A Further Reflection

At the risk of seeming a tad obsessed about James Forcillo, I feel compelled to do yet another post on him and Sammy Yatim, the troubled teen he recklessly and needlessly gunned down three years ago.

We all know there is a great deal of injustice in the world, the bulk of which is not open to easy resolution. Sometimes all we can do is bear witness to that injustice and the suffering it causes. Although hardly an adequate response, a small gesture at best, it is, in my view, better than silence.

First, on the fact that Forcillo has been granted bail due to his pending appeal, this is what Justice Eileen Gillese had to say about releasing the criminal officer:

“Despite the seriousness of the offence for which the Appellant stands convicted,” she wrote, “in my view, fully informed members of the community will objectively understand and accept that it is not contrary to the public interest that he be released.”

The fact that he will now be under house arrest pending his appeal (which begs the question of whether house arrest will constitute 'time served' should his conviction be upheld) is not sitting well with everyone:

Criminal defence and constitutional lawyer Annamaria Enenajor, who wasn’t involved in the case, said there can be a disconnect between what the courts may consider to be supporting public confidence in the justice system and what the public actually feels.

“As a member of the public, I’m outraged by the conduct of Officer Forcillo but I also I view it in the broader context of police violence and impunity. So my understanding of what diminishes my confidence in the administration of justice might be quite different than that of a judge who is really only dealing only with the case in front of them,” she said.

“The reasonable person, who according to the court who is the holder of the public opinion, is somebody who trusts the police, believes the police implicitly and has confidence in them. And that’s not generally representative of many members of society.”

Annamaria Enenajor may be reflecting the concerns of the broader community here, but what about those of the Yatim family, who have suffered grievously over the loss of their son and brother?

Nabil Yatim, Sammy's father, speaks of their ongoing trauma:

Yatim, 68, is thoughtful, articulate, reflective, but he struggles to explain the pain of the past three years. “You go through hell and back — how I can describe that more?”

Immediately after getting the news of his son’s death while on a business trip in the U.S., Yatim, a retail management consultant, says he took things hour by hour, day by day. He became a “hermit,” never wanting to go out, avoiding family and friends, because the subject was always the same.

“You’ve been thinking about it all day and all night, the last thing you want to do is talk about it some more, so you become isolated,” he said. “And you just kind of nurse your wounds, in a sense. It was horrible. It still is.”

Harder still is the public nature of the family’s grief. Sammy’s death and the unprecedented conviction of a police officer for attempted murder have made international headlines. Yatim finds himself reluctant to introduce himself to strangers, knowing his name will prompt questions — are you related to Sammy?

“People are so nice, and they mean well, but sometimes you just don’t want to open up (your) wounds again, every minute of every day.”

With psychiatric help and medication, Yatim says he is at least now able to sleep. “I have a little bit more strength than I thought,” he said.

But he and his wife are not the only people contending with the aftermath of Sammy's death. Sammy's sister, two years younger than her brother, has undergone trauma that I think few of us can fully appreciate:

In the hours after Sammy’s death, it was Sarah, then 16, who had to identify her brother’s body. She is “traumatized,” and has dropped out of school. “I am very concerned about her,” Yatim said.

He is trying to get her professional help, even check her into a residence program to treat post-traumatic stress, but the family can’t afford it, Yatim said.

The other day, in speaking on the conviction of Forcillo, Mike McCormick, head of the Toronto police union, said,

“This is a tragic day for the Forcillo family, the Yatim family - there will never be any good outcome from this, it's tragic all around.”

That may well be, but perhaps Nabil Yatim's pained observation about Forcillo sums up a stark reality that puts things into a truer perpesctive:

“He gets to go home. My son sleeps in an urn.”

A Skating Party For Forcillo

What many of us feared has happened. James Forcillo has been granted bail:

Justice Eileen Gillese’s decision was released to counsel by email this morning.

“The Appellant’s release, pending the determination of his appeal, poses no risk to the public as there is no risk that he would commit further offences,” Gillese wrote.

“For the reasons given, despite the seriousness of the offence for which the Appellant stands convicted, in my view, fully informed members of the community will objectively understand and accept that it is not contrary to the public interest that he be released.”

I guess Justice Gillese's definition of the public interest is far narrower than mine. It should bother everyone that the public's interest in seeing justice swiftly served continues to be ignored.

Kind of gives new meaning to the term 'contempt of court,' doesn't it?

Forcillo Is Sentenced, But Is It Justice?

Toronto police officer James Forcillo, who gunned down Sammy Yatim three years ago, has been given six years for his despicable act. Is it justice? I don't know.

I'm Just A Poor Boy, Nobody Loves Me

That famous line from Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody might have been the inspiration, and is certainly the subtext, for James Forcillo and his lawyer's pleas that poor baby James be allowed to serve whatever sentence is passed down to the killer of Sammy Yatim as house arrest.

The officer’s acquittal on a charge of second-degree murder means his use of lethal force was justified and the mandatory minimum penalty he faces is grossly disproportionate to his conduct, his lawyers argue in written submissions filed in Ontario Superior Court.

