Chief Blair's Poodle Speaks

First, bullets flew through the Eaton Centre food court. Then, two weeks later, on a sun-filled patio in Little Italy. On Sunday, a man was shot while hundreds watched a fireworks display in the city’s east end. Just 24 hours before that, a stray bullet grazed a toddler’s leg in North York.

Yet Mark Pugash, Toronto police spokesman and spinmaster, tells us there is really little to worry about here.

I guess, despite evidence that would seem to contradict this skilled communicator, This is the best of all possible worlds.

Police Chief Bill Blair Well-Rebuked

Oh, there is much in the news today to report and comment on, but I'll start with something close to my heart: Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair, whom I regard as an unindicted co-conspirator in the police violence that erupted during peaceful protests at the 2010 G20 Summit in Toronto.

In a previous post, I reported how the Chief was offended by the phrase 'the banality of evil' used by a criminal lawyer in an article on the propensity toward racial profiling of the Toronto Police. Today, a Star reader, Paul de Groot, takes him to task:

Re: Arendt reference is offensive, Letter March 16

Police chief Bill Blair justly faults criminal lawyer Reid Rosonik for his comparison of the disproportionate arrests of blacks in the GTA to the “banality of evil” as demonstrated by the Nazis. He is on shaky ground, however, when he levels the charges of intellectual laziness and unpersuasiveness.

Chief Blair’s stonewalling and intellectual indifference in the face of overwhelming and endless evidence of police wrongdoing during the G20 fiasco, hardly qualify him to make these charges. Given his newfound fondness for intellectual rigour, I assume we can expect him to make a full admission of the egregious police malfeasance during the summit that continues to taint this city’s police force?

Paul de Groot, Toronto

It is so good to hear the voice of the people.

Sometimes You Just Have To Hold Your Nose

I always try to be completely honest in everything that I write for this blog. If I see reason for praise, I acknowledge it, sadly a rare occurrence. Most commonly I am extremely critical of the issues and people that I write about. One of my most frequent targets has been Ontario Liberal Premier Dalton McGuinty.

My contempt for the Premier arose out of the role he played in the G20 police-violence perpetrated against peaceful protestors last year in Toronto. As I have written previously and extensively, the McGuinty government was responsible for withholding crucial information from the public about the non-existence of expanded police powers, most notably the fiction that the authorities had the right to stop, question, and even arrest people who came within five meters of the security fence that had been erected to protect our visiting political 'masters.' I was, and I remain convinced, that that fictitious regulation emboldened the police to far exceed their authority, resulting in the mostly baseless arrest of over 1100 people, the vast majority of whom were later released without charge.

The other person I hold directly responsible is Chief Bill Blair, who, like the Premier, waited until the Summit was over before revealing the truth. The fact of collusion between the two is obvious, and the refusal of McGuinty to call an inquiry has allowed an ongoing distrust, cynicism and disillusionment to continue to fester, not a healthy situation for a democracy. And I remain convinced that Chief Blair should resign.

So what is my point here? Sadly, despite my publicly-stated repudiation of the McGuinty government and my resolve not to vote for them in this election, I have come to the onerous conclusion that I must go back on my word.

The are two reasons for my reversal: Tim Hudak, and the fact that the recent Star poll breakdown of ridings show that in mine, the Liberal and the PC candidates are virtually tied, with the NDP not even within shouting distance.

Having lived through the years of his mentor and predecessor Mike Harris, I know the emptiness of the recycled rhetoric which Hudak is fond of spouting: finding efficiencies, cutting taxes but not services, etc. etc., concepts that may find a ready audience with the simple-minded, but deeply insulting to the critical thinker. As well, the recent antics and attempts at dismantling Toronto by Mayor Rob/Doug Ford and their acolytes offer an effective preview of what is in store for the rest of the province should Mr. Hudak and his band gain entry to the Premier's office.

