Tag: SPVM

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Two Concordia Students claim they were violently arrested for Jaywalking

Graphic by Carleen Loney / The Concordian

The students will file complaints against the officers for excessive use of force

One night at the end of July, at almost 3 a.m., Concordia PhD students Amaechi Okafor and Wade Paul were walking on Saint-Jacques street, heading towards Okafor’s apartment in NDG. 

As they walked, they saw police cruisers and officers gathered around an individual wrapped in a blanket. Not wanting to interfere with the situation, Okafor and Paul stepped into the street to go around the cruiser, then returned to the sidewalk. 

“We didn’t even cross the road,” said Okafor. “I actually told him: ‘Let’s step on the road and avoid these cars and step back on the sidewalk,’ which we did for a split second. And all of a sudden, we just hear yelling.”

“Next thing I kind of remember, there was a police car coming up onto the sidewalk,” recalled Paul. Okafor said the intervention was “very, very aggressive.”

The officers were speaking French, and while Okafor speaks French, neither student could understand the officers’ accent—Okafor is an international student from Nigeria, and Paul is from St. Mary’s First Nation in New Brunswick. When told this, the officers switched to English and requested to see Okafor’s ID. 

Okafor and Paul asked why they needed his ID, and the officers said that it was because they had been jaywalking. The students asked for clarification, at which point the officers asked to see Paul’s ID as well. 

“They said […] that we were under arrest,” said Paul. “I had my arm kind of twisted, I was thrown up against a fence. I had my rights started to be read to me. I was in full panic mode.”

“The way the arrest went was really strange for me because it’s something I’d never experienced,” said Okafor. He recalls being put to the fence, handcuffed from the back and searched from top to bottom.

He was then put against the cruiser, where the officers spread out his legs so far that his pants ripped and searched him again, he said. This also affected his old knee injuries, and he is still suffering from knee pain a month after the arrest. He said the pain makes it hard for him to walk and work.

“I felt abused. I think that was the word to use. Because I didn’t give them the right to touch me all over where they touched me,” said Okafor.

The students said they were put in separate police cruisers, where they were left alone for 20 minutes. Officers went through their belongings and wallets, and did not explain what was happening. Okafor said they never read him his rights.

Both were fined $49 for jaywalking and $499 for refusing to show their ID. 

Since the incident, Okafor’s family has joined him in Canada. He waited two years before bringing them here, wanting to make sure it was a safe place for them. Now, he fears what happened to him might happen to his three children.

“If my son is 16-17, what would happen if a cop were to stop him like that?” he asks. “I don’t want to lose my son because I’m ambitious.” 

The students have pleaded not guilty to their fine. With the help of the Center for Research-Action on Race Relations (CRARR) and its executive director Fo Niemi, they are planning on filing complaints with the Quebec Human Rights and Youth Rights Commission for Racial Profiling and with the Quebec Police Ethics Commissioner.

“The only down thing is that the law, as it stands right now, will allow these officers not to cooperate with the Police Ethics Commissioner investigation,” explained Niemi. “Because they have the so-called constitutional right to silence. Not to incriminate oneself.”

Niemi is hopeful that the misconduct charges for excessive use of force will go far. “Just the fact that they were handcuffed, that’s a form of force that was used excessively,” he said.

“It all goes far to speak on how unsafe international students should feel,” he said. “Because if that could happen to me, it could happen to any other person.”

After hearing his story, other international students told him that they were worried about their own safety.

Niemi stressed the importance of speaking out about these situations. “Just because you’re international students, it doesn’t mean you have less rights when it comes to this.”

The SPVM declined to comment on the intervention.

Infographic by Carleen Loney / The Concordian
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Innocent man arrested without motive?

CARLEEN LONEY/The Concordian @shloneys

Calling the police into question and their ability to do their job right

A man named Brice Dossa was handcuffed by Montreal police on Thursday, Nov. 3 in the parking lot of Montreal’s Central Market. Police suspected him of stealing a vehicle which was later proven to be his own. The plainclothes Detectives who specialise in car thefts, however, were unable to release Dossa immediately because they had misplaced the keys to their handcuffs and needed backup officers at the scene to release Dossa.

In a video that has since gone viral, Dossa is seen asking officers if he was arrested because he’s Black. While the two officers deny that this unjustified arrest has anything to do with race, many on social media are concerned that this is just another case of racial profiling.

If not, why was the man suspected of car theft and arrested for it by police, prior to the officers verifying who the vehicle belonged to?

In the questionable sequence of events which led up to Dossa’s wrongful arrest, the unfortunate historical trend in which the Black community is faced with unwarranted and unjust policing has, yet again, resurfaced in the headlines.

The video segment of the arrest is truly abhorrent. It calls into question these cops’ ability to perform their duties. 

One major inconsistency in the officers’ discretion was that the car theft under investigation on Nov. 3 involved a vehicle which was reported to have visible signs of damage. However, CBC independently confirmed that Dossa’s car showed no traces of such damage. Yet, when Dossa arrived at the scene where the police were still examining his vehicle for evidence, they promptly arrested him.

Dossa claims he is left traumatized by the experience, which could easily have been avoided with proper due diligence from the police. This puts into question whether law enforcement can ensure equal treatment for all. 

