State repression and borders

G20 Policing in Toronto – Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Blue…

Linchpin — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 08:11:12 -0700

During last week’s G20 summit, police arrested or detained over a thousand people. With guns drawn, they kicked people awake, they threatened, pepper sprayed, TASERed, tear gassed and beat those in the streets. Although the politicians declared the policing at the summit a success, popular anger at the police is at an all time high. At such moments, it is important to look closely at the tactics and strategy that were used to police dissent, not least because the models that are considered successful, tend to spread.

How was the summit in Toronto policed? The website for the Integrated Security Unit argues that “The approach to the Summit would be best described as an expanded version of our approach to previous events based on best practices and the lessons learned.” This seems obvious. However the ‘expansion’ included some new and worrying elements.

Their Laws—Our Loss

Linchpin — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 08:02:00 -0700

by Jeff Shantz
State repression columnist

In events like the G20 protests and clampdown there emerge real opportunities for recognition and understanding that are not always so readily available behind the screen of “business as usual.” The learning curve shifts and some things become much more clear.

Free Our Friends! Community Update on G20 Detainees

Mick — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 08:23:15 -0700

by Direct Support Committees of G20 detainees

While G20 leaders met behind a steel cage and a 1-billion dollar Fortress Toronto operation, we witnessed an unprecedented coordinated police operation in the city of Toronto. Police brutality against protest participants, journalists, legal observers, medics, and random passersby came in the form of indiscriminate arrests, beatings, pepper spray, rubber bullets, police horse charges, illegal searches and seizures, and extended arbitrary detentions. While in custody, people were forced into steel cage cells with up to 40 people per cell; made to sleep on concrete floors with open bathrooms; denied food, water, toilet paper, and sanitary products; subjected to sexual harassment, threats, humiliation, and intimidation; and refused access to medical attention, phone calls, and legal counsel.

They Were Doing Their God-Damn Jobs: On Policing

Linchpin — Sat, 03 Jul 2010 15:23:05 -0700

Riot Police protect the banks at King and Bay, June 26, 2010, PHOTO: Ali Mustafa (cc)

by Jeff Shantz
State Repression Columnist

In the days following the mass police assaults on organizers, demonstrators, and bystanders during the G8/G20 events, even as comrades linger in squalid detention centres and jails, a troubling notion is taking shape, seemingly gaining traction, among activist circles as well as some sectors of the general public more broadly. This notion suggests that the police in Toronto acted in a way that was somehow atypical or out of the ordinary. Even more there is a sense that the police could have “kept order.” Some public discussion suggests that policing during the G8/G20 reflects a breakdown, a failure to carry out their duties “properly.” Incredibly, during a rally in support of people in detention, Naomi Klein suggested that the police “Do your god-damned job!” In response many in the crowd chanted “Do your job! Do your job!” Elsewhere, and even more incredibly, Judy Rebick has suggested that the were police failed to do their jobs properly in not arresting perceived black block participants: “What they could have done is arrest the Black Bloc at the beginning before they had a chance to be part of the bigger crowd and that's what they didn't do.” Some seem to believe that the police were supposed to be there to protect them or that the police provide the means for “protest” to take place.

Toronto Community Mobilization Network Call for immediate support and solidarity

Linchpin — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 09:35:26 -0700

July 1, 2010

From June 25-27, elites from the world’s most powerful economies met in Huntsville and Toronto to draft policies to further exploit the environment and people, bolstering the systems that sustain colonialism, wars and displacement.

With global attention on Toronto, tens of thousands of people mobilized in a historic week-long convergence in opposition to these policies. Daily demonstrations highlighted struggles for Indigenous sovereignty; environmental justice; migrant justice; an end to war and occupation; community control over resources; gender justice; and queer and disAbility rights.

Also unprecedented was the over $1.2 billion spent on security, the most in G20 summit history, which paid for a dizzying array of weaponry and nearly 20,000 police—plus a security fence that turned Toronto into a fortress to host a select few and a police state to terrorize the rest of us.

