Appeal cites racial profiling: Fo Niemi
A Châteauguay man who was pepper-sprayed by a police officer in 2015 while picking up his children to drive them to school will get his day in court today.
John Chilcott will appear in Quebec Superior Court in Valleyfield, where he is appealing a municipalcourt ruling upholding three traffic tickets totalling $1,068.
On Dec. 14, 2015, Chilcott, an English-speaking black man, was at the wheel of his Ford Explorer in the parking lot of his apartment building, with his two daughters, then age 10 and six, in the back seat, when Constable Mathew Vill stopped him and asked him to identify himself.
Chilcott, who said he had been pulled over by police at least three previous times in “driving while black” incidents, refused to comply without first being told why he had been stopped.
In response, Vill pepper-sprayed him in the face as his daughters screamed and complained of sore throats from the spray. The two girls later received medical treatment for the effects of the pepper spray and missed two days of school.
Vill called for reinforcements and Chilcott was handcuffed and placed in a police cruiser — a scene his wife captured on video after seeing the confrontation from the window and racing downstairs to the parking lot.
Chilcott was ticketed for obstructing the work of a police officer, failing to turn off his vehicle when pulled over, and using his hazard lights unnecessarily.
Chilcott acknowledged that he had used his hazard lights that morning while driving home after taking his two eldest children to school. He stopped on St-Francis Blvd. after seeing one of his daughter’s friends waiting for a bus and promised to drive her after picking up the two youngest children. Vill, who had been going the other way in his police cruiser, made a U-turn and tailed Chilcott to his home.
Vill said that when he saw Chilcott talking to the girl, he suspected he might be a sexual predator.
Chilcott contested the tickets in municipal court but lost in May 2017.
Fo Niemi, executive director of the Centre for Research-Action on Race Relations, which has been representing Chilcott, said in a statement Sunday that Chilcott’s appeal asserts that the trial judge erred in interpreting evidence of racial profiling and trivialized the level of force used by police and the injuries to Chilcott’s daughters. It also claims the officer’s sworn testimony contains several contradictions.
In a written statement in 2015, the Châteauguay police confirmed that pepper spray was used during “an intervention after an individual refused to collaborate following a Highway Safety Code infraction” and that medical assistance was offered to those on the scene but it was refused.
The police force refused further comment because the case was before the courts.
Chilcott also has a case in connection with the incident before the Quebec Human Rights and Youth Rights Commission, as does his wife.