Ironically, this event comes shortly after the Quebec Superior Court ruled in a racial profiling case that police could no longer pull over drivers without a valid reason, as it constitutes a violation of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedom. Officers who are not dutifully impartial in service to the law might finally incur sanctions when these newly-established regulations become viable six months from now.

Meanwhile, instances of police brutality and racial profiling frequently continue to make headlines, yet our premier continues to deny the existence of systemic racism and bias. 

As he claimed in 2020, when addressing protests in response to George Floyd’s murder, “I think that there is some discrimination in Quebec, but there’s no systemic discrimination.” More recently, during the last electoral campaign, Legault again reiterated his stance that systemic racism does not exist. 

It is appalling that the government or law enforcement institutions in this province refuse to acknowledge the pernicious consequences of systemic racism. The foundation for such beliefs — and the inaction that follows — normalizes and legitimizes the abuse of power by the state in ways that undermine democracy, justice and equality for all citizens.

Following Dossa’s wrongful arrest, new policies need to not only be incorporated within the practices of law enforcement, but also should be made effectively operational.  Let’s hope that the recent decision ruled by the Quebec Superior Court will yield change in the years to come, so that everyone is guaranteed equal freedom and safety.

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Protesters call for defunding of police after fatal shooting of Sheffield Matthews

Push for funding of mental health services after SPVM kills another Black man

 

Protesters held a demonstration on Nov. 7 seeking justice for Sheffield Matthews, a Black man who was fatally shot last week by police in Montreal. The protest called for the defunding of police and the reallocation of funds to mental health intervention teams that are trained to de-escalate people in crisis.

Black Lives Matter and the Defund the Police Coalition organized the rally that took place in Trenholme Park in the Notre-Dame-de-Grâce neighbourhood.

Protestor at the Defund the Police protest sign points to the fact police were called because Sheffield Matthews was in distress

“I’ve had enough. I’m angered, I’m triggered, I’m just sad and annoyed that this keeps happening right in our backyards,” Antonia Haywood, a protester at the demonstration, told The Concordian. “When there’s a crisis involved, I don’t think the police should be there … we need people trained in crisis intervention and mental health to be present in times like these.”

Early last Thursday morning, police responded to a call of a man in crisis in NDG. When they arrived on scene, they reported seeing a Black man holding a knife near a civilian car. When the man came towards their squad car, police alleged that the man lunged at them with the knife and they shot him seven times, killing him.

Sue Montgomery, mayor of the borough Côte-des-Neiges—Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, said she’s attending the protest in solidarity with Black Lives Matter.

“It’s a tragic, senseless loss of life and I’m here to stand side by side with the Black community,” said Montgomery. “It’s clear there’s systemic racism in this city.”

Julien Lévesque, a spokesperson for the SPVM, said he had no comment on the killing of Matthews or response to the calls by protestors to defund the police. He said he supports the right for demonstrators to stage a protest, as long as it’s done safely.

Remy Gibbs, whose uncle was shot and killed by police two years ago in the same neighbourhood, spoke to the crowd in the park. Gibbs contrasted the killing of Matthews to the police’s treatment of Carl Girouard.

Girouard, who’s white, slayed two people and injured five with a sword in Quebec City this past Halloween. He was talked down and left unharmed by police.

Protestor wore an earring with the acronym ACAB, which stands for “All Cops are Bastards”

“Sheffield Matthews supposedly had a knife and was still murdered after he didn’t kill anybody [which] is a sign that systemic racism does exist,” said Gibbs, megaphone in hand.

Hundreds of people cheered after each speech was made. Demonstrators chanted “No justice no peace, defund the police!” and “Black lives matter! Black lives matter!”

After the speakers finished, the organizers led the protest to the streets as the chants carried on. Protesters banged pots, others whistled, and many held up their fists as they blocked traffic from passing through. The protesters marched to the corner of Côte-Saint-Luc Road and West Hill Avenue where the shooting took place.

Several people placed bouquets of flowers at the spot where Matthews was killed. One man said he picked flowers from his garden.

“It’s Montreal standing up to injustice,” Egbert Gaye told The Concordian. Gaye is the founder of Community Contact, a newspaper that covers Black and Caribbean issues in Quebec.

“Police have a weak point in dealing with two things: Black people and mental health,” said Gaye.

The Bureau des enquêtes indépendantes (BEI), an internal provincial organization that conducts independent investigations when someone is seriously injured or shot by police, is still investigating the death.

 

Photographs by Fenn Mayes

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Concordia student files two ethics complaints against five SPVM officers

Student said she felt dismissed and minimized when reporting her harasser to the Montreal police

 

A Concordia University student has filed two ethics complaints against five Montreal police officers over the dismissive treatment she endured while reporting a harassment complaint.

The 30-year-old PhD student Anna* told The Concordian she felt continuously dismissed and disparaged by the SPVM officers.

Over the course of a month, Anna said she made several attempts to report a man who had been stalking and harassing her on the downtown campus.

The Center for Research Action on Race Relations (CRARR) will be assisting Anna with the two complaints filed with the Quebec Police Ethics Commission. According to a statement on the issue released by CRARR, Anna was harassed in October and November of 2019.

