Carding killed credibility of Tory, police
The demand to “Stop Carding Now” is a cry of desperation.
Rationally, Torontonians know police will nose around and take copious notes and do what they do. The frustration comes from the police refusal to play fair, to respect the people they serve, and to follow some simple rules that protect the citizen’s dignity and rights.
In 2014, the Toronto Police Services Board struck the right balance on carding and most people who were paying attention nodded approval. Investigate crimes, talk to suspects or would-be suspects, arrest who you will, but in casual encounters where no criminality is involved please tell the citizen of his or her right to walk away. And give the contact a receipt that documents the reason for the stop.
The board took the action because data shows the police do such casual encounters millions of times and put the info in a data base. And analysis of that data shows that black citizens are four times more likely to be carded than white citizens. Brown residents? Close to three times as much.
This smacks of racial profiling. Worse, if you are black and found in what appears to be a predominantly white neighbourhood, then your chances of being carded increases exponentially. It’s bad enough for black citizens to suffer from Driving While Black. To add Walking While Black is too much. Simply put, this is outrageous. The fact ex-chief Bill Blair, the new Chief Mark Saunders, Mayor John Tory and others support the dismantling of the 2014 reform and refuse to honour the rights of citizens is beyond disturbing. So, instead of asking again for the police board to fix carding, citizens want to be rid of it before an incident happens with a black kid frustrated at being harassed by police and the world realizes what’s happening in Toronto.
They do not want to hear from Mayor Tory on the issue. He symbolizes the problem.
Tory talks about “suspending” carding and restarting it after he and the new chief have fixed the problem. But he is the problem; and the chief has proven his judgment on carding is impaired.
Tory’s very presence on the police services board — a position he insisted on assuming — has aggravated the carding crisis. So now, you don’t send the arsonist to put out the fire.
Citizens do not want apologia from Saunders. He can’t be trusted on the file. If you think that’s a harsh assessment, consider this: Saunders forcefully and strongly backed carding days after he became chief. He did this even as he revealed that he himself had been stopped as many as 10 times by police. His crime? Probably wearing his baseball cap backwards, fitting some kind of profile, he told CBC interviewer Dwight Drummond.
Viewers nodded in disbelief. Everyone suspects the reason for such stops, more often than not, is “the skin you’re in.” Saunders, somehow, accepts that as collateral damage and the “social cost” necessary to catch bad guys.
Here’s the problem. Toronto has about 50 to 60 murders a year. Let’s say half of them are gang-related? And let’s say we have 20 bad black dudes shooting each other, with the occasional stray bullet striking down innocent citizens.
Is it reasonable to embark on a campaign to stop tens of thousands of young black men — doctors, university professors, senior police officers, judges, politicians, bums and their children — to document their movement and record the information in a database?
What is this? South Africa? Southern United States?
Saunders has said, in frustration, that all he hears are a litany of complaints about carding, but no solutions.
That’s not quite so. The issue is he and the police brass do not like the solutions they hear. They prefer the status quo.
Notice the evolution of the carding narrative out of police headquarters.
First, carding is great. It solves crimes. It’s legal.
But asked to produce the evidence of same, police refuse. Ex-chief Bill Blair solicited three legal opinions on carding — paid for by taxpayers — but refused to say what the opinions were. The Ontario Human rights Commission has grave concerns, as does the privacy commissioner.
Blair convened a citizen-police advisory team (PACER) and they drafted 31 recommendations that would revolutionize policing and make Toronto a model force. On the carding file, the recommendations contemplated that police tell citizens of their right to engage or not engage in the carding exercise. And when they do, police should give them a receipt documenting the contact.
It was a brilliant procedure. The police board passed it in 2014.
Only arrogance and hubris would motivate someone to oppose this. That is exactly what happened inside police headquarters. And that has landed us at the point where former mayors and the chief justice of Ontario and many luminaries must trundle down to city hall to oppose carding.
The new police narrative is that the complaints are about how carding was done in the past. Those days are over. Reforms under study will fix the problems.
The police and the mayor have zero credibility on the issue. That’s why so many citizens throw up their hands and say, Enough. End this.
That, unfortunately, is easier said than done.
More on that later. Royson James usually appears Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Email: rjames@thestar.ca