I find much to fault in Ontario's Liberal government, yet sadly at this juncture, I am preparing to hold my nose and vote for it, clearly the lesser of two evils from my perspective.

Please sign this petition urging Prime Minister Harper to stop threatening Michaela Keyserlingk and to stop exporting asbestos.

Two Sunday Morning Links

Echoing some of the sentiments I expressed the other day, this morning's Star editorial endorses the Toronto Police Services Board's decision to deny promotions to nine officers recommended by Police Chief Bill Blair. Is it possible that these officers, who behaved illegally by removing their name tags during last year's G20 Summit, were chosen by Chief Blair to be rewarded for their initiative? After all, if they couldn't be identified while violating people's Charter Rights, wouldn't they have in fact spared the good Chief more serious embarrassment and questions about his flawed leadership during the Summit?

Also in today's paper, Martin Regg Cohn's column, entitled Will Tory Trojan Horse hurt Hudak’s crusade? offers some interesting insight into an extreme right-wing faction of Tim Hudak's Ontario Progressive Conservative Party whose tactics, according to the article, "make the U.S. Tea Party look like … well, a tea party by comparison."

Enjoy the day.

Please sign this petition urging Prime Minister Harper to stop threatening Michaela Keyserlingk and to stop exporting asbestos.

The Toronto Police Board and Bill Blair

It is somewhat heartening that the Toronto police board, which has traditionally enjoyed harmonious relations with the Toronto Police, is showing a bit of spine.

As reported in today's Star, the board is refusing to accept Chief Bill Blair's recommendation for the promotion of nine officers who brought discredit to themselves and the force, not to mention undermined public respect for the police, by removing their name tags during the G20 demonstrations last year.

Apparently the police association, which is filing a grievance on behalf of the offending officers, argues that they were already docked a day's pay for their misbehavior and that further punishment is unwarranted. Funny, I always thought a promotion was a reward for good work, not an automatic bump in pay grade.

One can only hope that the board is sending an unequivocal message to Bill Blair about who is really in charge of the police.

Vindication For Those Abused By G20 Police Forces

The vast majority of the 1100 people abused, assaulted and arrested as a result of the thuggish actions of the G20 police forces, apparently intent on suppressing Canadians' Charter Rights last June in Toronto, must be feeling a deep measure of vindication today, this despite the fact that Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty, Prime Minister Stephen Harper, and Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair have never acknowledged that anything wrong transpired and, of course, have blocked any attempts to hold an inquiry to begin to heal the damage done to our democratic traditions and our trust in the police.

The Toronto Star headline, Aggression during G20 rally ‘perpetrated by police,’ judge rules speaks a truth long evident to those who were either present at the demonstrations or saw a wealth of video evidence depicting an out-of control constabulary wilfully suppressing our democratic right to protest last year in Ontario's capital.

Justice Melvyn Green made his comments after dismissing the charges against a 32-year-old bricklayer from London, Ontario, Michael Puddy, whose only 'crime' seems to have been wearing a T-shirt that offended police sensibilities, leading to his being arrested and charged with obstructing police, concealing a weapon and possession of a prohibited weapon, a pocket knife that he uses in his trade.

As reported in the Star,

The London, Ont. bricklayer was on his way to a concert downtown when he joined the front line of the late-night Saturday rally. Puddy was wearing a “Police Bastard” T-shirt named after a punk band, when he was pushed to the ground and cuffed.

Puddy was shuffled from officer to officer and eventually transported to the temporary Prisoner Processing Unit on Eastern Ave. He spent two days behind bars and was forced to sleep on a concrete floor and use a toilet without a door before he was released on $25,000 bail.

Justice Green made the following comment which, to me, reflects the most serious implications of the unwarranted police actions:

“The zealous exercise of police arrest powers in the context of political demonstrations risks distorting the necessary if delicate balance between law enforcement concerns for public safety and order, on the one hand, and individual rights and freedoms, on the other.”