“He followed me to coffee shops, and my workplace at Concordia, and would seemingly know my schedule,” said Anna.

She decided to file a formal criminal complaint to police at Station 20 near the downtown campus after the two months of harassment escalated to a physical altercation with the man.

She explained her situation at the station but was told that the officer who would listen to her complaint was busy with an Amazon package theft, and that she had to come back later.

“I had a feeling that there was no sense of triage, there was no sense of the gravity of my situation being taken seriously,” said Anna.

After she returned to the station, this time escorted by a Concordia security guard later that evening, Anna said she had to fill out a document about her complaint behind a glass window sitting in a waiting room chair.

She said this process took hours of back and forth with the officers, who asked her to describe details such as what her harasser was wearing, what time of day the incidents occurred, and what was said.

When she described to the supervising officer what the man looked like, Anna said the officer responded, “Sounds like a good looking man, why don’t you go on a date with him?”

“I was really shocked at this callous and offensive conduct,” said Anna.

After filing her complaint, she told an officer that she was scared, and asked to be escorted home. The officer dismissed Anna’s request, asking her if the attacker was at her home “right now,” and if she had any friends or family that could help her instead.

“Instead of supporting vulnerable women, who already self-identify as ‘I’m in trouble, I’m vulnerable’ there’s a sense of ‘we can’t help you, go find some friends, why don’t you call your family.’”

Anna is not originally from Montreal, and said she didn’t have a support system she could rely on at the time.

A few days later, Anna said she was terrified to be walking home from class at night, only to find the door to her apartment already open. She called 911, but the police officers took over an hour to arrive. The officers then gave Anna a document for her to fill out her complaint report, again.

The officers told Anna she would have to follow up with her complaint at the police station near the downtown campus, where it was initially filed.

After they left, Anna said she felt she needed to know more about her harasser. She decided to research about him online after obtaining information on her harasser from a police document. That’s when Anna found out he had a history of sexual assault.

“It hit me at that moment, that the police had a record of him and yet still did nothing to protect me, or even inform me of his record.”

Afraid for her safety, Anna went to the police station and waited for hours at the detention centre for a detective to look at her case.

“I was too afraid to go home,” she said.

On several occasions, Anna said when she tried to communicate in English about her case with the SPVM, officers were reluctant or outright dismissive of her case.

Anna described trying to follow up on nine separate occasions, and officers would hang up on her, or walk away from her at the station. On one occasion, she said she called and spoke to a supervising officer about her case only to have him say “tabarnak” and hang up on her.

“Being minimized, being laughed at, and not being taken seriously, and to have to chase the police down for my own safety, all of these are barriers to access to justice for women like me.”

Executive Director of the CRARR Fo Niemi, who is assisting Anna with her case, says this is the first time he has seen a case like this.

“We haven’t seen something so blatantly egregious like this, especially in terms of the very offensive comments that she got at the police station, and the fact that she had to run after police officers and the police department and after [reaching out] several times in order to get at least somebody to call back,” said Niemi.

According to Niemi, Anna’s two police ethics complaints involve incidents which occurred at the SPVM police station, and the incident in which the officers came to her apartment after it was broken into.

What concerns Niemi is not only the treatment Anna endured, but whether this is a systemic issue.

“If accessing a police department or police services involves this kind of reaction and conduct, you can imagine how many women may not even go to the police for fear of not being taken seriously and not being believed.”

SPVM spokesperson Jean-Pierre Brabant says the SPVM could not comment on the ongoing investigation.

*to protect the subject’s identity, we are using a pseudonym.

 

Graphic by @the.beta.lab

 

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Folks, we need to make cops more comfortable

graphic by @sundaemorningcoffee

A satirical approach highlighting why the SPVM should wear body cameras when dealing with citizens

Just last month, the SPVM released a whopping 215-page report concluding that body cams were an ineffective and overpriced project for the Montreal police force, effectively dropping it entirely. Additionally, the conclusions of a survey on officers revealed that they felt they were being watched and the cameras presented a breach of privacy, leading to them being uncomfortable having it on.

The conclusion of the report states that “according to the steps required by the local directive, it is up to the police officer to activate [the body camera], which has the effect of making them bear the weight of an important additional responsibility.” And folks, the last thing we need is around 3,000 people in possession of firearms and a dozen different incapacitating and violent tools (that are legally usable on civilians) to feel uncomfortable with the idea of additional responsibility!

This is why I come to you with a fervent plea: won’t somebody please think of the cops? Over the past few years, the SPVM has been through a myriad of “uncomfortable” situations and it would be a complete shame to burden them with extra responsibility.

Like when two Montreal police officers forcibly picked up a homeless man from downtown Montreal and drove him in a cruiser all the way to the Ontario border and dumped him there, according to CBC News. The punishment for essentially re-creating a kidnapping from one of the Taken movies with an innocent man off the streets was suspension with pay. However, fear not, because it took eight years to charge the officers with forcible confinement, assault and uttering threats, according to the same source. The arc of history is long, but it eventually ends with reluctantly admitting officers kidnapping people is bad. This whole conversation about using body cams does not consider the fact that serving and protecting Montreal is super hard when everyone can see footage of you loading a person into a cruiser like it’s moving day and chucking them into Ontario.

