“There’s always a context in which these things take place.”

So says Toronto police spokesman and perennial apologist Mark Pugash about the beating administered by the police to Santokh Bola, a victim of what the authorities admit was a 'mistaken arrest.'

Sure looks to me like just another case of police brutality, something the Toronto constabulary is becoming notorious for:

Bola’s lawyer, Michael Smitiuch, told a news conference Wednesday that the video shows police delivering 11 punches to Bola in quick succession, and a total of 20 blows to his head.

“Officer, please, officer,” Santokh can be heard saying in the video. “Let me go, please let me.”

The incident took place by Bola’s car in the rear parking lot of his family’s store on Islington Ave., according to the lawsuit.

In the video, Bola can be heard begging to speak to his grandfather and twice says, “Let me talk to my parents.”

He also pleads, “Sir, I beg you.”

When the beating was over, Bola was held briefly in a police cruiser and then set free, Smitiuch said. No charges were laid.

He was taken to Etobicoke General Hospital by his grandfather, where he was treated for head and facial injuries.

Another Indictment Of Police Leadership

Anyone who reads this blog regularly knows that I am a regular critic of the police. While recognizing the at-times difficult job they have and the very real potential of becoming jaded because of the criminal element with which they must deal, I have never had any sympathy, understanding or tolerance for the abuse of power that some regularly engage in.

Similarly, I am frequently offended by those who lead institutions but refuse to take responsibility for the dysfunctions that occur under their watch. We have, for example, Stephen Harper's declarations that he knew nothing about the Nigel Wright payoff of Mile Duffy; while I do not believe the Prime Minister, even if it were true, responsibility, and blame, as they say, resides at the top.

Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair, about whom I have written many times, strikes me as one who enjoys the perks of power but refuses to accept responsibility when things go wrong with his troubled force. The G20 debacle is probably the most egregious, but hardly the only example of his failure as chief.

A story in this morning's Star offers the most recent indictment of Blair's leadership. The Supreme Court made a definitive ruling on police strip searches in 2001, forbidding the authorities to strip their suspects completely naked, declaring it a breach of Charter Rights. Despite this, however, Toronto Const. Sasa Sljivo declared during the trial of Lerondo Smith, charged with drug trafficking and breaching conditions ... that he has stripped “hundreds” of people completely naked as part of routine searches.

Two things are striking about this admission. First, Sljivo averred in court that he was unaware of the Supreme Court ruling, and second, he told the court that he was trained by his coach officer, a police mentor, to strip-search people fully naked.

The story goes on to say Toronto police adopted those rules (i.e., the prohibition laid out by the Supreme Court) in its procedure information sheet regarding “searches of person.”

My questions are few and simple:

If the rules have been clearly set out by the Toronto police, how is it that Const. Sljivo has carried out hundreds of improper searches, apparently endorsed by his training officer?

Does the Toronto constabulary regard the Supreme Court ruling as one more honoured in the breach than in the observance?

What kind of environment has the 'leadership' of Chief Blair fostered that this could happen not once, not twice, but hundreds of time?

How many others engage in this illegal practice?

Predictably, questions sent to police spokesman Mark Pugash about the pervasiveness of these searches and whether anyone has ever been disciplined for conducting them went unanswered.

Stripping prisoners naked is a time-honoured practice of torturers to break people down. It has no place in a democracy. Chief Blair has some serious police misconduct to answer for.

Police Torturers And Their Enablers

It is heartening to know that the Hamilton police are discharging their duties responsibly, as attested to by a video that went viral this week. However, to believe that all is well in policeland would be but a comforting illusion.

Yesterday, Kev reported on the 'excesses' of some Toronto police whose actions, described by the Court of Appeals' judge as 'torture under the Criminal Code', led to the staying of a conviction against the victim. Incidentally, two of the officers involved in the abuse, Jamie Clark and Donald Belange, received promotions, no doubt rewards for their 'exemplary' work.

Where does responsibility for the rot reside? As in all institutions, it must be placed on the shoulders of the leadership, in this case the office of Chief Bill Blair, who frequently seems more adept as a politicians than he does as Toronto's top cop. And the Toronto Police Services Board, led by Alok Mukherjee, has to be seen as one of the chiefs chief enablers.

A report by former Special Investigations Unit director Ian Scott suggests that Blair virtually ignored over 100 letters Scott sent to him alleging that officers repeatedly violated their legal duty to co-operate with the provincial watchdog. Blair's spokesperson and pet poodle, Mark Pugash, disputes this, asserting: “All of the points he raised were dealt with..."

