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Joint Lawsuit Planned for G20 Arrestees
Overwhelmed with calls, Civil Liberties Association is working on suing police forces
The Canadian Civil Liberties Association says it is considering a joint lawsuit against the Toronto police and other police forces responsible for the G20 mass arrests.
Riot police surround a large street demonstration on the closing day of the G20 Summit in Toronto, Sunday, June 27, 2010. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster) “The CCLA is planning to help people who are seeking compensation to (initiate) a lawsuit in the Superior Court of Ontario,” said Nathalie Des Rosiers, general counsel for the CCLA. “We have a couple of plaintiffs.”
More than 1,000 arrests were made relating to the G20 summit and multiple reports have emerged alleging peaceful demonstrators or even bystanders were caught up in the mass arrests — most notably, at the Esplanade’s Novotel Hotel on Saturday, where demonstrators tried to stage a sit-in, or at Queen St. and Spadina Ave., where a large crowd was boxed in and detained for several hours in the rain.
All arrests this weekend were made under the criminal code and not the Public Works Protection Act, according to the province.
Des Rosiers said the CCLA has been overwhelmed with phone calls and has already collected 75 complaints from people claiming they were wrongfully imprisoned, detained, harassed or assaulted by the police.
Among them is Adam Suska, a 32-year-old supply teacher. After watching a Queen’s Park demonstration on Sunday, Suska was walking towards Bloor St. and Spadina Ave. when police officers stopped him and asked about his black t-shirt.
Following Saturday’s trail of destruction caused by protesters using Black Bloc tactics, there were multiple reports of summit police targeting people dressed in black.
Suska claims police called him a “piece of s---” and asked for identification, which he didn’t have. He was arrested for breaching the peace and taken to the Eastern Ave. temporary jail, where he was released without charge after eight hours.
Suska said the experience has shaken his faith in police and he now has trouble sleeping. He said he would definitely be open to a joint lawsuit or class-action suit.
“I felt just disgraced and so ashamed,” Suska said. “I shouldn’t have to feel like that just for walking down the street.”
Police Chief Bill Blair has tried to justify police officers’ actions during the summit, saying Black Bloc members infiltrated peaceful demonstrations or that protesters failed to disperse when asked.
Blair has announced an internal police review, but there are growing demands for a public inquiry, with the Public Service Alliance of Canada, Greenpeace and 121 signatories from the York University faculty recently joining the chorus of voices asking for an independent probe. The Criminal Lawyers’ Association is also calling for an independent fact-finder to probe the circumstances surrounding the G20 arrests and NDP critic Don Davies (Vancouver Kingsway) has requested the House of Commons public safety committee be recalled to study issues surrounding summit security.
The provincial government is also coming under increasing fire for its handling of a controversial regulation created under the Public Works Protection Act. Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Hudak deflected blame from the police and said the public’s ire should be directed towards the “slippery and cowardly” Premier Dalton McGuinty for secretly making a regulatory change that police interpreted as giving them more power.
NDP Leader Andrea Horwath also blasted the Liberals for bungling the issue since the Star broke the story last Friday.
“The entire thing is a mess and it’s an absolute absurdity,” said Horwath. “There needs to be an independent review as to what happened.”
Of 1,090 people detained over the G20 period, 714 were charged with “breaching the peace” and taken into custody, according to police spokesperson Const. Tony Vella. All were eventually released unconditionally. (Some 113 were released at the scene of the arrest with no charge.)
According to section 31 of the criminal code, officers can arrest anyone found to be “committing the breach of the peace or who, on reasonable grounds, he believes is about to join in or renew the breach of peace.”
But according to criminal lawyer Paul Calarco, there is “no legitimate basis” for many of this weekend’s arrests.
“Wearing a black t-shirt is not any basis for saying reasonable grounds (for arrest),” he argued. As for arresting peaceful demonstrators en masse, “that is not a proper use of Section 31. That is an intimidation tactic,” he said.
“Standing on the sidewalk and exercising your constitutional rights is not a breach of the peace.”