Or, imagine how awkward it would be if the officers tasked with spying and tracking journalist Patrick Lagacé in 2016 had to be held accountable for allegedly breaching his privacy by obtaining tracking warrants that allow the police to locate his cellphone via its GPS chip, according to The Globe and Mail. But, wait a minute, doesn’t the report on body cams mention that the officers felt uncomfortable being watched and isn’t this whole situation hypocritical? The answer is no, because cops need to be able to put someone in a chokehold for a minor infraction––turning on a surveillance device makes it difficult to squeeze a person’s entire respiratory system into dust as quickly as it would without surveillance. Meanwhile, journalists could potentially report on it and make the police look bad. Coming to terms with the consequences of your actions is just a hard concept to grasp when you’re on the force.

The report on body cams states that 90 per cent of the public has confidence in the SPVM. So, for the rest of you who probably think that cops harassing homeless people, spying on journalists to halt stories and pepper spraying protestors because they’ve been taunted one too many times is unwarranted—tough luck, because it seems like you hate cops getting comfortable with using their excessive amount of power on the daily. How dare you!

Finally, the report clearly indicates that it costs way too much to maintain the use of the body cameras. The pilot project cost $3.4 million and in order to implement them full-time, it would cost around $24 million a year, according to CTV News. I completely agree that it would be a waste of money for the SPVM. The police budget should strictly be used to make surveillance of citizens without their permission easier. Also, it should be used to equip officers with even deadlier weapons, so they can comfortably deal with people who are out of line. If the choice is between trusting the police’s promises or actually enforcing policies to keep them in check, you know I’m takin’ the path of least resistance…mostly because we all know what happens if we don’t.

Graphic by @sundaemorningcoffee

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Editorial: Vicious victim-blaming rhetoric needs to end

Graphic by Ana Bilokin

This past year, we’ve heard a lot of conversations about racism, sexism, equality and sexual assault. It’s safe to say that something has changed.

Perhaps it’s the fact that some voices are now louder than others, and these ‘uncomfortable’ conversations are happening more often. Regardless of the reason, when we reflect on this past year from an optimistic perspective, we can see many instances of positive change.

But while movements like #MeToo and #TimesUp successfully dominate the news cycle, we still have a lot of work to do within our local communities. This is particularly apparent in the recent actions of our city’s police. According to Le Devoir, Montreal police faced backlash for launching a sexual assault prevention campaign that implied women make themselves more vulnerable to sexual assault when they drink too much.

The campaign was called “Je sors avec ma gang, je repars avec ma gang,” and was initially launched in 2012. Montreal police recently decided to reactivate the campaign by distributing some leftover flyers in the Plateau-Mont-Royal borough. However, they received a lot of backlash from social media users due to the victim-blaming nature of the campaign, and decided to retract it.

This isn’t the first time Montreal police have been involved in victim-blaming. In 2016, local police told girls at Villa Maria High School that they were “asking for harassment” because of their short skirts, reported CBC News.

We at The Concordian are appalled by the lack of social awareness in the Montreal police’s decision to re-launch this campaign. In a social climate bursting with conversations about sexual assault and victim-blaming, it’s inexcusable to promote the idea that victims are responsible for the horrible actions of perpetrators. While we’re glad they retracted the campaign and realized their mistake, the fact that they re-launched it in the first place shows we have a long way to go.

This isn’t an ongoing issue exclusive to Canada either. On Nov. 14, protests took place in Ireland against the use of a victim’s underwear as evidence in a rape trial. A 17-year-old girl accused a 27-year-old man of rape, and the man was found not guilty of the crime, according to Global News. The defendant’s lawyer argued that the jury should consider that the girl was wearing lacy underwear at the time. “You have to look at the way she was dressed,” the lawyer said. “She was wearing a thong with a lace front.” This sparked protests all over Ireland, and people posted pictures of their underwear on social media with the hashtag #ThisIsNotConsent.

Sexual assault is not the victim’s fault. It is the fault of the perpetrator—the one who chooses to violate and hurt an innocent person. We need to end the victim-blaming narrative, and we must continue to call out those who perpetuate it. Not only does this narrative place the blame on people who need to be listened to and believed, it also promotes lies. If sexual assault was related to how much someone drinks, then sober people wouldn’t get sexually assaulted—yet, they do. If sexual assault was related to how revealing an outfit is, then people wouldn’t get assaulted in the winter—yet, they do. If going to a club or bar makes people vulnerable to sexual assault, people wouldn’t get assaulted in their own homes—yet, they do.

We at The Concordian hope this upcoming year continues to see a huge shift in the narrative surrounding sexual assault. We hope survivors feel they are listened to, validated and respected, rather than blamed and condemned. The only people we must condemn are those who commit these acts—and those who continue to push this vicious, victim-blaming rhetoric.

Graphic by Ana Bilokin

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Breaking down police brutality

The 21th annual police brutality march held on March 15. Photo by Alex Hutchins.

