In (partial) defence of carding
Toronto Mayor John Tory announced Sunday that at the June 18th meeting of the Toronto Police Services Board (of which he is but one member), he will be seeking a complete end to the controversial practice of “carding.” This is undoubtedly the beginning of the end of the current carding policy — which in the minds of some has been a racial profiling issue. In addition to the mayor, the board chair, Dr. Alok Mukherjee, has recently been very clear that he supports ending the controversial practice.
Mayor Tory has made what I believe to be the only palatable decision at this juncture. Although I agree with the Mayor’s decision, I personally support carding in some more tolerable form. Most or all police services have similar practices, under a variety of monikers. The system as used in Toronto prompted many to have valid concerns. But carding itself could still be useful.
For years, my former command, the Ontario Provincial Police, had the “Contact Card” system. They still do under a different brand and recording mechanism, but in essence, they were paper forms that were filled out following an interaction with a suspicious person in suspicious circumstances, or a known criminal that we thought we should keep tabs on. At that time, it was never about purposely approaching a person of any colour in a public place and demanding identification and creating a record of it. It was about trying to put two and two together in situations that didn’t seem quite right, and documenting it for investigative purposes. I personally submitted hundreds of them.
I believe that most times — but I can’t guarantee all, but most — the person had interaction with an officer because they were driving a car, were a passenger in a car, and were walking in a high crime area or near a residence or establishment frequented by criminals. In other cases they may have been companions of known crime group members (like bikers) or other known criminals in some situation. Identification was obtained from them through some valid legislative authority of the day, or through total voluntary compliance by the individual. Forms were completed, submitted and shared with other officers at shift briefings and most often with the local police intelligence officers, who may find some investigative linkage to other Contact Card information gleaned, witness information and/or informant reports. How many times practice this has helped solve crimes is immeasurable, but is undoubtedly highly beneficial.
Picture this scenario: officers are on patrol in an area plagued by nightly business break-ins. They see two males walking down a dark alley between those businesses. It appears they’ve spotted the police and then stopped in the shadows. Does the average member of the community not expect that the police would check that out further? To not check it out would be, to the eyes of many, a dereliction of duty.
The individuals would be checked out on police databases to see if they were wanted or escaped or on court conditions of some sort. Regardless of the response to the database query and action then taken, a card would be completed and submitted. That may well be the piece of information investigators need on some case somewhere, to identify a suspect in a serious crime.
If the people were non-white, would that mean that the police interaction was racially motivated? There’s a significant difference between investigative profiling, like I’ve just described, and picking on a person of colour in a non-suspicious situation and giving them the third degree for no other legitimate reason, which would be tantamount to racial profiling. Good old-fashioned police work simply hap- pens, and most of the time without an element of bias. Officers may sometimes seek out members of a particular ethnicity if they are searching for a particular suspect, of course, but that is not itself racial profiling.
I don’t believe for a minute that when the Toronto Police Service put their early carding practice in place years ago, that they ever intended it to become a racially-divisive issue. Nor did TPS leaders intend that any of their members would use it as a tool to single out men of colour for questioning and information gathering. I trust that only a handful TPS members or officers from other police services have intentionally utilized their various methodologies that way. But perception can become reality and the citizens of all communities need to be confident that the right things are happening for the right reasons, particularly when tools are wielded by those entrusted with the power to take or change lives or liberty. Torontonians were losing faith in their police due to carding. Something had to be done.
But the police do need some accountable mechanism to record information regarding suspicious people and situations. We can talk about the controls that should be placed on gathering that information, and how and when it should be shared. But to deny police this ability goes too far.
Mayor Tory said it well when he said “the best investigative tool the police have is the trust of the people they serve and protect.” Police services will not survive without the trust of the public they serve. People will not report crimes, co-operate as witnesses or provide helpful information if they don’t trust the men and women in blue. Public trust in the police has sadly eroded in a number of major cities across North America, and carding has made it much harder for police to build and maintain public trust in Toronto. A fresh start is a necessary first step in solving this problem — but only the first step. Mayor Tory, the Police Services Board and law enforcement agencies all across North America have their work cut out for them.
If police see someone acting suspiciously, and don’t stop to investigate, the public would accuse them of dereliction of duty