2010-07-19

Civil liberties lawyers, MPs gathering evidence against G20 summit arrests

One of the lawyer monitors who was arrested, 24-year-old Andrew McIsaac, who works at the law firm of Paul Cavalluzo, a widely respected human rights lawyer who was counsel to the commission of inquiry into Maher Arar’s rendition and torture in Syria, told The Hill Times he witnessed a police officer brutally yank the plastic zip-ties so tight on an 18-year-old prisoner in his cell at the temporary jail that the young man began crying for help as blood circulation was cut off to his hands.

In a pattern that is emerging from dozens of protesters and others who have given information to the Law Union, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association and other organizations and MPs, Mr. McIsaac said he and the others in his cell went for 10 hours without water or food as they were held through the night, under bright lights and in cold temperatures that prevented sleep. As they begged for food, eventually getting occasional plastic cups of water and one meal of a dry white-bread bun with processed cheese, a Toronto police officer who had been belligerent toward the prisoners sat down in front of them to eat a meal and taunt them.

Mr. Davies said he gave over his second cup of water to fellow inmates who used it to cleanse themselves after using the only toilet in the cell, with no toilet paper or tissue.

“There was a small sort of moist clump of paper on the floor,” Mr. McIsaac said. “Some people used that and then that was gone and other people used the water method, so I offered my cup so people could use that, you sprinkle yourself.”

On websites and in other accounts, female prisoners depict how they formed human walls around women who used the open toilets in their cells. On Torontonamo.ca, a young woman giving her video account breaks into sobs as she describes how police officers threw her on the ground and stepped on her head when they arrested her, one of the male officers passing his hands down her breasts and over her “private parts” before she was hauled to one of the paddy wagons the police used for the roundup. Another video shows a young woman in her early 20s being arrested for allegedly assaulting a police officer by blowing detergent bubbles at him.

NDP MP Don Davies (Vancouver Kingsway, B.C.), who is spearheading an attempt by opposition MPs to force an inquiry by the House of Commons Public Safety and National Security Committee, says he has interviewed two students from the University of British Columbia campus at Kelowna, B.C., who attended the protests and have testimony that will have “have every mother in the country” angry at the federal government and Prime Minister Stephen Harper (Calgary Southwest, Alta.) over what happened.

The two students, who flew to Toronto on a red-eye from Vancouver the night before the first day of the summit, were arrested along with other protesters sleeping in a University of Toronto gym at 6 a.m. on the second day of the summit and have accounts that include accusations police officers taunted a female protester locked up in the old film studio—dubbed Torontonamo by a web group also gathering first-hand accounts—and refused to provide her with hygiene products as she was menstruating.

“She was laughed at and she ended up bleeding through her clothes,” Mr. Davies told The Hill Times. He said he wants the two B.C. students to testify if he can convince Conservative MPs on the committee to abandon stalling tactics they used to run out time during the first meeting of the committee Mr. Davies engineered two weeks ago. “The evidence from these two should shock the conscience of Canadians.”

“These guys don’t have an ounce of guile in them, they aren’t Black Bloc, they are really nice guys,” said Mr. Davies, who has already interviewed the students for two hours.

“I think there should be hearings right now, there should be hearings day after say,” said Mr. Davies, who added Parliament has a duty to inquire because the RCMP commanded the Integrated Security Unit of federal, provincial and city police forces.

Mr. Cavaluzzo said a class action against the Toronto police force is possible, while a judicial inquiry should also be conducted. The Canadian Civil Liberties Association last week filed five complaints with the Office of the Independent Police Review Director in Toronto. The province’s ombudsman has also launched an inquiry, as has the Toronto police service civilian oversight board.

“I was shocked to see so many people arrested for no reason,” Mr. Cavaluzzo told The Hill Times. “I have never seen that in this country. This was just beyond the pale. The Supreme Court of Canada has talked about this, if you don’t have justification for arresting somebody and you don’t do something to stop it, then the worst abuses of a police state will come to the fore.”

Conservative MPs filibuster at a special meeting of the House of Commons Public Safety and National Security Committee. The government MPs talked out the clock during the opposition attempt to begin an inquiry into mass arrests and allegations of rights violations at the G20 summit in Toronto, but Mr. Davies said he and Liberal MPs will force a second meeting if the Conservatives do not agree to the inquiry this week.

Police, meanwhile, arrested two more G20 “most wanted” suspects last week in connection with the burning, looting and window smashing rampage during the G20 summit riots and three others have been identified from some 14,000 pictures and 500 videos taken by people, undercover police officers and surveillance cameras. The Toronto Police released a Top 10 “Most Wanted” list and pictures last week in hopes of tracking down and charging suspects.

Source: http://www.sbpost.ie/commentandanalysis/big-brother-really-is-watching-and-listening-50582.html