“The moral culpability of the applicant [Constable Forcillo] is at the lowest end that can be reasonably contemplated for an attempted murder conviction and there was no attendant harm to Mr. Yatim,” writes lead defence lawyer Peter Brauti.

In analyzing the verdict and the actions of Constable Forcillo, his lawyers maintain that it is not appropriate to impose a prison sentence. “The logical and legal effect of the jury’s verdict is that they accepted it was reasonable and necessary to kill Mr. Yatim,” states Mr. Brauti. “The second volley did not accelerate death in any way; it had no meaningful impact on Mr. Yatim’s health and it was incapable of causing Mr. Yatim any pain,” he adds.

Constable Forcillo’s lawyers also intend to appeal the actual verdict, but can not do so until after the sentencing.

Incidentally, unless he goes to jail, I assume Forcillo will continue drawing his police salary, as he is now.

Since I started with Queen lyrics, I'll end with them too, again from Bohemian Rhapsody:

Essy come, easy go, will you let me go?
Bismillah! No, we will not let you go. (Let him go!)
Bismillah! We will not let you go. (Let him go!)
Bismillah! We will not let you go. (Let me go!)
Will not let you go. (Let me go!)
Never, never let you go
Never let me go, oh.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Oh, mama mia, mama mia (Mama mia, let me go.)

Come to think of it, the entire song seems applicable to Forcillo:

Policing: A Contrast In Methodologies

We've all seen the videos depicting the murder of Sammy Yatim at the hands of Toronto police officer James Forcillio. Although Forcillo has been held to partial account for his foul deed, most realize, I think, that things didn't have to end the tragic way they did.



And with new and disturbing allegations of police misconduct being perpetrated against the family of Alex Wettlaufer, the public has every right to be gravely concerned about a constabulary that appears to regard itself as a sovereign power, meting out punishment and death at will with little or no real oversight or control.

But it doesn't have to be that way. The Toronto Star carries a story contrasting the execution of Yatim with the far more measured approach of an Ohio police officer, Joshua Hilling who, despite immediate peril, fires his weapon only once on knife-wielding suspect Javier Aleman and pleads with the suspect to drop his weapon in a protracted encounter that speaks so well of him. Unlike Forcillo, Hillman sought to deescalate the situation in order to save Aleman's life.



You can read a full analysis of the differences between the Yatim and Aleman cases in how the officers handled the situation here. One can only rue the fact that someone like Officer Hilling was not present when Sammy Yatim had his crisis. Had he been, the odds are that the young man would still be very much alive today.

UPDATED: More On Alex Wettlaufer, Toronto's Latest Young Person Killed By Police

If we are given to even modest introspection, it seems inevitable that the longer we live, the more we develop an increasing appreciation not only for the wonder of life but also its shortness and fragility. The older we get, the more we are witness to a parade of people who enter and leave our orbits, sometimes by choice, but more often by the cold fact of mortality. The exits that hurt us the most, of course, are of those we have known and loved. Yet the latter represent only a minute part of the larger human experience, but if we watch, listen and read carefully, even those we don't know touch us in some ways. I feel that way about Alex Wettlaufer, the young man killed Sunday night by Toronto police, about whom I wrote yesterday.



Unlike his friend Sammy Yatim, who met the same fate as he did, Wettlaufer will likely not occupy a large part of public consciousness, owing to the singular absence of video documenting his demise. I suppose that is why there was absolutely no followup on last night's news; the media were consumed instead by the attack on two soldiers by Ayanle Hassan Ali at a recruitment centre, an attack that Toronto Police Chief Mark Saunders was only to happy to hold a press conference about, despite the usual official reticence 'because the investigation is ongoing.' Silence thus far is the only official response to the killing of Alex.

But one media outlet has not forgotten the young man whose life was so cruelly cut short. Today's Toronto Star, in a solid editorial, bears witness to that life and discusses, as I tried to do yesterday, the implications of his death. I am taking this opportunity to reproduce the entire piece, one that I hope you will read:

Another police shooting can’t be brushed aside

We’ll have to wait weeks or months for the official version of what exactly went down late Sunday night in a park in North York. But even before all the facts are known, there are serious questions about the circumstances surrounding the death of Alex Wettlaufer.

He’s the 21-year-old man who was shot dead by Toronto police just before midnight on Sunday. The province’s Special Investigations Unit (SIU) is on the case, so the usual veil of silence has been drawn over the incident.

But this much is known: Police say they had “preliminary information” that two men were fighting at the Leslie subway station and one of them had a gun. Investigators say one man fled into the nearby park. There was a confrontation with police, and Wettlaufer was fatally shot.

Wettlaufer’s family, however, tells a very different story. They describe him as a quiet man with a full-time job whose ambition was to join the military. His mother, Wendy, says he was on his cellphone in the park, talking to a family member, at the moment he was shot. “He was crying, saying that he’s being surrounded,” she told CP24. “They kept telling him to put the weapon down, and he kept hollering telling them he didn’t have a weapon.”