Former SPVM officer discusses police training, Concordia student reflects on brutality

Protesters marked the 21st anniversary of Montreal’s annual police brutality protest by taking to the streets of downtown Montreal on March 15 to denounce brutality conducted by the Service de police de la ville de Montréal (SPVM) and other officers.

Since the march started in Montreal in 1997, similar marches have sprung up in cities across Canada and around the world, including in Nigeria, Spain, France, Mexico, Germany, England, Belgium, Portugal and the U.S.

Many Journalists and concerned citizens who have documented police brutality have held the SPVM accountable for their actions. This includes the Collectif opposé à la brutalité policière (COBP), the organization that holds the annual police brutality march in Montreal.

Regardless of these watchdogs, tension between some citizens and SPVM officers persists.

Daniel Slapcoff, a first year Concordia student in film production, said he recently experienced an act of police brutality when he was hit in the face with a police shield.

At the time, Slapcoff was outside City Hall documenting protests surrounding federal anti-Islamophobia Motion 103. The protest had been initiated by the Canadian Coalition of Concerned Citizens (CCCC) on March 4, with far-right group La Meute (the Wolf Pack) joining their ranks soon after. Left-wing activist group Action Antifasciste Montréal (AAM) counter-protested the demonstration.

As members of La Meute and CCCC decided to disperse City Hall, Slapcoff said police began interfering to ensure the differing activist groups didn’t end up too close to one another. That’s when Slapcoff noticed some officers aggressively pushing protesters.

“They stopped us because they thought we were getting too close to the other group,” said Slapcoff, who was standing at the edge of the protest with the other journalists.

That’s when Slapcoff was hit in the face with the officer’s riot shield, knocking out his two front teeth.

Slapcoff said he had identified himself before the incident to the same officer who struck him.

“I went up to the policeman and said, ‘Don’t worry, I’m not going to try and cause any trouble. I’m just observing,’” Slapcoff said.

After the incident, Slapcoff said he took a photo of the officer to document his ID number—following this, he confronted the officer about his behaviour.

“Do you see what you did? You just knocked my two front teeth—I had talked to you and everything,” Slapcoff recalled saying to the officer. While the officer asked Slapcoff if he wanted him to call an ambulance, he refused to apologize for hitting him.

“He said, ‘No, I just followed an order. That’s what I have to do,’” Slapcoff said. “I don’t know if that’s an official answer that he’s supposed to give or perhaps him just [being] mean.”

Although he has not officially decided to sue the SPVM, Slapcoff wants compensation for his teeth. “I was stuck in the hospital for the whole day after that,” he said.

“I have to get a two root canals and crowns,” he said. Yet, the root canals are only a semi-permanent fix. “In twenty years, I’m going to have to do it again.”

This was not Slapcoff’s first experience with police brutality. When Slapcoff tried to intervene after witnessing police officers pushing some men outside of a bar, eight of the officers forced Slapcoff to the ground.

“They were pinning me on the ledge, on the side of the sidewalk and applying pressure points to my jaw,” he said. When the officers ID’d him, they made a racist remark about his Jewish name, Slapcoff added. “Then they fined me $150 for disturbing the peace,” Slapcoff said.

“At that time, I just let it go. I didn’t want to deal with it, but this time I feel like I kind of have to.”

Paul Chablo, the current chair of John Abbott College’s police technology program and a former SPVM officer with 30 years of service experience, said there is a common misconception of what defines police brutality.

“If an individual resists a police officer and tries to confront him physically, the police officer is allowed to use force—that is not police brutality,” Chablo said. “[However], any police officer who uses more force than necessary is considered or can be charged with excessive force,” he said.

“Police brutality is not when you go to a protest and you arrest someone and you throw them to the ground,” said Chablo, who was present at a few of the anti-police brutality marches while working for the SPVM. “Police officers are allowed to use force to disperse an unruly crowd,” said Chablo.

However, if a police officer has restrained an individual and they are no longer resisting, but the officer is still using force, this qualifies as police brutality, Chablo added.

“The golden rule that [officers] are taught here is resistance equals force—the more the person resists, the more force you’re allowed to use,” Chablo said.

Chablo said so long as officers follow that rule and do not apply force to someone who has been restrained or has backed down, there will never be a problem. “He could be accused in front of an ethics board, but he will never be found guilty.”

In his last years with the SPVM, Chablo worked as chief inspector for the public relations department.

Chablo said students in the police technology program are advised to be particularly mindful of the force they use, given the ease with which bystanders can record their actions. However, the level of force used should not be dictated by whether someone is filming or not, he added.

“If you are questioning the force that you are using because you’re being filmed, then chances are, you’re using excessive force.”

In John Abbott’s police technology program, students undergo three courses on conflict management, said Chablo. In these courses, students study conflict management, in particular, verbal judo—a persuasive technique used to convince the person to cooperate by convincing them that they contributed to the decision-making process. This creates a situation where violence is avoided, Chablo said. “It’s conflict management and defusing tense situations.”

In these courses, students are also taught how to intervene legally and in a justified way to ensure they are not accused of intervening or making arrests based on race, gender or religion. Students also undergo training on necessary force—how to use it and when it is permissible according to the law, Chablo said.

