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I didn't want to run the risk of starting this week low on indignation, so I did some Googling on the G20 in Toronto and the long long tail of dealing with the fallout. The report of the Office of the Independent Police Review Director (PDF) came out in May and it's pretty damning: An inadequate policing plan developed without civilian oversight was poorly communicated to officers, who in turn didn't communicate well with the public, leading to widespread violations of civil rights (some of them "grave") which the higher-ups took insufficient actions to remedy. Basically, it's what anyone who followed the protests already knew.
I was also interested in the outcome of the "the largest mass arrest in Canadian history", but it's been harder to find a solid summary than I thought. According to the report, record keeping was so shambolic we don't even know how many people were arrested. A lot of news reports quote the Toronto Police's official figure of 1,118, but the investigation revealed that the real number was at least 1,140 and could be much higher. The most comprehensive breakdowns I can find are almost a year out of date and show only 24 convictions (2.1% of those arrested). Only 317 people were ever formally charged with a crime and 196 of those cases (nearly two-thirds) were stayed, withdrawn, or otherwise dismissed.
A more recent update puts the number of convictions at "close to four dozen", which must include the six convictions as resulting from a plea-bargain in the recently-concluded trial of the "conspirators cell" which was taken into custody before any property crimes took place. The "ringleaders" were convicted of "counselling others to commit mischief" and "counselling others to obstruct police", which don't require any proof of a connexion between the act of counselling and actual commission of a crime. (Basically, they're like "conspiracy" charges in US courts but with a lower burden of proof.) So some anarchists told some guys to do illegal things and not get caught, and those guys might not have even been at the G20, let alone done anything criminal. Bet you feel better knowing they're all behind bars, doncha!
As for the many officers accused of brutality and other violations? The latest seems to be that it will be September at the earliest (27 months after their alleged misconduct) before any of them could face any sort of disciplinary action. Apparently somewhere between 30-40 may end up being formally charged. Two have been brought to trial already, including one member of the Special Investigations Unit trio who were filmed beating up an unarmed, non-resisting demonstrator. I assume at least those two have been removed from active duty, but I don't know about any of the rest.
Why do I care? Well, we nearly missed having the G8 summit in Chicago this year. And I'm sure if we had, we would've had a depressingly familiar stew of poor communication and police overreaction. It's only a last-minute venue change that saved us from that, and we can't keep dodging bullets like that indefinitely--particularly not with the sort of would-be tough guy influence brokers that the job of Mare attracts in this town.
I was also interested in the outcome of the "the largest mass arrest in Canadian history", but it's been harder to find a solid summary than I thought. According to the report, record keeping was so shambolic we don't even know how many people were arrested. A lot of news reports quote the Toronto Police's official figure of 1,118, but the investigation revealed that the real number was at least 1,140 and could be much higher. The most comprehensive breakdowns I can find are almost a year out of date and show only 24 convictions (2.1% of those arrested). Only 317 people were ever formally charged with a crime and 196 of those cases (nearly two-thirds) were stayed, withdrawn, or otherwise dismissed.
A more recent update puts the number of convictions at "close to four dozen", which must include the six convictions as resulting from a plea-bargain in the recently-concluded trial of the "conspirators cell" which was taken into custody before any property crimes took place. The "ringleaders" were convicted of "counselling others to commit mischief" and "counselling others to obstruct police", which don't require any proof of a connexion between the act of counselling and actual commission of a crime. (Basically, they're like "conspiracy" charges in US courts but with a lower burden of proof.) So some anarchists told some guys to do illegal things and not get caught, and those guys might not have even been at the G20, let alone done anything criminal. Bet you feel better knowing they're all behind bars, doncha!
As for the many officers accused of brutality and other violations? The latest seems to be that it will be September at the earliest (27 months after their alleged misconduct) before any of them could face any sort of disciplinary action. Apparently somewhere between 30-40 may end up being formally charged. Two have been brought to trial already, including one member of the Special Investigations Unit trio who were filmed beating up an unarmed, non-resisting demonstrator. I assume at least those two have been removed from active duty, but I don't know about any of the rest.
Why do I care? Well, we nearly missed having the G8 summit in Chicago this year. And I'm sure if we had, we would've had a depressingly familiar stew of poor communication and police overreaction. It's only a last-minute venue change that saved us from that, and we can't keep dodging bullets like that indefinitely--particularly not with the sort of would-be tough guy influence brokers that the job of Mare attracts in this town.
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