Did Wettlaufer have a gun? Or did police mistake his cellphone for a weapon? These are among the questions that SIU investigators, who look into all deaths involving police, must try and answer amid the disturbing claims from Wettlaufer’s family.

Without video or other independent evidence, though, they will have to rely mainly on the version provided by police themselves. Wettlaufer cannot give his side. And in the wake of the Sammy Yatim shooting, many people will be understandably skeptical of the story told by police.

Yatim’s death in 2013 was captured on video from multiple angles. It showed a Toronto policeman, Const. James Forcillo, shooting Yatim eight times on an empty, stopped streetcar. In January, Forcillo was convicted of attempted murder – but there’s little doubt that without the video evidence he would have gone free. That’s what happened with every other officer charged with murder or manslaughter.

Ironically, Wettlaufer attended the same school as Sammy Yatim and they were said to be friends. The public was shocked by Yatim’s death because the video showed conclusively that it simply didn’t have to happen. He was trapped alone on the streetcar and there was no good reason to shoot him. Chief Mark Saunders himself acknowledged at the time that his force had lost public trust.

After that, Torontonians are in no mood to quietly accept the death of yet another young man in questionable circumstances. His shooting is another argument for all officers to wear body cameras, so there would be independent confirmation of how the confrontation developed.

In the absence of that, the public will expect a thorough investigation that does not take the official explanation at face value.

Doesn't Alex Wettlaufer deserve to be remembered by all of us, not just his devatated family and friends?

UPDATE: There is a gogundme campaign to help cover Alex's funeral. If you might be interested in contributing, please click here.

Now Sammy Yatim's Friend Has Been Killed By The Police

I have long held to the belief that had there been no video evidence, there would have been no charges, no trial and certainly no conviction of James Forcillo in the police murder of Sammy Yatim. The well-know blue line would have made sure of that. I cannot help but wonder if we will see that alternative reality play out in the latest Toronto police killing, this one, eerily, of Sammy Yatim's friend, Alex Wettlaufer.

While it is still very early in the investigation, and I am very mindful of the pitfalls of jumping to conclusions, what I have read and seen thus far is not encouraging, and I am left with a sadness over the loss of another young person, this one but 21 years old. Here is what we know so far:

The incident began just after 11:15 p.m. Sunday, when officers arrived at the Leslie subway station at Leslie St. and Sheppard Ave. E. to investigate reports of a fight between two men. Toronto police tweeted late Sunday that one of them had a gun.

Investigators say one of the men fled to the nearby park, where there was a confrontation with Toronto police, including members of the Emergency Task Force, that resulted in police fatally shooting Wettlaufer. At 11:34 p.m., paramedics were called to the scene. They transported the man to Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, where he was pronounced dead.

Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit (SIU), which probes incidents of death, serious injury and allegations of sexual assault involving police, was called in early Monday morning to investigate. SIU spokeswoman Jasbir Dhillon said the probe is still in the early stages, and investigators cannot yet say if Wettlaufer was carrying a gun.

“It’s part of the investigation, whether or not he was carrying a weapon,” she said.

That last line, to which I have added emphasis, raises questions. In most early investigations, whether a weapon was found is part of the basic information released to the public; given the egregious incompetence of the SIU, about which I have written many times, I have no confidence the truth will necessarily emerge.

As well, if police insist that he had a gun, will forensics tests be done to look for gunpowder residue to determine if it had been fired? If none is found, or he did not have a gun, how will the police explain killing him? Will we be given the kind of contemptuous lie that likely would have been given about Sammy Yatim had there been no video evidence, i.e., that he was lunging at police, menacing them in such a way that they had no choice? If so, I think we would be fools to uncritically accept such self-serving pap.

Perhaps some truth can be found in the news reports carried on local television.

In this first video, you will hear the shots fired by the police. There is no indication that they had been fired upon:



Here is Alex's sister:



Other family members are also speaking out:



Given the contempt for transparency that many police services seem to be showing these days, we, the public, have every right to be asking hard questions and demanding answers and accountability. I make no apologies for my own cynicism and suspicions.

For a parting context, perhaps the final word for today should be given to Lilieth Rankine, a neighbour who knows the family well:

“He’s a good kid, went to school, finished school,” she said. “I don’t get it . . . What happened? Can you imagine what the community is going through?”

To Serve And Protect Who?

Were I so inclined, I could probably devote this blog solely to police misconduct, so extensive does it seem. Perhaps it is due to the Forcillo conviction for the attempted murder of the late Sammy Yatim that we are more sensitive to the issue, but each day seems to bring new information about police behaving badly. A crisis of public confidence is not too strong a phrase to describe the public's growing distrust of those sworn to protect and serve.

And to make matters worse, as I observed in a post earlier this week, the police, or at least their unions, are reacting with outrage rather than humility at these charges and convictions, a fact that does not bode well for changing the culture and profile of our protectors.