How do we calculate the true cost of police actions that one normally associates with non-democratic states? How many people, for example, will choose to never (again) take part in a public demonstration or otherwise stand up for their beliefs because of what happened in Toronto?

Even if it is only one person, the cost of the G20 will still have been too high.

Revelations Of Further Charter Rights' Violation At G20 Summit

In what has become almost a routine posting to my blog, the Toronto Star has revealed yet another violation of rights arising from last year's federally and provincially supported G20 Summit. An article entitled Police wrong to question man with crossbow near G20 fence, judge rules, a few quotes will be enough, I hope, to persuade readers to peruse the article:

“The law makes clear that an investigative detention of that kind gives rise to a right to counsel,” provincial court Justice David Fairgrieve said Wednesday.

The judge also agreed with defence criticisms of Toronto police for continually denying McCullough’s rights to counsel while he was held at the Eastern Ave. detention centre for G20 detainees.

Just a timely reminder to all of us before we cast our vote in the Ontario election to carefully consider which political leaders have told us an inquiry is not necessary into what was the biggest breach of Charter Rights in Canadian history. No amount of political posturing diminishing its significance can alter the truth.

The Star: Police Strip Searches On The Rise

As reported in today's Toronto Star, "Toronto police strip searched roughly 60 per cent of the people they arrested in 2010, compared to 32 per cent 10 years ago, according to police statistics."

Given recent high profile incidents of this practice, some have suggested that the authorities are using the searches as a tool of intimidation and humiliation, yet another indication of a creeping authoritarianism insinuating itself into our social fabric.

But there may be another explanation. Given the high profile evidence of faltering police facial-recognition skills, and since we all come in a wide variety of shapes, sizes, and endowments, perhaps they are merely employing an adaptive strategy to more definitively and completely identify us for future reference, whether that be in a court of law or elsewhere.

More Evidence Of Bill Blair's Failed Leadership

The 'offer no apologies and accept no responsibility' head of the Toronto Police Services, Chief Bill Blair, has another facet of failed leadership to answer for. According to a report in The Toronto Star, a U of T student has documented at least eight occasions Toronto police have violated rules in place since 2006 requiring them to wear name tags.

According to the story,Vikram Mulligan says he was so troubled by police failing to identify themselves at last summer’s G20 summit he began photographing officers without proper name tags.

At a time when the Toronto force inspire more fear and loathing than admiration, this is hardly the moment for them to become de facto 'secret police.'

The rogue police behaviour the article describes is yet one more troubling indication that the lack of strong leadership and ability to inspire discipline is continuing to have widespread repercussions.

Once More, The SIU Cannot Fulfill Its Mandate

In what I can only construe as inept or complicit leadership at the top, the Toronto Police Service, thanks to massive obstructionism amongst the rank and file, has once again thwarted the SIU in fulfilling its mandate to properly and effectively investigate police wrongdoing.

As reported in The Globe and Mail:

Three officers investigated in a high-profile case of alleged police brutality at last year's G20 summit will not be charged after several peers, including supervisors, did not or could not say whether the officers had been involved in beating Adam Nobody, the province's police watchdog said Monday.

In my opinion, that lead tells us all we need to know about how much the Toronto Police co-operated with the SIU in its investigation. That after all this time only one officer, Babak Andalib-Goortani, has been charged, despite the fact that Adam Nobody was attacked by a phalanx of cops, means that the corrupt concealment of the truth by Toronto's 'finest' has been ongoing, and the person most responsible for facilitating that culture in the context of the G20, Police Chief Bill Blair, has much to answer for.

Despite his unwillingness to acknowledge any responsibility for his officers' actions or their subsequent concealment and obstructionism, Chief Bill Blair needs to resign as the first step in beginning to heal the massive breach in public trust that arose from the G20 police actions. To do anything less is to put career above the public good.