A further 263 of those arrested were charged with criminal offences — some because they had pocket knives or similar common items in their backpacks — and were sent for bail hearings.
Some people who were arrested will probably argue their Charter rights were violated, said Jonathan Dawe, criminal lawyer with Sack Goldblatt Mitchell. He pointed to reports of people being denied their right to legal counsel or to not be arbitrarily arrested or detained.
“I can’t imagine how (police) could not have known that what they were doing is unlawful,” Dawe said. “I’m shocked at what seems to have been a wholesale decision on the part of the police to abandon the Charter.”
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27 Comments so far
Show AllThe 'Five Metre' no approach zone around the perimeter fence surrounding the G8/G20 venue was accidentally revealed by the Toronto Police themselves to be a convenient fiction propagated with the willing assistance of the media.
The so-called 'Five Metre' statute allowed the Police to demand identification of anyone who came within five meters of the perimeter fence, and to detain them and search them for contraband items.
In a similar vein, during a weekend press conference the Toronto Police were displaying a number of 'seized' items they were showing as examples of the bad intentions of protestors, when a reporter actually doing their job asked if the items had in fact been recovered from protestors or 'anarchists'. The police spokesperson eventually reluctantly admitted they were items from other investigations and were being used as props.
The Police are not there to protect the general public, as so many believe. The Police serve the Elite and the wealthy.
Non Serviam - I will not serve.
Exactly right. Police are simply the muscle for the corporate oligarchy that runs the world. They protect corporate assets and beat the piss out of anyone even contemplating doing damage to a McDonald's storefront, but if a citizen is walking down the middle of the PUBLIC sidewalk and wearing an "inflammatory" tee-shirt slogan - in other words, not breaking any laws - then they will arrest said citizen.
I.E.: they protect the corporations, their overlords, but do not enforce the common laws that protect the citizens.
That's all the proof ya need who the police serve.
"When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag, carrying a cross."
Sinclair Lewis, "It Cant Happen Here", 1935
At some point all the 'Police' need to figure out who is really footing the bill here. It's them and all their friends in the form of intimidation that comes from their management and VIP's in the rank. None of those cops got much more than 'regular' pay for that work of intimidating the general population, they are all just stooges in this bully game. Police of the world stand up for you own rights if you have that much esteem for yourself. Rank and file cops are as big a roadblock as Democraps......and then there are the Rethuglicans that are just freakin' dead in the water as far as ethics or morality.
Why do you think they call them Pigs?
"Police of the world stand up for you own rights if you have that much esteem for yourself. "
The cops have enough rights at the moment, thank you. Police organizing is bound to lead to more brutality, not less.
Of course it's the courts and the legislatures that pass the laws that allow police to brutalize with impunity. The fat is 99% of the bourgeoisie jut love their police, this includes many rich liberals.
But the summit is over now, right? So the scum 'in charge' got away with their evil meeting.
They may not be 'evil' per se, but their methods don't win any points.
Still believe in the innate "benevolence" of the State, friends?
(Sarcasm off ...)
What the heck are you talking about. Conservative talking point?
The sad thing is that many of the people I speak with from other parts of Canada only remember tv images of burning police cars and folks smashing in shop windows. People don't seem to understand what the protestors were protesting about. In fact, many condemn the rally as a whole as pitiful, and (to my utter horror) are happy to give up their freedoms for extra police protection.
What I want to know is WHY the police stood back and allowed kids to trash cop cars and allowed people to smash in windows. Yet later that afternoon they went schizophrenic and started beating up and arresting everyone in their way. That's a question that I have yet to see answered.
Please consider the very likely possibility that most of those doing the trashing and looting etc were actually cops undercover or those they paid. This does not seem at all fanciful to me. Those of us who like to wear black apparently are now suspect of being bad people! What will these moronic police do when they happen upon the Women in Black who constantly vigil for peace? Will they arrest them, too?
Agreed, you have to wonder why a protest started out with burning cars and looting, instead of ending up that way after days of frustration.
Of course just about nobody can be sympathetic to that sort of behaviour, especially media commentators. It also validates more heavy handed tactics (mass arrests, preventative detention, etc.)