In its letters section today, The Toronto Star features an entire page of public reactions to the Forcillo conviction. Each letter is worth reading, but I reproduce just a few below to offer you a sampling of sentiments:

.... Police spokespeople have publicly worried that the verdict will “send a chill through the force.” But if a chill is what it takes to soothe the itchy trigger fingers of cops like Forcillo, then it’s exactly what we need. These men and women are given public permission to patrol our streets armed with increasingly deadly force. It’s time they understood that public scrutiny is part of that privilege – scrutiny that will become a bit uncomfortable now and then. Or are we supposed to look the other way when a citizen is killed?

As your editorial notes, the verdict will be small comfort to the Yatim family, but at least it’s something. And the Star deserves credit for its excellent series on police abuse and accountability in the GTA, “Breaking badge.” I believe that it has helped to shift our outdated attitudes towards the police.

Andrew van Velzen, Toronto

The TPS police union boss, Mike McCormack said he is “disappointed with the guilty finding and it sends a chilling message to other cops.” I agree. Indeed, disappointing the original charge was reduced and chilling that the blue wall choose to close ranks to protect a criminal in their midst rather than “serve and protect” the public.

Time for handlers at the senior police levels and politicians to take note. No more impunity for bad cops who have previously executed the emotionally or mentally upset among us. Rather than deescalating the situation. A overdue message to any cop who may wish to play fast and loose with civilian lives. Now consequences attached.

This is the first time in Ontario history a out of line cop actually has been convicted. Now the question is, will his legal weasels continue to attempt to subvert justice by their gyrations allowing this soon to be ex-thug in blue to escape?

Paul Coulter, Kincardine

Forcillo’s lawyer spoke of “trial by YouTube.” How about “trial by seeing is believing” or “trial by a picture is worth a thousand words.”‎

Let’s be clear here; no video, no conviction. All on-site police testifying in court would have backed and supported their brother’s need to use the excessive force repeatedly delivered on a dead or dying individual.

Tim Strevett, Hamilton

As in countless other trials, no one has emerged a winner here. Both Forcillo and Yatim’s family have lost.

I have to wonder, however, at the defence decrying the video shot that night, and suggesting it precluded a fair trial. When the police install cameras in the city and seek greater powers to snoop, we are told, if you are not doing anything wrong, you should not fear this surveillance. It seems, in this unhappy case, the police have learned they, too, are being watched and recorded.

Video evidence is virtually unrefutable; that’s why law enforcement wants it. Now, however, it seems the shoe is on the other foot.

G.P. Wowchuk, Toronto

...what should be most disturbing to the public is Mike McCormack’s reaction that the verdict is sending a “chilling message” to the police. The police still don’t get it. This reaction is itself sending a cold blooded warning to the public.

Torontonians have reason to beware the police when their spokesperson insists on their right to remain above the law.

Tony D’Andrea, Toronto

More On James Forcillo

H/t Toronto Star

In response to yesterday's post, both the Salamander and the Mound of Sound offered some interesting commentary. The Salamander has experience in dealing with troubled and armed youth, as you will see, and The Mound has had careers both in journalism and the law. I am therefore reproducing their respective observations below:

.. the slow motion process of the Forcillo trial re the killing of Sammy Yatim has come to a temporary junction point. the toronto newstalk jocks can't get enough of expert opinion, so called public sentiment & various views from officialdom. In the past I described my own experiences, to the estimable Mound.. wherein I was called upon to deal with emotionally disturbed teens, drug addicted teens and triple maximum security juveniles.. I was never armed by the way.

Sammy Yatim was troubled, delusional & psychotic.. 1/2 of a collision looking for the other 1/2 .. that's very clear via video evidence, medical history & post mortem toxicology. He was 'out there' .. 'crispy' & as likely to try and swim to Rochester as he was to confront a dozen armed police.

But the killing is really about fearful Forcillo, a known hothead cop who'd pulled his gun a dozen times in 3 years. So lets keep the event very very concise, shall we? Most anyone has seen the various videos of Sammy Yatim's last moments & is aware of Forcillo's 'defense'.

Of course I'll paint it in a slightly different light.. as I've been there, done it, got the t-shirt.. dealing with delusional drug addled teens.. with a weapon.. and nobody died!

Forcillo and his female partner arrived on scene as a seemingly damn cool TTC driver gave up and left his streetcar. 'Taking charge' .. so to speak, Forcillo confronted the teen from a close but safe distance, shouting profanity laden 'orders' as his memory challenged partner holstered her weapon.

In the midst of numerous armed cops beside and around him, Forcillo feared for his life, such was the threat of knife wielding Sammy Yatim, up there inside a streetcar. Really now? Armed cops standing on either side of him, behind him, at the rear doors etc.. and Forcillo thought the teen could fly like a witch and get to him from the streetcar, without descending the steps & covering the 10 foot gap to that crowd of armed cops?

Forcillo exemplifies 'failure' .. the 'fearful' defense is so limp that its to laugh at.. but the Force must close ranks. In reality I suspect other cops curse Forcillo on a daily basis. The idea that his 'training' was to do what he did in approx 50 seconds of disastrous failure is to laugh at. Somewhere right near the bottom of the Toronto Police hires in the last 5 years is Forcillo.. a weak link deserving to drive a desk.. maybe in data entry or vehicle maintenance.. To let him deal with the public, much less ever own a gun again would be a travesty.. Amen, end of story.

