Legacy of Infamy
Generally speaking, I am a law and order type but the one thing I have zero tolerance for is when agents of the state callously abuse the coercive powers of the law to subvert the law of the land. The civil suits from the G20 are going to be a horrendous burden on the taxpayers of this country because the security services acted in a fashion which put their conduct above the law they had sworn to uphold. Think I am wrong – just think Officer Bubbles. Secondly, it’s going to be very hard for the government to successfully win any of the suits brought against them considering the number of ‘legal monitors’ which were arbitrary detained among the 1100 plus arrested and detained, and then, mostly released without charge. The Hill Times Online
Civil liberties lawyers and Parliamentarians are gathering evidence they say will show Toronto police systematically violated legal and human rights as they quelled protests with the largest mass arrests in Canadian history at the G20 leaders’ summit in Toronto last month.
The evidence includes eyewitness accounts from lawyers who acted as monitors during the protests where police arrested 1,105 people, including bystanders, lawful protesters and some of the legal monitors, but released more than 900 with no charges.
Up to six lawyers who volunteered as monitors with the Osgoode Hall Law Union were swept up by police and have provided affidavit-style evidence to organizers about the abuses they witnessed in the notorious temporary prison Toronto police set up in an abandoned film studio, says Adrienne Telford, one of the organizers. The Canadian Civil Liberties Union had up to 50 legal monitors at the protests and is compiling information.
Go ahead and rant about the violent antics of the so-called Black Bloc rioters but remember this; 15,000 security officers allowed the Black Bloc to riot contrary to in downtown Toronto without a single police officer lifting a hand to stop the riot for over 90 minutes. The Black Bloc could have been easily been apprehended and stopped in their tracks, but instead, security forces chose to stand down regardless of potential threat to human lives and willful destruction to property. There were many law abiding citizens in the stores and restaurants the Black Bloc attacked but security forces chose not to intervene. Now the Toronto Police are spending umpteen hours and funds from the public purse attempting to hunt down and arrest the so-called Black Bloc. It would have been far easier on the public purse to arrest them in the act rather than harassing innocent citizens for wearing black and carrying backpacks long after the Black Bloc had disappeared much like thieves in the night.