People may think they have become a victim of police brutality, but if they think back if they used resistance and the police responded with some type of force, it’s not necessarily police brutality, said Chablo.

“I’m not here to defend the Montreal police because … they always have to be accountable for whatever they do,” Chablo said. “A police officer who will go out and commit an act of police brutality is doing it because his or her human emotions have taken over, and they are no longer following the rules. It’s very clear,” said Chablo.

The Concordian asked Slapcoff whether he believes training for SPVM officers should be revised. Slapcoff said he does not know the details of how officers are trained, but he believes there could be better training, specifically regarding anger management. “I think if they’re given training to control their anger, it’s not working,” said Slapcoff. “And I think that there could be a million reasons for why a policeman acts like that, it’s so widespread there has to be something that happens. There has to be a widespread change [to] their training.”

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UPDATED: Police adjourn anti-police brutality march

Cop car left with windows smashed on Union St. Photo by Savanna Craig.

Police give two warnings to protesters before shutting down the protest

The sound of helicopters flying overhead were heard as a crowd of approximately 300 marched along Ontario street. A protest which began with unified chanting, escalated to protesters throwing flares and one cop car being damaged as the group reached Quartier des Spectacles.

Protest participant smashes windows of SPVM car. Photo by Alex Hutchins.

“No justice, no peace, fuck the police,” protesters shouted in unison, as they walked from Hochelaga towards Montreal’s downtown core. The march began at 7 p.m. at Place Simon-Valois and concluded two blocks east of Place des Arts.

The protest was organized by Collectif Opposé à la Brutalité Policière, a group founded in 1995 which opposes harassment, intimidation, arrest, violence and brutality-related conduct by police. They also provide support for victims of police brutality.

Many protesters dressed in all black. Photo by Alex Hutchins

As marchers walked along Ontario street, some protesters began to throw flares as they turned towards Ste-Catherine, however, police blocked the way. Near Union and Ste-Catherine, one participant in the crowd began to hit the windows of a police car parked on the street, smashing them—a few joined in. Police, however, did not intervene.

Police warned protesters twice before intervening. Photo by Alex Hutchins.

At approximately 9 p.m. protesters marched towards Place des Arts—some shot flares and some began to hit windows. Around the same time, police arrived on horse. The SPVM warned the crowd that some participants were initiating unlawful conduct and if it persisted, police would intervene and shut down the demonstration.

One protester began hitting the window of the H&M located at Ste-Alexandre and Ste-Catherine, but didn’t shatter the glass. Police gave a second warning to protesters, as a line of cops trailed behind the march.

“Tout le monde deteste de la police,” many protesters chanted in unison. Most of the crowd was enrobed in black.

Video by Frédéric Muckle.

Moments after, police on foot and on bikes began trooping in. As protesters approached Saint-Urbain, cops interfered after some did not comply to cease vandalism. Some were kettled near SPVM headquarters, but were released.

A blockade was made in front of the headquarters, for remaining participants along Ste-Catherine. As the SPVM moved through the crowd, this split the crowd of protesters in half—a few cops on horses remained as steady watchdogs.

“They tend to do whatever they please,” said protest participant Richard Beaulieau, referring to police illegally arresting and ticketing people.

Police follow protesters. Photo by Alex Hutchins.

Beaulieau recalled the time an SPVM officer hit him with a baton on March 5, 2013, as he was participating in Maple Spring protests against tuition hikes.

Although police had successfully broken up the crowd, some participants lingered. Many cops stood guard, with a small row of police on horse at the intersection of Saint-Urbain.

Watch our video footage of the protest below.

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“Make Racists Afraid Again” protest

Protesters mobilize against Trump as he was sworn in as the new president of the United States.

An SPVM window was smashed, anti-Trump protesters were cleared with tear gas

Approximately 300 demonstrators protesting the inauguration of President Donald Trump marched down Ste-Catherine Street West in downtown Montreal on Friday evening.

The protest, called “Make Racists Afraid Again,” started peacefully in Phillips Square, but as demonstrators marched against the flow of traffic on Ste-Catherine, windows of commercial stores were vandalized. Montreal police, dressed in riot gear, used tear gas and shields to disperse the protesters after several people started throwing stones, smashing a window at the SPVM station on the corner of Ste-Catherine and Bishop Street.

Protesters mobilize against Trump as he was sworn in as the new president of the United States. Photo by Ana Hernandez.

The protest was organized by the Anti-Racist Resistance Collective of Montreal (CRAM) and Resist Trump Montreal, in partnership with DisruptJ20—a group that organized many large protests throughout the United States on Friday.

Protesters held banners denouncing Trump, the United States and fascism. Organizers used megaphones to chant ‘No more Trump, no more hate, America was never great!,’ as the march moved along the downtown thoroughfare.

Activist and organizer Eamon Toohey said the protest—meant to be “a show of solidarity with protesters in Washington”—was a success.

“We wanted to show that the rise of the far-right as represented by Trump isn’t welcome in the States and it isn’t welcome in Canada,” said Toohey.

When asked about the vandalism that took place during the march, Toohey said he didn’t have sympathy for the SPVM or businesses like American Apparel, which were targeted during the protest.