I'm not satisfied the judge handled the case correctly either, Lorne. The judge issued revised instructions to the jury after they had deliberated that, to me, sounded bizarre.

The whole theory of whether this was one or two shooting events was confusing. The coroner testified about the nature of the wounds inflicted at the outset, when Yatim had been standing, contrasted with the subsequent wounds from bullets that struck a prone victim. Wound paths are readily traceable.

As I understand it the forensics suggested the initial three wounds were mortal. Yatim would have died without more. How then to treat the next five wounds? The Crown chose to treat that as attempted murder.

In firing squad executions is the coup de grace administered after the initial volley a separate event? I don't see it that way. It's collateral to the first shots.

I think an appellate court might order a retrial. I suspect that better Crown counsel might rethink the prosecution theory and look beyond the 5-second pause.

If, as the video suggests, Yatim collapsed with the first shot, were the second and third really justified? Was the first shot warranted unless Yatim made some clear move to exit the streetcar such as stepping into the stairwell? That, to me, was the obvious threshold to the "self defence" business.

I think the Crown may have muddied the waters and left the judge to deliver an incoherent, confusing charge to the jury. Were I sitting on the appeal I think I would set aside both verdicts and direct a new trial.

Not A Moment Of Humility Or Uncertainty

I have avoided writing about the semi-acquital of Sammy Yatim's killer, Officer James Forcillo, partly because it sickens me when miscarriages of justice occur. Adding insult to injury is his lawyer's attempt to get his conviction for attempted murder stayed

...because Forcillo “substantially followed his training,” which was provided by the state.

“The state,” he said, “should be disentitled to a conviction because they . . . provided the training to him.”

Even more upsetting is the reaction of the police union, which you will see in a moment. But first, I'd like you to take a look at a clip about an execution perpetrated by the Cleveland police three years ago; especially offensive is the reaction of their union which, as you will see in the second clip, has some eerie echoes of Toronto police union head Mike McCormack's comments on Forcillo's conviction.





MsCormick laments that it sends a chilling message to front-line officers, as well it should. Unfortunately, the real message they will refuse to process is that when they violate their oath to serve and protect, they will be held accountable by the state, however imperfectly.

Humility, not police outrage, would be the proper reaction in both the Cleveland and Toronto cases.

Remembering Sammy Yatim

To listen to James Forcillo, the Toronto police officer who shot Sammy Yatim eight times as the knife-wielding teen stood inside an empty streetcar, he had no choice but to kill him:

"If I had done nothing, he would have stabbed me," Const. James Forcillo said at his trial, being held in front of a jury in Ontario Superior Court. "If I had waited for the Taser, he would have been off the streetcar. He forced my hand. He was the one who decided to come forward."

If you have watched any of the video of that fateful night (available on this blog), you will likely find that a difficult defence to accept, especially given the distance that separated Yatim and Forcillo. Was there a better way to have handled the situation? A recent machete attack in Toronto that was stopped by two unarmed security guards suggests there was:

The security guards in the above say that they were just doing their job. It's a pity that the Toronto police seem to have an entirely different way of looking at their positions. It is a perspective that has raised the ire of some Toronto Star readers:

Re: Security guards were just doing their jobs, Dec. 26

Please help me to understand this situation. On Dec. 23, an unarmed security guard was willing and able to risk his life by tackling and disarming an apparently agitated, machete-wielding man who had already injured an apparently innocent passerby.

In contrast, early in the morning of July 27, 2013, one Toronto Police Service officer fired multiple rounds into a knife-wielding man who had harmed no one, and another TPS officer deployed a taser on the recumbent, mortally wounded man.

Three questions: First, why is the TPS failing to train its officers as well as the security company seems to have trained its guards?

Second, why is the TPS failing to recruit officers who are apparently as brave and resourceful as this security guard and his partner demonstrated themselves to be?

Third, if the TPS had attended at the incident on Dec. 23 would we now be facing another scenario in which an accused person never had the opportunity to stand trial for the charges against him?

Edward Bricknell, Toronto

There is an important lesson to be learned from the recent incident near the Eaton Centre, where a man wielding a machete and a hunting knife was successfully disarmed by two security guards.

It would have been easy for them just to call the police, but the situation required immediate action to avert any further danger to the public. The security guards followed their training and immediately resolved a volatile situation that could have resulted in many more casualties.

This should be a salutary reminder to law enforcement officers when dealing with armed assailants. The use of a lethal weapon to resolve such situations must remain an option, but only as a last resort, not a first response.

Keith Spicer, Oakville

The headline says it all about Nathaniel McNeil, the unarmed security guard who tackled a machete-wielding man near the Eaton Centre. How many times have the Toronto police encountered a knife-wielding person (often mentally ill) who ends up being shot and killed. Perhaps the Toronto police should follow the example and/or learn from these security guards.