A Late Afternoon Thought On The Murdoch Scandal

I just read a post by The Disaffected Lib discussing the mounting number of resignations resulting from the Rupert Murdoch scandal. Both the Commissioner and Assistant Commissioner of the Metropolitan London Police (Scotland Yard) have resigned because of the disrepute they have brought to the organization through their actions and omissions.

Its a funny thing about the British, isn't it? I remember years ago when they were involved in the Falklands War, Lord Carrington, the British Foreign Secretary, resigned because he hadn't anticipated the conflict.

Meanwhile, in Canada, whenever something goes awry, a politician or public official may say he or she 'accepts full responsibility,' she retains her job, and everyone moves on as if nothing happened. Or to bring it even closer to home, Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair, who apparently apologizes for nothing and accepts responsibility for nothing, continues in his position despite the atrocities committed by the police under his control during last June's G20 summit.

Only in Canada, you say?

The Real News Commentary on G20 Summit Police Crimes

As always, The Real News offers a refreshing perspective rarely found in the mainstream media. Anything that continues to keep the G20 police abuses of Charter Rights in the public forum can be nothing but good for our democracy.

Toronto Star Readers Speak Out On Police Abuses

I have written before about how much we are enjoying our subscription to The Toronto Star, one of the few newspapers that still seems to be doing the job that the press traditionally performed: keeping the public well-informed and reminding the powers-that-be of ongoing scrutiny, functions vital to the maintenance of a healthy democracy. While much of the mainstream press has largely abandoned these roles in deference to their corporate masters, The Star, as they say, 'keeps on truckin.'

Part of that mission is well-fulfilled in the publication of readers' letters, something that reassures those of us in the progressive blogosphere that we are not alone in our thirst for societal fairness and justice. Three letters in today's paper, critical of the Toronto Police and the judiciary that treats them so differently from others, are well-worth reading.

Judge Excoriates Cops As Thugs, Expresses Contempt For Superiors Who Conceal

Yesterday I posted some of the comments made by Justice Allen upon sentencing two Toronto police officers to a year of house arrest for beating a Cabbagetown man in 2009. Today there are further comments in The Star by the Superior Court Judge, including the following:

Police turned a blind eye to thuggish behaviour by officers that’s worthy of a criminal gang. He said, “This attitude is inconsistent with effective policing. It is inconsistent with the rule of law” describing it as "...behaviour we expect from gang members on the street, not the police.”

Allen was sharply critical of superior officers at 51 Division who didn’t report the attack to the civilian Special Investigations Unit, which probes incidents where police cause serious injuries.

“Any officer who is prepared to turn a blind eye to the use of excessive force has to take some responsibility when their colleagues are facing the loss of their career and their liberty.”

Justice Allen's most damning comments came when he spoke of what motivated the police attack:

“This crime was committed because Mr. Moore spoke disrespectfully to the officers, calling them the rich man’s army and suggesting they go arrest some gangster,” Allen said. “The officers decided to put him in a cell overnight and then beat him severely when he did not cooperate in his arrest.”

Clearly, despite the myriad examples of police brutality and abuse of authority being made public, the Toronto Police force and, I suspect, the forces in many other jurisdictions, are still out of control, aided and abetted by superiors ignoring the brutality either because they are part of the 'blue wall of silence' or crave career advancement.

the Real News Asks Some Important Questions About The G20 Secret Law

Although hardly the best interview I have seen, the following is worth viewing inasmuch it raises real questions about credibility regarding who the driving force was behind requesting the Public Works Protection Act invoked during the G20 Summit. Was Bill Blair acting on his own initiative, or was it at the behest of the RCMP? Just one of the many questions that only a public inquiry can answer, an inquiry that both Dalton McGuinty and Stephen Harper are steadfast in their refusal to call.

Why Civilian Oversight of the Police is Crucial

Rex Meade of Dundas has a very interesting letter on police heavy-handedness and how to deal with it in today's Star. If you get a chance, take a look at it.