Where the truth resides is something the public is not allowed to know. As reported in today's Star, the Toronto Police Services Board refuses to make this information public:

Chair Alok Mukherjee said Thursday the board has “considered” publishing the reports, but has not because certain information must be kept confidential under the Police Services Act, such as the names of officers involved in disciplinary matters or classified police procedures.

This stands in contrast with several other police services boards in the province, which release the chief’s reports at public board meetings, with confidential details removed.

Ottawa, for example, publishes its reports online, leaving out only the names of the officers involved. [I]n Durham, reports are only kept secret if their disclosure would threaten public safety or personal privacy.

Meanwhile, the good people of Toronto are expected to remain content with this from Chief Blair:

“In every single case without exception, I have reported to the oversight authority that the statute says I’m supposed to, which is the police services board.”

But the chief said he doesn’t think those reports should be made public.

“That is at the discretion of the board, and there are aspects of those reports which quite frankly deal with issues of personnel, which are not appropriate to be made public.”

We live in a troubling time when, on many levels, the Canadian public is being treated with an indifference that borders on absolute disdain, even contempt. However, despite the best efforts of the Harper cabal to establish a Canada that is more secretive and repressive society, a process that seems to be infecting all levels of governance, we still enjoy basic freedoms as a putative democracy; full disclosure of police misconduct is required and demanded unless the police motto "to protect and serve' is to be seen as little more than a cruel irony.

Toronto Police: Again and Again and Again ....

Albert Einstein famously defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. By that standard, perhaps both the Toronto Police force and I are insane; I seem to periodically write essentially the same blog post about their misbehaviour, and they seem to keep practising a disturbing pattern of conduct that cries out for remediation.

The latest case of alleged police brutality was reported yesterday in The Toronto Star:

Ian Scott, director of the Special Investigations Unit, (the body that probes incidents of serious injury and death in which police officers are involved) said Wednesday he was unable to conduct an “adequate” probe into a brutality complaint made by Tyrone Phillips, who alleges police beat him up during his arrest outside a nightclub.

Toronto police, Scott said, have refused to provide the SIU with Phillips’ complaint, first filed to the Office of the Independent Police Review Director, a provincial agency that probes grievances against police, then forwarded on to police.

The story, laughable were it not for the seriousness of the incident, outlines what seems to be a bureaucratic and jurisdictional dispute between two provincial bodies that, upon closer examination, suggests once again that Chief Bill Blair is continuing a policy of opacity that shields his officers from any real accountability.

Hiding behind the strict letter of legislation, his spokesperson, Mark Pugash, offers fatuous reasons for not releasing the formal complaint filed by Phillips, who alleges he was beaten severely by police and placed under arrest for no apparent reason, sustaining a serious concussion in the process, one that medical records verify.

As reported in today's Star, while the victim has given permission for the release of his complaint to the SIU, all that police spokesman Mark Pugash seems interested in doing is disingenuously carp about the fact that SIU head Scott went to the media to complain about his force's intransigence:

Pugash asked Thursday why Scott “went through the exercise he did yesterday with the inflammatory and quite offensive news release.”

Meanwhile, the larger issue of police brutality seems to be getting lost in this jurisdictional 'pissing match.'

And according to The Star's Rosie DiManno, there is sufficient blame to go around:

Each party has wrapped itself in the piety of rules. Yet those purported rules, as interpreted, have resulted in nobody doing the morally correct thing.

Scott has a complaint and a complainant. The police information sworn out after Phillips’ arrest would include the badge number of the arresting officer. That’s an obvious starting point for the SIU investigation. The subject officer isn’t compelled to submit to an interview — another failing of the Police Act. But it doesn’t require an investigative reporter to chase down the basic facts of the incident: Witness officers, if there were any; booking officer, or anybody else who came in contact with the accused; hospital records, to which the patient is entitled.

Ultimate responsibility for the conduct of the men and women of the Toronto Police force rests with 'teflon' Chief Bill Blair, a man apparently more deft at maneuvering to protect his own career than he is at holding himself and his force to account. As DiManno pointedly asks,

What did Police Chief Bill Blair do with Phillips’ complaint? What was the outcome of the mandated police investigation before the grievance was sent on to the SIU? It should be noted that the Police Act does, in fact, allow the chief to divulge information contained in a complaint received, under various exceptions to the nondisclosure guidelines, which shouldn’t be there as masking layer anyway.

