West African denied release again
Man who has spent four years in jail ‘can’t be trusted,’ board says
The Immigration and Refugee Board has again refused to release a West African man who has spent more than four years in maximum-security jail without charge because the government has been unable to deport him.
Ebrahim Toure is a 46-year-old failed refugee claim- ant who was profiled earlier this year as part of a Star investigation into immigration detention.
He has been locked up at Central East Correctional Centre in Lindsay, Ont., since February 2013.
He says he was born in Gambia, but he doesn’t have any documentation to prove his citizenship so the country will not take him back.
Toure is not considered a danger to the public. He is being detained solely on the grounds that the government believes he is unlikely to show up if they can ever arrange his deportation.
Though immigration officials accuse Toure of not co-operating, he says he would like to be deported and has given the government all the information he has.
In a written decision delivered three weeks after Toure’s June 15 detention review, presiding board member Suzy Kim — a government appointee who acts as a kind of judge in the quasi-judicial hearing — said Toure “generally lacks credibility” and has largely contributed to his own lengthy detention.
Citing his use of a fake passport to gain entry to Canada, his past history of aliases in the U.S. and the fact that he once claimed to be from Guinea, Kim said Toure is “unreliable” and “cannot be trusted” to appear if his deportation were ever to be arranged.
“I do not believe that anything (Toure) says can be taken at face value,” she wrote.
In response to Kim’s decision, Toure’s lawyer, Jared Will, said he will take the case to Superior Court, where earlier this year he secured the release of seven-year immigration detainee Kashif Ali in a ruling that was critical of the government’s practice of indefinite detention.
Will had argued at last month’s hearing that Toure’s detention violated the Charter of Rights and Freedoms because it is indefinite and arbitrary. He said there was no reasonable prospect of Toure’s deportation, so his detention was detached from its purpose.
On Tuesday, Will said he wasn’t surprised Kim disagreed.
“The various members of the Immigration Division have made it clear that they don’t take constitutional rights to liberty very seriously, and I did not expect a different outcome on this particular occasion.”
Kim is known for being particularly resistant to releasing immigration detainees. She had the third-lowest release rate of any Immigration Division member from 2013 to 2016, according to data obtained by the Star through an access to information request. She ordered release in 8.2 per cent of her cases, well below the 17.9-per-cent national average. An Immigration and Refugee Board spokesperson declined to make Kim available for an interview or take questions on her behalf.
Toure has no criminal record in Canada, but he has spent the entirety of his 53-month detention in a maximum-security jail because of a 12-year-old conviction for selling pirated CDs and DVDs in Atlanta, an offence for which he pleaded guilty and served no jail time.
He theoretically could have spent the last four years in the less-restrictive Immigration Holding Centre, which is specifically for immigration detainees. The Immigration Holding Centre is not full.
But the Star found that the insurance contract held by the private company that provides housekeeping and food services requires it to be a “low-risk” facility. As such, immigration detainees with any criminal record whatsoever — even non-violent offences for which no jail time was served — are considered ineligible and are sent to maximum-security jail instead.
Will said he is looking forward to having Toure’s case heard in an actual court, where disclosure is mandatory and hearsay evidence is not permitted.
“It will be refreshing to know the actual basis of the allegations that are being made against Mr. Toure and have the opportunity to contest them,” he said. “We’re also looking forward to being in a forum where we hope and expect that his Charter rights will be taken seriously.”