G20 Summit Police Tactics Continue to Outrage Canadians

There is a series of letters in today's Star that articulate the ongoing sentiments of ordinary Canadians a year after people had their Charter Rights ripped away by an out-of-control police force during the G20 Summit in Toronto.

There is also one by Bruce Cox, the Executive Director of Greenpeace, about the not-so-subtle lesson that 'kettling' imparts.

All of the letters speak for themselves, and need no further comment from me.

Chief Bill Blair: No Apology, No Resignation

Having released a self-serving 70 page report reviewing the G20 Summit debacle, Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair has concluded he has nothing to apologize for and will not consider resigning. As reported in today's Star, despite a public opinion poll showing a dramatic drop in public support for police actions at the Summit, (2010- 72%) (2011 - 41%), the Chief seems content to talk about things that went right, such as protecting the perimeter fence, while ignoring the widespread violations of Charter Rights in the arrests of over 1100 protesters, promising only that kettling will not be used in the future.

Also absent from the report is any explanation for the obstructionist tactics employed by the police this past year in identifying offending officers, despite the plethora of video evidence submitted by citizens. The fact that only two officers have thus far been charged says a great deal to me about the Chief's 'commitment' to uncovering the identity of these renegades.

Despite the erosion of public trust in the police and despite the ongoing trauma of people who directly experienced last June's police-state actions, something positive emerged for Bill Blair - the opportunity to hone his political skills to the point where his public utterances match the platitudinous quality of the most seasoned of Queens Park or Parliament Hill veterans.

Clearly, should his police career suffer an unlikely reversal, a new one serving the people awaits him.

Canada's Quasi-Police state

While the Premier of Ontario continues to blithely and glibly disavow any responsibility for the horrendous abuses of Charter Rights that took place during last June's G20 Summit, admitting only that he "could have done a better job of communicating," evidence continues to mount that we are living in a quasi-police state.

Thanks to the Toronto Star's superb ongoing coverage, the issues arising from the illegal actions police took during the Summit continue to raise profoundly disturbing questions about the erosion of our freedoms and the almost complete impunity enjoyed by the police responsible for that erosion. The latest revelation, found in today's Star, has the headline, Police sued over hellish 11-hour G20 arrest ordeal. The story reveals how Sean Salvati claims he was arrested, strip-searched, beaten, denied access to a lawyer and left naked in a cell for nearly an hour.

What was Mr. Salvati's 'crime'? Speaking to two female RCMP officers who did not care to be spoken to on the eve of the Summit. Although the term is perhaps used too much, 'Kafkaesque' is the only one that seems appropriate for what followed. Please read the entire article to see what you think.

Tangentially, I guess there is one thing that people do like about Premier McGuinty. He recently promised to make the (GO) trains run on time. And for some, I guess that's all that matters.

The Moral Fiber of Dalton McGuinty - Being Smug Means Never having To Say You're Sorry

I have written so much about last June's G20 Summit and the widespread violation of Charter Rights presided over by Police Chief Bill Blair and Premier Dalton McGuinty that my postings almost border on obsession. However, the absence of any redress for what happened continues to trouble me deeply.

Despite the gravity of the police abuses, the ever-smug Premier continues to 'hang tough', insisting there is no need to call an inquiry, and that the only thing he has to apologize for is not communicating as effectively as he should have. Such a caviler attitude toward violations of rights that essentially define us as members of a democracy is the main reason I will not be voting Liberal in the fall election.

However, Mr. McGuinty should be aware that the aftermath of this sad episode is not just a threat to his political hide. Many people, including me, are now deeply suspicious of the police and their attitudes, and that suspicion, without the catharsis that would be afforded by an inquiry, will only continue to fester and sicken the citizenry in any number of ways.

Today, the failure of the police to acknowledge any wrongdoing or regrets, even as they vow not to use the tactic of kettling again, as reported in the Star, is yet another bad decision that will do nothing to begin the healing process or abate the widespread disillusionment being experienced by the good people of this province.