Both excellent questions, the answers to which, if past performance is any indication, will not be forthcoming.

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.

Why The Star Is The Real 'Newspaper Of Record'

Those who regularly read The Toronto Star will hardly be surprised to learn that it has just won five National Newspaper Awards for the excellence of its reporting, reporting that often results in some real benefits to society. A new benefit appears to be emerging as a result of its two-part investigation into police who lie under oath.

While its response to the investigation could be cynically dismissed as a political one, the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police now says that

... the justice system should report police officers who are found by judges to have lied, misled the court or fabricated evidence.

“If a judge perceives that an officer has not fulfilled his oath of honesty, a judge should report it to a police service. The national association would naturally support mechanisms that would ensure this happens,” said association spokesperson Timothy Smith.

Despite the dismissal of the series by Mark Pugash, who has basically said that The Star doesn't know what it is talking about and can't be taken seriously, the chair of the civilian oversight Toronto Police Services Board, Alok Mukherjee, told the Star he is troubled by this “serious issue” and wants something done to stop the lies from eroding the public’s trust in his police force.

At a time when the majority of mainstream media seem to be constrained by the agenda of their corporate masters, it is reassuring that The Toronto Star continues in unfettered fashion to pursue important work leading to a better Canada.

Police Who Lie Under Oath - Part 2

Part 2 of The Star series on the problem of police lying under oath is available on its website. Today's coverage examines the lack consequences for such behaviour, many departments seeming to prefer a see-no-evil, hear-no-evil kind of approach. And as per his function, the always pugnacious Mark Pugash, Toronto Police spokesman, accuses the Star of not knowing what they are writing about.

Self-Serving Rhetoric From The Toronto Police

As one who strives to be a critical thinker, I am loathe to make absolutist or ill-informed statements and assertions, even as I admit to frequently falling short of the mark. Nonetheless, after the debacle of the G20 Summit of June 2010 held in Toronto, I find myself frequently dubious of statements from the police that may serve to conceal or excuse instances of brutality and blatant violation of our Charter Rights.

It is for this reason that I am very skeptical of assertions by the Toronto Police, as reported in today's Star about Sean Salvati.

Readers may recall that Salvati, a paralegal, was arrested, stripped naked, paraded in front of a female officer and left without his clothing in a jail cell in June of 2010, allegedly for public intoxication, a claim he vigorously denies. According to him, his humiliating treatment was prompted by an innocuous remark to a couple of RCMP officers about the task that lay ahead of them the next day, the Saturday of the G20 Summit.

Even if one chooses to disbelieve Salvati's claim, his lawyer's protracted and frequently frustrated efforts to obtain some basic documentation and the video of his client's ordeal is a testament to police obstructionism.

I hope you can spare a few moments to read the entire article.

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.

Mark Pugash and the G20 Police Scandal

Mark Pugash is certainly earning his salary these days. The vexing and pugnacious Director of Corporate Communications for the Toronto Police has been loyally but, in my view, futilely acting as a human shield for Chief Bill Blair, the leader mysteriously unavailable for comment on any matters generally pertaining to the investigation of police abuse of citizens during last June's G20 debacle and most recently and specifically, the beating of Dorian Barton while he took some pictures during the protests.

Continuing to defend the indefensible with a straight face, Mr. Pugash has a letter in today's Star in which he takes the paper to task for claiming to be playing a role in advancing the momentum of the investigation into Barton's claims.

As always, the reader can decide how credible Pugash's claims are about the Toronto Police Services' investigation of its own people.

The G20, The Toronto Police and The Art of Critical Thinking

For those who might wish to sharpen their critical thinking skills, I am providing a link to an article in today's Star that provides a timeline of the investigation into Dorian Barton's abuse at the hands of Toronto police during last June's G20 Summit. Are the police claims of co-operation with the SIU investigation into the identity of the offending officer credible? Does police spokesman Mark Pugash's narrative pass the smell test? Has Chief Bill Blair behaved like a leader who wants to hold his force accountable?

You decide.

Journalism You Can Sink Your Teeth Into

For those who think all journalists have lost their bite, I suggest they read Rosie DiManno's column today as she writes disdainfully of the Toronto Police Force and its consistent failure to track down officers who abused citizens during the G20. Making so bold as to accuse somebody within the service of lying, she also expresses her contempt for the application of a double standard in evidence that is obvious in the SIU's failure to accept civilian witnesses as sufficient to go forward with charges.

Let's hope that Rosie doesn't incur any traffic infractions in the near future.