“I’m not going to condemn protesters smashing the window of the police station,” said Toohey. “The police are the armed wing of the state and serve [to] enforce the policies that place people in jeopardy. No condemnation there.”

According to The Montreal Gazette, Montreal SPVM said they did not ticket or arrest anyone.

However, Concordia student Maidina Kadeer said she was arrested while waiting with her friends following the protests. “[The police] grabbed me and slammed me against the window and began handcuffing me,” Kadeer said.

Police officers are seen in front of the broken glass. Photo by Adrian Knowler

“They, at no point, told me if I was being arrested, for what—[they gave] no reason as to why I was being handcuffed and arrested,” said Kadeer. Her other friend began filming the scene, but the officers then pushed him, threw his phone out of his hands and stomped on it, she said. “They held me like that with no explanation.”

Student Stéphane Krims came directly from McGill’s music school to march, carrying his double bass the entire way. Krims said he is worried Trump’s election has made hate more widely tolerable in America, adding that he was alarmed by “the [racist] behaviour that some people exhibited when they found out that Trump was going to be president.”

Blake Hawley, an American citizen at the Montreal protest, said he was embarrassed by the message Trump’s election sent to the rest of the world.

“[The United States] already didn’t have a great image, but it’s definitely worse now for sure,” said Hawley. He said he’s afraid American-Canadian relations may suffer during the Trump years.

“The whole idea of the American government isn’t taken seriously anymore,” said Hawley. “The U.S. is going to lose allies as we go into this administration. [Trump] might be as bad as everyone thinks. If he is, the U.S. will lose a lot more respect than it already has.”

Toohey said he is concerned that Canadians are not taking the election of Donald Trump seriously enough. “There’s a sense here in Canada of, ‘Oh, we’re not America,’” Toohey said. “But injustices and abuse of police power are happening in Canada too.”

“Things are going to get as bad [here in Canada] unless they’re challenged,” he added. “It’s not just the United States, it’s not just Trump. It’s what he represents and what he was elected on.”

Be sure to check out an audio piece on this protest on The Concordian Radio Show on CJLO 1690 AM on Wednesday from 8 a.m. to 9 a.m.

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Bikers Beware! Your wallets are in danger!

Photo of the police officer who issued the writer a ticket. Photo by Alex Hutchins

Cops litter the Maisonneuve bike path with their cash-grabbing tactics

One of my favourite weather-permitting pastimes is biking. Even in Toronto, where I’m from, I cycled everywhere—to school, to meet friends, to work. As a student, I’ve been using my bike for years to cut back on transportation costs. In all those years, I never once got a ticket while on my bike. I’d never really even considered it. But a few weeks ago, I got a ticket for not making a complete halt at a stop sign—and I am beyond pissed off.

I was biking along a typically quiet, low-traffic section of the De Maisonneuve bike path, around 2:30 p.m. I slowed down as I approached an intersection somewhere between Clarke and Greene Ave but, after seeing it was clear, I decided to continue through, mainly to keep my momentum—which hundreds of bikers do all the time—and it all went smoothly. There were no car-bike or bike-bike altercations. Yet next thing I knew, a whistle was blaring behind me. I stopped and turned around to see what had happened, only to find this G.I Joe-like officer running towards me at full-speed.

It was all so overly-dramatic—the chase, the questioning, the identification process. I mean, I truly could not believe it was me that he was pulling over. I was issued a $48 ticket, which although it isn’t a substantial amount, it still puts a decent dent in my already-too-small student budget.

I thought I was the anomaly until, within 24 hours of being issued my ticket, I found at least two other cyclists on social media who received tickets for going through stop signs. These two cyclists were ticketed in front of Laurier Park and at the corner of Bellechasse and St Dominique, according to two Facebook posts on the MTL Trading Hole page.

The whole situation reached another level of ridiculous when the officer ticketing me attempted to reassure me by saying: “I’m issuing you this ticket in the name of road safety.”

Hold up. Rewind. Let’s pretend that my ticket was truly issued “in the name of road safety.” Firstly, I would have been pegged in an area where the safety of road-users is legitimately threatened. For example, Melville Ave, where cyclists would be emerging from Westmount Park, having gained speed through the sloped, winding paths. This is blocks away from Clarke Ave though, and had I been flagged there, I likely would not be writing this article. But was an officer stopping cyclists there? Nope.

Because you see, fellow bikers, these cops don’t get into their cruisers wanting to make our roads safer. The Montreal police have admitted previously that “officers in the city’s special traffic squad are given traffic ticket quotas,” according to CBC News Montreal. Following this is a statement highlighting how the police didn’t admit to traffic quotas earlier because “it would have created negative publicity,” reports the same CBC News article. Does this sound as though all this ticketing is truly “in the name of road safety?”

And to what avail? The issuing of this ticket to me and a few other bikers won’t cause some societal cathartic re-evaluation of how we navigate and share the roads. It’s time we find a more effective solution—something that really is in the name of road safety.

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Irony hits the SPVM

Photo by Joseph Leger

Photo by Joseph Leger

“Fuck the police. Know your rights!” my friend Nick texts me after I send around a SnapChat clip of the kettle I’m in. I delete the message as soon as it pops up on my screen. What are my rights?

