Quebec should follow Ontario model on policing
An independent body should be established to probe allegations of police misconduct
Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre announced late last month that Philippe Pichet will replace Marc Parent as police chief when his term ends this September.
Here’s our blueprint for how Pichet can act to rebuild public confidence in the police, better protect and prepare his officers and most importantly, save lives.
We should begin by saying that the authors of this piece don’t often agree. One conservative, the other progressive, we meet each Monday to debate the issues of the day on CJAD radio.
However, in our years of covering the news together, we’ve come to agree on a few things. One of those is that Montreal police can go too far when dealing with marginalized people, sometimes using threats, weapons and violence to punish rather than maintain public order. Complaints rarely result in the officer involved being charged, let alone fired, leading to a fairly predictable culture of police impunity.
And it isn’t only those who are homeless or mentally ill who have trouble with the police. This spring, students protested in the streets of Montreal. While we might disagree on the validity of their cause, we’re troubled by videos that have shown police physically assaulting protesters who are neither violent nor resisting. In a free and fair society, we cannot tolerate police abuse.
We believe Quebec should borrow the recommendations of Ontario’s recent report on policing. We also believe an independent and civilian body tasked with investigating allegations of police misconduct should be established, as already exists in Ontario. Finally, officer training in resolution of hostile situations with non-lethal means and interaction with the mentally ill must be significantly expanded.
THE ONTARIO REPORT
Soon after Sammy Yatim was shot and killed last year by a Toronto police officer, who has now been charged with murder, police chief Bill Blair commissioned a report on how to better deal with “people in crisis.”
Retired Supreme Court justice Frank Iacobucci delivered 84 recommendations, including requiring police to wear body cameras, expanding availability of non-lethal weapons (Tasers), training police better on how to de-escalate conflicts and expanding mobile crisis intervention units staffed by teams of specially trained police officers working alongside mental health professionals.
Blair, who is now a candidate for the Liberal Party in this year’s federal election, promised Toronto police would implement the recommendations as quickly as possible. Quebec should follow suit.
POLICE INVESTIGATING POLICE
The current system for investigating officer-involved shootings in Quebec is to call in an outside police force to conduct the investigation. A coroner’s report into the shooting of Fredy Villanueva, whose death was probed by provincial police, illustrates the problem with this approach.
“I can certainly understand (the Villanueva family’s) skepticism toward the process intended to find the truth,” Justice André Perreault wrote in a scathing indictment of investigators who broke their own rules for handling officer-involved shootings in an apparent effort to shield the officers under scrutiny.
Justice Perreault said the investigation was so badly botched that he had to be careful not to consider the attempt to protect the involved officers as proof of their guilt.
Unfortunately, rather than an isolated incident, this judicial inquiry into the handling of a high-profile case seems to have given us a peek behind the curtain of what police investigating other police forces looks like in practice.
Surely, public confidence in the police forces of Quebec could only be improved by the creation of a fair, independent and civilian body charged with investigating allegations of misconduct. If Ontario can do it, why not Quebec?
TRAINING SAVES LIVES
In these days of austerity, cuts are being made to budgets all over. There’s one budget that our governments, regardless of political orientation, need to commit to expanding: police training.
The Iacobucci report identified a severe need for better training of officers in how to de-escalate conflicts and protect the person in crisis as well as the public. The eerily similar police shootings of mentally ill men Alain Magloire, Farshad Mohammadi and Mario Hamel (along with bystander Patrick Limoges) in recent years illustrate the problem is real in Quebec, too.
All police officers should be trained in the law, use of their weapon and most importantly how to defuse a situation without using a gun. It sounds basic, but clearly current police training in these three areas is lacking.
Police should also be required to undergo psychological screening as a condition of their employment and receive training akin to what a psychiatric nurse receives in how to manage people in crisis without harming them.
GOOD FOR THE PUBLIC, GOOD FOR THE COPS
All of the measures proposed here would not only improve transparency, enhance public trust and save lives, but also benefit police officers.
We provide our police officers with the latest technology, but when it comes to giving them the training they need, we’re failing them. As cuts have stripped services to the mentally ill, police officers increasingly have to deal with people affected by a variety of disorders, who may be confused, delusional or suicidal.
No one would benefit from enhanced training, and partnerships with mental health professionals, more than frontline officers. It’s past time they develop the skills they need to do their job properly.
These simple measures would be a win–win for the public and the police. Ontario has already acted, and the results are overwhelmingly positive. Isn’t it time Quebec’s political leaders followed suit?
We provide our police officers with the latest technology, but when it comes to giving them the training they need, we’re failing them. Tommy Schnurmacher and Ethan Cox Complaints rarely result in the officer involved being charged, let alone fired.