It also completely took the focus off the G20 abyss meeting happening down the road. What happened there anyway? What was that all about?
cop cars or prop cars
I wondered that, too...insurance?
Why in the hell aren't easily identifiable numbers assigned each security officer on the streets and pasted on their fronts, backs and helmets.
It would be a great way to weed out the violent ones through video evidence available everywhere on those streets and make the whole security force much more accountable. As it is, they all look like unidentifiable androgynous soldiers in a star wars movie.
I am sure this has been considered, but rejected. Would love to hear the reasons given. This should be pushed.
surely you jest
the whole point is that they become unidentifiable henchmen
without an identity of their own, without conscience
dehumanise the police
and vilify the victim
that's the way it works
military-esque...
elevated suicide rates...
They will most likley win this lawsuit. The GOvernmnet (Read the taxpayer) will pay compensation. A few peoples will shift their roles inside Government.
No Police officer will be imprisoned. A statement of apology will be issued and at the next such conference it will all happen again.
To SERVE (the polititions) and PROTECT (the elite)
Don't be shocked, Jonathan Dawe. Just knuckle down and get ready for the fight of all our lives. You can't imagine how the police couldn't have known that what they were doing was unlawful? Please, sir. Are you that naive??
Of course they knew it was unlawful. Certainly the fascist robots that pass for their leadership and superior officers knew. THEY DID NOT GIVE A FUCK. That's the deal here. Wholesale contempt for the people, their rights, democracy, and anything other that the G20 agenda.
In case you hadn't noticed, these new tactics and approaches in fascist repression - misleadingly called 'law enforcement' by the police, the politicians and their apologists - have been mounting since 9/11/2001 and the moves by the Bush/Cheney Crime Family in the States, such as the 'Patriot Act'. The Toronto police, like their government masters, like the NeoCons, could not care less how transparently fascist they are seen. They regard themselves as untouchable. And in this most recent, Canadian manifestation of hatred for the people and democracy and rights, and the iron-fisted ramming through of the NeoCon agenda, this right-wing gangster Harper has a lot to answer for. That prick should be personally sued for this debacle.
The fantastically childish retort, reported in one of the CBC items on the weekend, in which a jackboot said to a citizen/protester/innocent who may have been resisting the illegal search: "Do you want to be responsible for terrorism?" is right up there with, "You shouldn't mind having your rights stolen if you have nothing to hide," and is absolutely indicative of the imbecilic and contemptuous attitude toward the citizens in the New Feudalism, and this point ought to be raised in courtrooms, if and when these cases get there. And you can be sure the police and prov./fed. governments will do all they can to prevent anyone getting their day in court.
Couldn't have put it better!! The drone masters intend to crush all resistance and assume total control. There will be no rainbows in the future, and you won't be able to go back to Kansas.
Here you go. Evidence of orders from the top for the Police to be hands off on the car burners and window smashers: ( http://www.torontosun.com/news/columnists/ joe_warmington/2010/06/30/14564416.html#/ news/columnists/joe_warmington/2010/06/30/pf-14564416.html )
This is just one more piece of evidence that the first wave of many recent Black Block 'anarchists' committing acts of vandalism and destruction of property are on the Police payroll. It happened in Vancouver on the first day of the 2010 Winter Olympics(tm), we have seen them active in Quebec...
This tactic, of trapping protestors and innocent members of the public between Police lines, and then telling them to disperse with no way to leave inevitably leads to Police acting in a repressive and violent manner.
Non Serviam - I will not serve.
Hey, Galenwainwright, that link can't be found. Sounds interesting. Did you post it right?
Any legal action against this policing should actually be linking up with legal action against the police in Copenhagen for their total trashing of the right to protest and legal action against the British police for their trashing of the right to protest in London during the G20 'meltdown' demonstrations.
The reason that these cases should all be linked is that it is the same body of influence that is ordering this kind of treatment of dissent as well as this kind of technique for media manipulation.