J.G. Wong, Toronto

So a security guard is able, with his bare hands, to disarm a machete-wielding lunatic who had attacked an innocent bystander, yet Constable Forcillo, flanked by members of his force, felt it necessary to pump 8 bullets into Sammy Yatim despite the fact that no citizens were at risk.

What a coward.

Michelle McCarthy, Toronto

You can read the rest of the letter here.

Respect, Fear, and Loathing

If we are completely honest, many of us will admit to a deeply ambivalent relationship with the police. On the one hand we look to them for protection against the less ordered elements of society, but on the other hand, in the deeper recesses of our psyches, we also fear and, at times, loathe them. And on some level we probably recognize that they can be very dangerous if we insist too vehemently on our rights against their sometimes arrogant intrusions into our 'space.'

Think of the rampant abuse of police authority during the G20 Toronto Summit. Think of the murder of Sammy Yatim.

And I say all this from the cossetted position of a middle-class and educated white man.

I can only imagine how much more difficult that relationship must be if one is black.

Dr. Dawg has written a fine analysis/post-mortem of the the shooting of Michael Brown and the failure of the grand jury to indict his killer, Officer Darren Wilson. If you haven't already done so, make sure to check it out.

Similarly, the CBC's senior Washington correspondent, Neil Macdonald, has penned an arresting piece that deserves wide readership. His thesis: questioning police authority is a risky, even potentially deadly, business:

Most police despise any challenge to their authority. Some will abuse it, if necessary, to protect that authority, and the system can allow them to do that.

Some police are bright, professional and educated. Some are louts. Some are racists. You never know which variety you're facing.

But what they all have in common (outside Great Britain) is the weapon at their hip, and the implicit threat of its ultimate use to settle matters.

Macdonald suggests there is but one way to behave when confronted by the police:

But I've had my share of dealings with police, in the U.S., Canada, and elsewhere in the world, and there is a universal truth: when police demand submission, it's best to submit.

Michael Brown's fatal mistake, he implies, was his refusal to submit:

Officer Darren Wilson told grand jurors that when he told Michael Brown and his friend to walk on the sidewalk that Saturday afternoon instead of down the middle of the road, Brown replied "fuck what you have to say."

Eventually, they tussled at the window of Wilson's cruiser. Finally, with both of them outside on the street and facing one another, Wilson shot the unarmed teenager to death.

Clearly, the yawning racial divide of the United States was a contributing, perhaps overriding, factor in Brown's death, and that chasm will likely never be bridged. But Macdonald suggests a practical measure that might go a long way to curbing the police violence that so painfully and periodically erupts:

Ensure that every police officer working the streets of America wears a body camera. That would certainly help.

Many police cruisers are already equipped with dash cameras. And the Ferguson case demonstrated the fallibility of eyewitness accounts.

So why not pin digital cams on uniforms? They would act as impassive, accurate monitors, both in cases of police abuse and when someone falsely claims police abuse.

I suspect police here will probably resist the idea, though. Nothing questions authority like hard video evidence.

And as experience has shown us, such a measure is sorely needed in our own country as well.

Wouldn't A Taser Have Been More Appropriate?

I have often thought that had the video evidence not been so strong and graphic in the shooting of Sammy Yatim, the 'official' police story would have been that the disturbed 18-year-old had lunged at officers and thus had to be killed. What the video apparently showed, however, was what many would describe as the execution of a kid who posed no threat to anyone.

Similar video has arisen in the recent shooting of St Louis resident Kajieme Powell, an obviously disturbed man carrying a knife by his side. According to St. Louis Metro Police Chief Sam Dotson, the officers used deadly force due to the suspect with a knife coming within three of four feet of the officers, which would be considered within lethal range.

While perhaps not as definitive as the Yatim video, the following does cast doubt on the official story. Have a look and make up your own mind:

Sammy Yatim's Accused Killer Back On The Job

While the presumption of innocence is fundamental to our justice system, common sense and public sensibilities are always unspoken elements of the equation. This is clearly seen, for example, in jury selection, a good part of which is designed to ferret out and exclude from participation those with prejudgments that could affect the rights of the accused to a fair trial.

With that preamble and proviso out of the way, what I express in the following is simply my opinion, a perspective informed by news coverage of the accused and the aforementioned common sense and public sensibilities.

I have written several past posts on Sammy Yatim and related matters of police abuse of their authority. Yatim, readers will recall, was the 18-year-old whose death at the hands of police on July 27, 2013, was captured on video. While holding a knife in an empty streetcar, presenting no immediate threat to the many police who were on scene, Yatim was shot to death by Const. James Forcillo, who was later charged with second-degree murder.

Now, incredibly, just a few days after the beginning of his preliminary hearing, word has arrived that Forcillo has been back on the job since February.

The decision to have Const. James Forcillo return to duty — after a seven-month suspension with pay — was made by Chief Bill Blair.

“The chief, using his discretion, made the decision to lift his suspension and since February he has been assigned to administrative duties here at headquarters,” spokesman Meaghan Gray confirmed Wednesday. “He is not in uniform and his job does not require any use-of-force options.”

