Uproar was a wake-up call for whole city
Peaceful anti-racism protest descended into pandemonium
Outside police headquarters on College St., a works crew was removing several tons of rocks the size of softballs, designed by a landscape architect to look like a dry stream bed near the entrance.
“I’ve got to get rid of the ammo,” one of the workers told a Toronto Star journalist.
The dismantling of a pretty pathway on May 5, 1992, had ugly implications. The night before the city had erupted in violence and no one — least of all the police who had been on the receiving end of projectiles — wanted a replay.
It was “a mob scene like Toronto has never seen,” declared the Star the morning after the rampage, which began as an anti-racism protest.
The six-hour melee, which left more than 100 Yonge St. stores damaged and looted, ended with 32 arrests and dozens injured, including 37 police officers and three of their horses. (A second, smaller riot broke out the next night but was nothing to rival the big one.)
The outrage had been imported from 4,000 kilometres away in Los Angeles, where, a few days earlier, four white police officers were acquitted in the beating of a black motorist, Rodney King. The verdict sparked L.A. riots that left 55 dead and more than 2,000 injured.
Toronto sympathizers planned a peaceful protest in solidarity at the U.S. consulate on University Ave., but even as organizers put the wheels in motion, Metro police shot and killed a knife-wielding black man in the west end, raising local rancour.
As 22-year-old Raymond Lawrence approached an officer, the cop shouted and fired a warning shot before putting two bullets in the suspected drug dealer’s chest, the special investigations unit found.
Two days later, on Monday, May 4, a crowd of 1,000 gathered at the consulate before marching north to Yonge and Bloor Sts. where they staged a 45-minute sit-in. Then peace turned to pandemonium as young thugs swarmed south and west.
The downtown core was overtaken by a “seething sea of humanity,” reporters said, “smashing store windows, punching passersby and helping themselves to everything from tuxedos to pastries.”
While all races were represented, the majority were white youths and skinheads with covered faces, ac- cording to observers, who also noted that some black people tried to “stop the madness.”
“Please, please, everybody go home,” implored one Bay St. bystander. “Let’s not have any black blood shed tonight.” He was ignored. “A standoff between police and protesters on Bay St. took on the atmosphere of a maniacal party,” a reporter wrote. “The mob screamed at and taunted police, laughing and throwing rocks, daring the officers to try to take them in.”
Several hundred police were called in as Yonge turned from “Fun Street” to “Fear Street,” according to reporter Michael Tenszen.
Ill-equipped and under orders not to intervene, officers did little to stop the marauders.
“They had only their arms and hands to fend off the rocks and bottles and bricks hurled into their ranks,” the Star reported.
“I have never seen a mob as angry or as violent in my life,” battered front-line cop Jim Wright recalled a couple of days later.
With police chief William McCormack out of town, deputy chief Peter Scott was left to explain that the force had been prepared for a peaceful demonstration, not mayhem, and he had to decide between protecting property and lives.
“Did I want property damage or did I want bodies in the morgue? I chose the former,” Scott told the media later.
Protest organizers insisted the riot was not connected to their peaceful rally, which aimed to draw attention to racism and perceived police brutality in the city.
“People have been very, very angry for a long, long time” over the government’s “inaction” in countering racism, particularly among police officers, stated Dudley Laws of the Black Action Defence Committee.
Ed Clarke, another committee member, blamed “some nuts” and a predominance of white youths for stirring things up.
There appeared to be little connecting the dots from the fray back to police shooting victim Raymond Lawrence or the injustice served upon Rodney King, whose vicious beating was caught on videotape and seen around the world. The African-American, who later won $3.8 million (U.S.) in a lawsuit against the city of Los Angeles, died five years ago from drowning aided by a drug overdose.
Most of the Toronto rowdies “were just looking for an excuse to break the law,” according to cab driver Tim Onabolu, whose view was shared by truck driver Michael Belleville.
“It was hooligans, just punk kids going up the street getting away with murder,” he said after witnessing the bedlam that engulfed downtown.
The riot served as a wake-up call for the police force, which vowed to rethink its strategy for handling future protests but said little about the charges of systemic racism.
“We’ve realized now that the rules of the game have changed,” Scott said later. “This type of demonstration can quickly turn to violence, so therefore we have to be better prepared.”
As crews replaced glass and business owners contemplated installing protective metal barriers, the heart of the city was gripped by a cold, new reality.
“This is the kind of madness I never thought we would see in Toronto,” said one proprietor whose windows were smashed and electronic equipment looted.
“Something happened to Toronto when its set, glassy smile was kicked in,” observed Star scribe Joey Slinger, summing up a widely held impression. “We lost our virginity. We lost our innocence. What could never possibly happen in decent old Toronto could happen after all, it turns out, and did.”