The sergeant is lazily reciting some sort of routine arrest warrant. It’s procedure. It isn’t about whether we hear and understand it or not. And it isn’t about whether we had time to take down the number we might need to call (514-842-2244.) I get a kick out of “You have the right to remain silent” — just because!

I overhear a group of friends say, “well, I guess we should just order the pizza next time instead of going outside to pick it up.” This is when I realize that Montreal, during protests, becomes a police state. Over 250 people (notice the omission of “protesters”) were arrested on Friday and according to reports, none were a huge threat. In fact, no one really had time to start protesting as police had already set up their barricades and preemptively arrested a bunch of people.

Passerby or not, if you were there at the wrong place at the wrong time, you were . . . well, just that. I meet a guy while handcuffed on the STM-turned-SPVM bus who was on his way out of class when we got trapped right in front of UQÀM. He has a bus to catch at midnight for a $270 organized trip to Boston celebrating St. Patrick’s day.

About half of us are journalists, begging the cops to take a look at our press passes. It’s more than plain bad luck when half the people arrested are the media and frankly, that’s not a good image for the SPVM’s reputation, which is more than tarnished at this point.

According to Thursday’s Metro, the number of complaints sent to Montreal’s ombudsman’s office went from 103 to 1,577 per year since its creation in 2003. Police brutality, I am sure, made up most of those in 2012 and 2013.

We’re on Ste-Catherine St. between St-Denis and Sanguinet and the air is cold and wet. One of the guys who started the commotion is on the ground in pain as an ambulance with a cop in it passes by. A few girls are crying, but when the officers stop screaming at those of us trying to negotiate, things get quiet. Our fate sets in and we start fraternizing. Is the sheer ridiculousness accountable for the light atmosphere or is it because we’re a bunch of kids?

Even some of the cops exchange some sympathetic looks with me as I explain to my father over the phone why my boyfriend had to pick my little brother up at the bus station and not me. One of them goes to pick up my gloves that fell out of my pocket on the ground behind him.

Only after did I realize how lucky I had been when I learnt about how Kelsey McGowan, the only protester to be hospitalized, was pushed, dragged and allegedly kicked by cops as she had been standing on the corner (on the sidewalk) of St-Urbain and Ontario.

“I [made] an assumption that there were several protesters running from the riot police because I felt about 10 heavy blows to the back of my head, shoulders, back and legs,” said McGowan, only to realize that the only people close enough to touch her were police officers.

It’s wildly ironic that the very thing we protested on March 15 became a staple for the event. It isn’t that it’s a reality we’ve accepted, it’s that it’s a reality that we’ve come to know. There’s this civil — see municipal — war going on between our future and those who protect it and that very notion is so scary.

As university student Shawn Austin told the Montreal Gazette, “we were never given a chance to prove we can be peaceful. We’re not out here to say all cops are bad. We’re out here to make the point the police brutality is unacceptable and I think tonight, the police made that point for us.”

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Student protest cut short

Photo by writer

Photo by writer

A commemorative demonstration against the tuition indexation fell flat early Friday night when Montreal Police quickly shut it down.

Students gathered at Place Émilie-Gamelin for the one-year anniversary of the March 22, 2012 protest. Last year over 200,000 students exercised their democratic right to free assembly and flooded Montreal’s streets to protest a tuition fee increase of $1,625 over a five-year period by then-Premier Jean Charest.

Police have taken a heavy handed approach to student protesters and the Service de police de la Ville de Montréal seemed intent on shutting down the public assembly early Friday when it marked the third consecutive protest to be immediately declared illegal and kettled in under a week.

Kettling is tactic during demonstrations that forces protesters into a small space, sectioning them off and leaving them with a single exit usually determined by police.

The SPVM declared the demonstration illegal as a violation of municipal bylaw P-6 which states that groups must provide an itinerary.

“Police partout, justice nulle part, [police everywhere, justice nowhere]” cried protesters.

In squads, the SPVM surrounded Place Émilie-Gamelin. There were lines of cops blocking off Ste-Catherine St. and St-Hubert St. where police were quick to section off the small group that had gathered in commemoration and dissent.

The protesters were defiant but there was a relaxed air to the scene. Volunteers were handing out sandwiches and a man played the snare-drum. It resembled a parade more than a protest if it weren’t for the brigades of police.

The crowd marched up St-Hubert St. and turned east on De Maisonneuve Blvd.. As the protest neared St-Timothée St. police rushed in and forced them back. Before they could backtrack down a different path another line of police swept in and cut them off.

“Those last few protests; arresting people for nothing [except] exercising some rights even though they’re not strictly legal,” Mary Davis said, referring to Bill 78, “It is just a money grab to get $600 to pay for all the trouble that’s being made by the students but without trouble being made nothing will ever change, nothing will ever happen.”

Sandwiched between scores of flak jackets, batons, polycarbonate shields and jackboots, the bulk of demonstrators as well as journalists present were arrested and fined. Those not kettled were shooed and shoved away.

The protest was quickly over with over 150 protesters detained and fined for being part of an illegal protest.

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