Police express ‘regret’ for 1981 bathhouse raids

Chief admits gays treated ‘as not fully part of society’

Toronto police Chief Mark Saunders made history Wednesday when he expressed “regret” for the police force’s treatment of the gay community in the past, especially extensive raids on gay bathhouses in 1981 that led to the mass arrest of hundreds of gay men.

“The Toronto Police Service expresses regret for those very actions” and “for treating those communities as not fully part of society,” Saunders said during the annual Pride reception at police headquarters Wednesday.

Saunders said lessons from the raids continue to inform how police reach out to the LGBT community, and in light of Orlando, police must continue to support and protect those marginalized because of their sexual orientation. “Policing requires building trust,” Saunders said.

“It is a good and appropriate time to acknowledge something in our community that was wrong,” Mayor John Tory said before introducing Saunders. “It is timely, it is right and it is necessary.”

Rev. Brent Hawkes, a gay activist and pastor, helped Saunders craft the statement.

“My intention was to honour the people who went through the horror of that night,” he said, adding that he approached Saunders months ago about the possibility.

Saunders did not mention the 2000 raid on Club Toronto on Mutual St., during a women’s bathhouse event known as the “Pussy Palace,” which left many women feeling violated. Police settled a civil suit in 2005.

The 1981 raids on four downtown bathhouses were carried out after complaints that underage youth were having sex there, says Howard Morton, then director of Ontario’s Crown office.

Police humiliated and outed gay patrons of the private clubs, and arrested hundreds of men.

When no evidence was found, the men were instead charged with being found-ins in a common bawdy house, or house of prostitution. In more than 90 per cent of cases, the charges were dismissed in court.

At the time, most men were “deep in the closet” and viewed the private clubs as safe spaces to have sex during a period of widespread homophobia.

“They did wrong,” Dennis Findlay, president of the Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives, said in an earlier interview. The raids launched the Canadian gay rights movement.