A close Yatim family friend, Joseph Nazar, was stunned by the news:

This is a betrayal by the police chief,” Nazar said. “This officer is charged with murder and he’s working in a police station?

“If this is true, we’re not going to sit quiet about it,” he added.

Police union head Mike McCormick, “fully” supports the chief’s decision to lift Forcillo’s suspension.

“We encourage management to find meaningful work for suspended officers when possible, as long as any risk has been mitigated,” McCormack said. “And it actually happens quite frequently.”

He said it’s good for the officers, the service and taxpayers.

What McCormick failed to acknowledge is that it's not so good for the pursuit of justice, fosters the perception of a blue brotherhood with more contempt than concern for the public, and betrays an egregious disdain for a still-grieving family that will never again embrace their loved one.

Do Police Have The 'Right Stuff'?

Given the killing of people like Sammy Yatim and Steve Mesic and the taser takedown of Iole Pasquale, it would seem a legitimate question to ask, as Star readers offer their views:

SIU ruling on Tasered senior yet another shock, Oct. 11

Maybe Toronto Police Service just needs to hire tougher cops or send them for martial arts training.

I’m having a hard time imagining a confused, feeble 80-year-old woman rushing three physically fit officers with the speed and fury of a Ninja while flashing and twirling a bread knife and doing flying drop kicks. Maybe these guys should transfer to the TTC and work as fare collectors.

Best to keep a thick layer of plexiglass between them and those dangerous pugnacious seniors. Then if an armed robber tries to hold up the booth, they can utilize their use-of-force skills on a more deserving citizen.

Douglas Porter, Peterborough

Is it not ironic that health-care workers in long-term care are able to help Alzheimer’s patients without resorting to violence while a group of police officers were so frightened, maybe even terrified, that they Tasered an 80-year-old woman to protect themselves.

Our highly paid police officers could take a lesson in dealing with the elderly from our health-care workers, often immigrants women working for minium wages. Anyone who is so nervous and easily frightened should not be police officers working on the front line.

Howard Wilson, Toronto

Your Morning Jolt

Most people get their morning jolt from their breakfast cup(s) of coffee. As I wrote earlier this week, an 80-year-old woman, now identified as Iole Pasquale and suffering from dementia, got her jolts at 3:30 a.m. from two police taserings while walking along a road in Mississauga with a bread knife.

Described in the original report as frail, police sources say Pasquale was out of control and refused to follow police orders to put down the weapon before she was Tasered.

As a consequence of the tasering, she fell down and broke her hip. Any degree of independent living is no longer an option. Paquale's daughter Angela could be described as a tad upset.

A crime wave of unprecedented proportions seems to be under way; given the cases of Sammy Yatim wielding a pen knife on a deserted streetcar, a crime for which he paid with his life, and Steve Mesic, the emotionally disturbed unarmed Hamilton man whose disrespectful turning of his back on police apparently warranted death, given that his dorsal area was the recipient of the bullets that killed him, few would dispute the dangers police confront on a daily basis.

What is to be done for our brave men and women in blue? Surely the public second-guessing that follows such highly-publicized events is deeply demoralizing to those who protect and serve us.

But undoubtedly, relief is forthcoming for our centurions. The SIU is currently investigating the Pasquale rampage and, if past practices are any indication, full exoneration of the subject officers is all but assured. The Sammy Yatim case is the likely exception. The citizen video of that killing has been widely circulated, offering a view of events that would challenge even the most elaborate and obdurate of police 'narratives.'

Nonetheless, citizens have been warned. Obey authority. Offer no resistance. Question nothing. Your well-being, even your life, may very well depend on complete compliance and passivity.

Constable Stefanie Trudeau

Given Sammy Yatim's tragic execution by police for swearing at them and holding a penknife, and the shooting in the back of the unarmed Steve Mesic in Hamilton, I suppose the 'mouthy' young man depicted in the following video was 'lucky' to be merely pepper-sprayed for his 'impertinence.' Nonetheless, the justice sytem in Quebec, after an internal police investigation, has ruled that there was insufficient context in the video evidence to charge the officer, Constable Stephanie Trudeau:

Quebec’s directorate of public prosecutions said in a statement Wednesday afternoon that 27 witnesses had been interviewed in the course of the probe into Trudeau’s actions that evening and they had concluded, given the “aggressive and violent nature of the protests,” that the officer had not used unnecessary force as defined in the Criminal Code.

“As a result, no criminal offence has been committed by the officer who was the subject of this investigation,” the agency said.

From my perspective, the video seems to offer a pretty full context, but hey, I'm a mere civilian with a bias in favour of free speech:



If you would like to see another video featuring Constable Trudeau's aggressive proclivities, click here.

The Police Are Such Sensitive Souls

Andre Marin, Ontario's Ombudsman, found this out after announcing he was planning to investigate the province’s direction to police on de-escalating conflict situations in light of the police killing of Sammy Yatim.

According to a report in The National Post, a Durham police detective, Dennis Scott, opened a Twitter account under a pseudonym so that he could call Marin a carded member of Al Qaida. With what I guess passes for original thought amongst the constabulary, Scott went on to call the ombudsman “a complete douche bag!” and had this suggestion: “Why don’t you stick your big French nose up your ass instead of business where it doesn’t belong.”

