By Neil Armstrong
 |
| Photo contributed Justice Michael Tulloch of the Court of Appeal for Ontario |
A recently released report is calling on the Ontario
government to amend a regulation to state that no police officer should
arbitrarily or randomly stop individuals to request their identifying
information.
The Report of the Independent Street Checks Review conducted
by Jamaica-born Justice Michael Tulloch,
a judge of the Court of Appeal for Ontario, also recommends that officers
should be instructed that the requirements of the regulation “apply when a
police officer requests identifying information in a regulated interaction,
whether or not the officer retains and records the identifying information.”
Justice Tulloch publicly released the report, which includes
104 recommendations, at a hotel in downtown Toronto on January 4.
On June 7, 2017, the judge was appointed by the Government
of Ontario to lead an independent review of Regulation 58/16, which was
introduced in 2016, and its implementation.
The regulation outlines Ontario’s new rules on the
collection of identifying information by police in certain circumstances, “a
practice that is commonly known as street checks (and sometimes referred to as
carding),” the report notes.
“Street checks were originally intended as an investigative
tool to capture the information of people who police had reason to suspect of
being involved in criminal activity. Over time, however, it grew into a much less
focused practice.
“Some police services began collecting and storing personal
identifying information of many citizens without any belief that they were
involved in criminal activity, and without much evidence that such databases
were particularly useful in solving crime,” said Justice Tulloch in the
executive summary of the 295-page report.
He said many of the issues surrounding carding and street
checks stem from a misunderstanding of the terms themselves.
“A street check is where information is obtained by a police
officer concerning an individual, outside of a police station, that is not part
of an investigation.”
The report notes that this is a very broad category of
police information gathering, and much of it is legitimate intelligence gathering
of potentially useful information.
“Carding, as referred to in this report, is a small subset
of street checks in which a police officer randomly asks an individual to
provide identifying information when the individual is not suspected of any
crime, nor is there any reason to believe that the individual has information
about any crime. This information is then entered into a police database.”
The report recommends that, “no police service should
randomly stop people in order to collect and record identifying information and
create a database for general intelligence purposes.”
 |
| Valarie Steele of the Black Action Defense Committee (BADC) |
Valarie Steele of the Black Action Defense Committee (BADC) describes
the report as excellent noting that it has been done by someone who has a good
understanding of what is happening.
“This is somebody who has had experience looking at things
like that and the conclusion that he has come to is the right one.”
She said one of the things that continue “to elude the
police is that they are thirsty for being respected but most of the things they
do earn them the disrespect.”
“Even though rank and file may tell you how fair and how
professional and how dedicated they are, my overarching attitude is that they
are dedicated to being disrespected by the Black community based on the way
they treat them.”
She describes the report as “a foundation document that we
will be able to look at in the future” and that it is evident that Justice
Tulloch has listened.
Steele said successive provincial governments waited
twenty-five years before they looked at policing in Ontario.
She said the BADC has participated in all of the
consultations and has been at this for decades, which is why she is encouraging
the young people to “fight them tooth and nail and blame every level of
government for the disadvantage.”
A recommendation says the regulation “should state that
chiefs of police should ensure that every police officer on their police
service who attempts to collect identifying information does so in compliance
with this regulation.”
The report wants the Province of Ontario to make efforts “to
raise public awareness about the content of the regulation, and the
circumstances under which people are and are not required to provide
identifying information to the police.”
In its response to the report, the Toronto Police Services
Board (TPSB) says it supports
the intent of the regulation and is in the process of reviewing the significant
report by Justice Tulloch.
“We
await the provincial government's substantive response to these important recommendations.
We also look forward to engaging with the government as it considers each of
the recommendations, including how the province can develop a robust public
education campaign and police training that will provide police officers and
members of the public with a better understanding of their rights and
obligations during interactions that fall within the Regulation. The
Board also looks forward to more broadly engaging with the government as it
determines what changes it will be making to the Safer Ontario Act,” says the
TPSB in an email.
The board says it has been demonstrating its commitment and leadership in this area over the last several years.
The board says it has been demonstrating its commitment and leadership in this area over the last several years.
TPSB
says its policy on “Regulated Interaction with the Community and the Collection
of Identifying Information” seeks to establish “a process that will enhance
public trust concerning the collection of identifying information, promote
police-community engagement and improve community relations.”
It says
it welcomes the opportunity Justice Tulloch’s report provides to bring
consistency across the province in this important form of police-public
interaction.
Sylvia Jones, minister of
community safety and correctional services, said the government will review the
recommendations and is “committed to developing legislation that works for our
police and for the people of Ontario.”
“Our new police legislation will
reflect a simple principle: racism and discrimination have no place in
policing. Justice Tulloch’s report will inform our work as we fix Ontario’s
policing legislation,” she said.
No comments:
Post a Comment