McCormack’s perspective is troubling
Re Andrew Loku tragedy is not about race,
Opinion March 31 I never once heard the race card being played in Andrew Loku’s death, as Mike McCormack has suggested. The issue here has been about the police’s dealings with mental health victims.
If McCormack’s idea of de-escalation is to only yell at a mental health patient to put down a hammer (or scissors or pen knife), no wonder these patients are being shot at so quickly.
McCormack also cites the issue that Loku was threatening his neighbour. But this neighbour said publicly that at no time did she feel threatened, that there was no attempt to de-escalate, and that the police acted too quickly in shooting Andrew Loku.
If our police officers follow McCormack’s way of dealing with mental health conflicts then mental health sufferers could be in for big trouble.
As a 58-year-old bipolar patient, never in my life have I seen such terrible response to mental health victims as in the past six years. Mark Levine, Thornhill As a conscientious young Canadian, I don’t have to look far to see that discrimination still happens. In light of recent cases of excessive police brutality in the U.S., there is a growing public fear and distrust of police.
As the public defenders, the police are not people we should be afraid of. However, when cases involving the investigation of an officer are done by the Special Investigations Unit and little information is released to the public before clearing the officer, one cannot help but feel slightly frightened by officers who seemingly do not have to face consequences for their actions.
While there might be concerns about safety of an individual officer, by not releasing their name, or other details of the SIU investigation the police are only further alienating themselves from citizens. The only way to address the root of the problem, and for police to regain the public’s trust and restoring their image as protectors is to have complete transparency in their internal investigations. Khizar Abid, Ajax