Toronto city councillor, who was critical of the police killing, was also the recipient of advice from Scott:

“You are a real expert, huh? Douchebag city councillor? Were you there? You need to keep your idiotic thoughts to yourself.”


Durham Police Deputy Chief Paul Martin tweeted that he is investigating these disturbing allegations.

I'm sure that will set everything to rights.



H/t trapdinawrpool

Sammy Yatim: A Guest Commentary

I received the following as a response to one of my blog posts on Sammy Yatim, the young man gunned down a week ago by the Toronto Police. Anon's comments and insights are more powerful than anything I could have written:

Sammy...
I've wanted die...Only I was to scared to do it myself.
I pushed everyone around me to edge, silently hoping they would save me.
That night on the bus, those girls most likely ridiculed you, pushed you...as you felt you have had enough. New to Toronto, trying to fit in, left home...and nowhere to go. I know what it's like...No one understood...You allowed everyone off the bus. If you wanted to hurt someone, you had plenty opportunity...you did not. You wanted to say your're angry, and had no other means of expressing, I know...I've hurt too.
When the police arrived and you yelled obcenties, I picture myself. "what are you going to do!?" It always escalates. In my past at least. And then I am left feeling..."What have I done" It's as if I black out in rage. I still feel that way when an officer is in my rear view. I have done no wrong, yet feel complete anxiety. That night when confronted by so many officers, you realize you have really done it this time. You know your in trouble and your scared. I know. I know, because I could never control my anger. I know, because at that moment, you come slowly come back to reality.

As I watched you back up, move forward, and unsure of what do. It all seems cloudy. Your still angry, and hoping the other party realizes, I know you new they would never hurt you. You know they were going to calm you. And faced with guns pointed at me, I know I would need somebody to whisper it's okay. You were waiting for that moment, the moment when you could release the knife, as that was your only armour. I could only imagine the thoughts going through your mind. I can remember at my darkest moments of rage, coming back to reality only once I had pushed it too far, I remember thinking..."Gawd...what have I done".

Eighteen is such a young age, and so very tough. So much pain, learning love, life, and mean kids. I am always amazed at the students who say" Hey he went to my school" and shed tears, and the ones who always thought he was such a nice guy, yet probably never spoke to him as he passed in the hall. They gather at the funeral and form huddles of tears, yet while alive he was alone.

We all suffer from mental health, EACH AND EVERY HUMAN.

It's how we deal with it that seperates us from a patient. Some report it, some deal with it, some ignore it, some medicate it. We all have issues in our lives.

It's how each individual handles their stress or depression. I hope other teens feeling left with no other options are confronted with options and not left with death. RIP Sammy.

Sammy Yatim: A Petition From Change.Org

A petition has been established at Change.org. seeking justice for Sammy Yatim. At last count it was closing in on 27,000 signatures. Here is how it reads:

In the early hours of Saturday, July 27, 2013, Sammy Yatim was shot dead by a Toronto Police officer as the 18-year old man stood alone in a stationary TTC street car with a 3-inch knife in his hands. His death has caused an uproar in the community and oridnary people are asking, "Why did Sammy Yatim have to be shot dead by the Police?"

In the last 25 years, a number of people have been shot dead by the Toronto Police who claim to be acting within the law. After every such tragedy, inquiries and inquests are held that make recommendations, but it seems none of these policies and procedures have succeeded in preventing the death of men and women who need help, not harm.

In 1996, a medical student Edmund Yu was shot dead as he sat alone in the back seat of a TTC street car, armed only with a tiny hammer.

Now, Sammy Yatim has been killed by a police officer firing not one or two, but nine bullets and all within a few minutes of his first encounter with the young man who was alone inside a stationary TTC street car.

An inquiry is taking place. However, we fear this inquiry too will end up like earlier such exercises and no will be found responsible for the death of this young troubled man who had all his life ahead of him.

If the police constable who shot Sammy Yatim dead is not charged, once more we will send a message to ordinary citizens that Police forces are above the law.

For the good of communities and for better civilian-police relations, let a court decide whether any laws were broken in the death of Sammy Yatim.

This petition is not to bring disrepute to the fine men and women who serve in the Toronto Police and who we consider the world's finest police force.

Having said that we feel the SIU and the AG of Ontario should intervene in the interest of justice and also to assure the citizenery who feel they have no voice in this matter.

We acknowledge that despite the many videos, we do not know the entire story. However, based on the video and the reaction by Police Chef Bill Blair and Police Chair Alok Mukherjee, where they immediately suspended the officer in question, we feel there is enough evidence for us to conclude that something awfully wrong happenned that resulted in the death of Sammy Yatim.

In view of the above, we feel if an apporpriate charge is not filed against the police constable who caused the death, the citizenry will lose confidence in the legal system and the men and women who have been entrusted to deliver justice.

If you are interested in adding your name to the growing numbers seeking justice, click here.