People need to be connecting the dots. In London, the only building that had not been boarded up was a small branch of the Royal Bank of Scotland that was right in the middle of where police knew the demonstrations would be. The police left the windows completely unguarded and stayed away, even when a large group of journalists had suspiciously began to gather there. Of course, when the windows were smashed (By people who were definitely not part of the well organized Meltdown movement or known to any other activists groups) then the nation had their front page image.
The aim is twofold: discredit those who dissent and, once you have cleared away as much press as you can, kick the shit out of everybody still there and do everything you can to terrify them away from ever daring to exercise their right to protest again.
To those who are involved in the legal proceedings, it is really important that you link up with the legal department of the Climate Camp movement as they have had tremendous success. Contact them here: www.climatecamp.org.uk
Together, once we are all informed and conscious of these tactics, we can beat them.
Remember, the police are just following orders, get the people who are giving them the orders. Follow the shit trail right to the doors of the kinds of transnationals who are profiting by the madness that this form of capitalism is pushing us towards.
A system based on infinite growth but which relies on finite resources is doomed. There's plenty enough food in the world for everyone to eat well, plenty enough shelter, plenty enough resources for peace and contentment to reign. But that will only happen once we stand together and bring down these sad, greedy, myopic institutions and systems that degrade what it means to be a human being.
Watch how Climate Camp make a fool of Royal Bank Of Scotland this Summer and continue to do all we can to shame and bring down BP.
Big love form across the pond and Keep it lit!!
I had to break up the link with spaces to get it posted. One of the bugs here at CD...
Best of luck to you on your side of the pond!
Non Serviam - I will not serve.
1967, Berkeley antiwar protesters sprayed in the face with MACE (rendering them physically defenseless and helpless), THEN clubbed with police batons, THEN dumped inside waiting school buses, THEN transported to U.S. military bases, THEN held incommunicado for 2-3 days. Ronald Reagan had just been elected CA Governor. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
We sang: "The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind, the answer is blowin' in the wind." But by now, my guess is that said answer is somewhere else in the Milky Way.
Because of this fascist treatment, not a few persons went north to Toronto in 1968.
Trylon
BURNING COP CAR
A friend was at the march last Satrirday, and saw this:
A lone police car (bit of an old beater) slowly followed the main protest procession. And when the 10,000+ crowd stopped (because every street leading closer to the fence was blocked by phalanxes of cops in riot gear), the two officers in the cruiser, simply got out and walked away from it, leaving the car stranded, standing alone and UNLOCKED, within easy reach of the activist crowd...with, surprise, surprise, predictable results. A few people turned their ire on the (conveniently) abandoned cop car and trashed it.
And the police stood back and watched it happen - and watched as windows were broken (no more, btw, than what went on after a hockey game some months earlier in Montreal).
SHOCKING images of a burning cop car appear all over the (compliant and commplicite) media...with predictable results: Police crack down hard on 'dangerous thugs and hooligans' and, incientally anyone else who happened to be in the vicinity, or 'coralled' by police and couldn't easily leave the area.
In other words: The car(s) were deliberately left as BAIT - to be trashed and burned - so that the cops could
a) justify the huge security build-up and bill, and
b) display 'necessary' force in order to intimidate citizens and show who is boss.
To my mind, beside being set up and staged by police - pure theatre - the whole G20 'security' response is a kind of drill or practice or rehearsal for future agitations, up-risings, unrest, resistance, breakdown of 'civil order' - shit that is bound to happen sooner or later given present economic and enviromental realities.
@lark: I also witnessed this happen.
The obvious contempt for human rights is blatantly displayed in the United States, Canada,in Mexico and Central America. This is also occuring in Asia, the Middle East and in Europe as well. This disregard for the rights of people to organize, assemble and protest goes hand in hand with the obvious disregard for labor rights, and a critical crisis (depression) in the global economy!
As progressives, leftists, social justice advocates, we must recognize that the struggle for justice is everyone's struggle as our oppressors are the same! We are in this together, but we are being ripped apart, one by one!
The oppression of the people across the globe will increase as the crisis in global capitalism gets worse! We must be prepared to resist, endure and survive!