinced Blair that his future would be far better served by obeying his political masters than hewing to the path of integrity.
Further evidence of government and police lying to the public emerges as the McGuinty Government is now stating that no one was arrested under any extended laws, but only regular criminal laws. The critical thinking public will, of course, want to know why 31-year-old Dave Vasey was arrested when he ventured within the allegedly non-existent boundary, refusing to either show his i.d. or allow his bag to be searched, believing he was only enjoying his basic rights of citizenship. Told he would then have to leave, he refused, after which he was arrested under this ‘non-existent’ rule. What then, was the offense for which he was arrested?
These and other questions must be forcefully asked and re-asked in the days to come. To do anything less would be criminal.
A car search last Friday netted a cross bow and chain saw but they were not determined to be G20 related, and no charges were laid. When this was pointed out, Chief Blair acknowledged the items should not have been displayed but said “everything else” was seized from summit protesters.
However, police also included objects taken from a Whitby, Ont., man who was heading to a role playing fantasy game in Centennial Park Saturday morning. As was reported by the Globe on Saturday, Brian Barrett, 25, was stopped at Union Station for wearing chain mail and carrying a bag with an archery bow, shield and graphite swords. His jousting gear was seized by police, but was on display Tuesday, even though he was not charged and police told a Globe reporter it was a case of bad timing.
The critical thinker, of course, would have even more reason after this display to question the veracity of what he or she was being told. But then things got worse. Blair announced that there was no five-metre rule in place allowing police to search bags and demand identification from interlopers who had violated the police’s ‘comfort zone.’ His justification for this alleged lie: “I was trying to keep the criminals out.”
I say alleged lie, because this came only after an announcement from the Ministry of Community Safety made an announcement that “all the cabinet did was update the law that governs entry to such things as court houses to include specific areas inside the G20 fences — not outside.
A ministry spokeswoman says the change was about property, not police powers, and did not include any mention of a zone five metres outside the G20 security perimeter. “
However — and my nose was really starting to hurt by this point — we remember Dalton McGuinty’s statement of support for the police on Friday after word got out about the secret order-in-council suspending some of our Charter Rights:
Premier Dalton McGuinty denies it was an abuse of power for his government to secretly approve sweeping new powers for police.
“I just think it’s in keeping with the values and standards of Ontarians,” McGuinty told the Toronto Star on Friday amid a battery of complaints from opposition parties, city councillors, civil libertarians and regular Torontonians that the new rules were kept secret and, some say, may go too far.
The rules allow police to arrest and potentially jail anyone refusing to produce identification or be searched within 5 metres of the G20 security zone.
“Most Ontarians understand that there’s something extraordinary happening inside our province,” the Premier said. “We’ve tried to limit the intrusiveness to a specific secure zone as much as we can by working together with our police.”
Despite the fact that it was front page news on several of Ontario’s dailies, Premier McGuinty did nothing to disabuse the public about this seemingly inaccurate information, which leads me to conclude a number of limited possibilities:
He is so inept a Premier that, despite the alleged regulation having been passed secretly by his Cabinet, he knew none of the details;
Chief Blair was lying about these special powers, promulgated throughout the media and eliciting mass confusion and outrage. Were this so, wouldn’t it be incumbent upon McGuinty to immediately terminate the Chief, having gone far beyond anything General Stanley McCrystal did to warrant firing?
He was colluding with the police to continue to perpetrate this ‘falsehood,’ a possibility that would justify our asking how committed the Premier is to Charter Rights and basic democracy;
The regulation was as everyone understood it, but because of the widespread revulsion it inspired, the Liberal Government, realizing the potential political consequences to be so very costly, disavowed any relationship to the odious regulation, therefore requiring Bill Blair to ‘fall on his sword’ over this issue.
The fact that the position of Chief of Police is, de facto, a political one, would likely have convinced Blair that his future would be far better served by obeying his political masters than hewing to the path of integrity.
Further evidence of government and police lying to the public emerges as the McGuinty Government is now stating that no one was arrested under any extended laws, but only regular criminal laws. The critical thinking public will, of course, want to know why 31-year-old Dave Vasey was arrested when he ventured within the allegedly non-existent boundary, refusing to either show his i.d. or allow his bag to be searched, believing he was only enjoying his basic rights of citizenship. Told he would then have to leave, he refused, after which he was arrested under this ‘non-existent’ rule. What then, was the offense for which he was arrested?
These and other questions must be forcefully asked and re-asked in the days to come. To do anything less would be criminal.
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