Their Beastly Behaviour

by C. L. Cook
Watching the testimonies of those abused by the Toronto police and members of other police forces invited in for the billion dollar "security" operations staged against the citizenry, (with a shout out to the bailiffs, and assorted others constituting what passes for a judicial system in this country Canada in 2010) leaves me wondering why some of these people got into the justice game?

 

Did they include in their application forms a desire to inflict emotional and physical pain on strangers?

 

Did they admit to the sexual rush they get when pushing around people who can't fight back? Did they reveal their disdain of the principles of justice and of the democratic process?

The Real News Network has run a series of testimonials since the G20 ended last week. One of their own reporters was also assaulted by police, and had some of his recording equipment grabbed away from him. It seems the boys in the riot squad still possess enough of a sense of, if not shame, then culpability to try to hide what they're doing from the press.

 

And well they should want to hide the cowardly doings got up to in Toronto.

For instance: The pretty young woman who had burly riot cops pin her head to the ground with their heavy boots, while others zap-strapped her hands, making sure to inflict enough pain, humiliation, and discomfort to dissuade her from ever going down to a protest again, (something a Justice apparently tried to reinforce with an order of conditions for release, in contravention of her Charter of Rights and Freedoms rights) as still others put the boot to her for good measure.

 

She says she is all of 5 foot 3 inches tall, and weighs barely more than a hundred pounds, and now stands charged with resisting arrest and obstructing a police officer; it's a standard double tap rap many of the innocents rousted by police and herded into makeshift cages received.

Or, how about the treatment John Pruyn, a 57 year old Revenue Canada worker and part-time farmer from Thorvold, Ontario received? Pruyn is an amputee, having lost a leg in a farming accident. He was sitting on the grass in Queen's Park with his daughter and two of her friends, in an area the authorities had assured was a "protest friendly" spot. Someone failed to tell the goon squad that. When approached, John was a little too slow to his feet for the fancy of the police.

John Pryun was then set upon by the police. They kicked him down to the ground, then used their knees to pin his head, as they shouted curses in his face. Pryun was also charged with resisting arrest.

 

This after his canes were taken from him, his hands zapped behind his back, and his prosthetic ripped off him. Apparently our heroes in blue considered his leg a weapon to be wielded by the hopping man against the fully armed and armored platoon.

 

Despite being aware of his conditions, the brutishness continued. He was accused, while being ministered painful blows, of being a "spitter," something the young woman above was repeatedly told during her ordeal.

John Pryun spent the next 27 hours held in a mesh cage. The treatment he and those crammed in there with him received would merit charges of cruelty to animals, were he and his fellows rightly considered feeling creatures; but they weren't considered at all. Many report being refused water, food, or access to toilets. Others report their jailers making extra efforts to eat chocolate strawberries and swill bottled water in front of them while turning a feigned deaf ear to their cries for water.

While this story is ancient history to much of the corporate media, and the government organ CBC, small presses on the internet, and civil liberties groups, and a burgeoning Facebook campaign in Canada are pressing for public inquiry into both the egregious lawlessness committed by law enforcement officers as cited here, and to the nature of this beast that Canadian Justice has morphed into these last years.

Just who is training police to treat the civilian population in this manner?

 

While Toronto's G20 experience is shocking, it is not surprising. We've seen this brand of "enforcement" in the United States, (most recently in Pittsburgh during anther G20 confab) and around the world. Can we expect in Canada next the army to begin sniping protesters from rooftops, as seen recently in Bangkok? Or, will we see jet propelled tear gas canisters fired directly into the heads and faces of peaceful demonstrators as in the West Bank?

The police actions in Toronto, and across the country in case after case of abuse and impunity are very troubling portents of a dark future for this place no-one in power I have heard has yet to address. Now is the time for courage for those in high places to put their name on the wall and stand to protect our True North. It is also the time citizens demand democratic Canada be returned; now!

And it is past time for those behind the perversion of justice and the principles we emblazoned in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms be exposed and given their day to defend their actions in a true court of justice.