The fight back is on! Solidarity with the Toronto 900 rallies organized across the country

Alex_Hamilton — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 10:23:33 -0700

Everyone out against police brutality and in solidarity with the Toronto 900! A protest outside police headquarters in every city!

Saturday July 17, 2010 Protest in Quebec City, Montreal and in many Canadian cities

The events of the past week in Toronto have been unprecedented in Canadian history. Over 900 people were arrested, the biggest mass arrests ever in Canada, for daring to protest against the destructive policies of the G20.

Protesters and local residents were subjected to violent baton attacks, snatch squads, tear gas and rubber bullets. Sleeping people have been pulled from their homes at gunpoint in the middle of the night. Many have been beaten. People who have been arrested have been strip-searched and held in cages, facing long delays in obtaining legal support. We have heard numerous accounts of sexual abuse by police from women who were arrested. Journalists have been punched, arrested and had their equipment broken.

This is what a police state looks like!

Linchpin — Sun, 27 Jun 2010 20:10:50 -0700

Editorial
June 27, 2010

We live in a political and economic system based on constant violence; exploitation of workers, destruction of the environment, war, racist police killings, hunger and homelessness in an environment of plenty, denial of land and self-government to indigenous peoples, plundering of the resources of the Third World and the arming of repressive regimes. This weekend, this quiet violence continued within the G8 and G20 summits. G20 leaders agreed to halve national deficits by 2013; The expected cuts to educational, social services and healthcare programmes will no doubt continue to be carried out on the backs of workers and poor people.

Free the Toronto 500!

Linchpin — Sun, 27 Jun 2010 15:13:30 -0700

Breaking news: CP24 now reports the total number of G20 arrests is 604. 253 today alone according to police.

Appeal for broad political support for the G20 arrestees
By The Movement Defence Committee

June 27, 2010, 3:00pm

The MDC’s Summit Legal Support Project is appealing to the movements it supports to mobilize a show of political strength and solidarity for the nearly 500 people arrested in the last four days. The Toronto Police and the ISU appear to have lost control of their ‘prisoner processing center’, denying arrestees meaningful and timely access to counsel while beating and arresting those peacefully protesting their detention outside.

Despite assurances to the contrary, only a handful of people have been released, including those held for many hours without charge. Arrestees are given incorrect information about the bail process they will be subjected to, and friends and family members gather hours early at the courthouse, located far from the city center and inaccessible via transit. Our lawyers call in and are told that there is no one available to make decisions or wait for hours at the detention centre, only to be denied access to their clients. Almost 500 people are in custody and we know from experience that the vast majority of those charges will disappear and yet the cell doors remain shut.

We need to step it up and build a political response. We need many more voices – especially prominent ones – to say that the abuse and incompetence at 629 Eastern Avenue must stop. We must demand that all levels of government take control of the police forces under their command. We need to ensure that courts and crown attorneys act to enforce constitutional rights rather than collude in their violation.

Free the Toronto 500!

The Movement Defence Committee

G20 prompts expanded police power... permanently

Linchpin — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 18:29:57 -0700

By Paul M.

The global protectors of capitalism will descend on Toronto this June to discuss how to best increase corporate profit rates while simultaneously selling belt tightening measures to societies already ravaged by a global recession. Imperialist wars, global poverty, and environmental destruction are massive problems that affect billions of people across the globe. How can we be sure that such important people as the leaders of the G20 will be protected from the vindictive mob of labor activists, environmentalists, immigration rights and anti-poverty organizations who will seek to hold them accountable?

An Interview with Laura Whitehorn on The War Before

Linchpin — Sun, 04 Apr 2010 18:44:46 -0700

By Sara Falconer
4strugglemag

The War Before: The True Life Story of Becoming a Black Panther, Keeping the Faith in Prison, & Fighting for Those Left Behind. By Safiya Bukhari. Edited by Laura Whitehorn. Preface by Wonda Jones. Foreword by Angela Y. Davis. Afterword by Mumia Abu-Jamal.

In 1968, Safiya Bukhari witnessed an NYPD officer harassing a Black Panther for selling the organization’s newspaper on a Harlem street corner. The young pre-med student felt compelled to intervene in defense of the Panther’s First Amendment right; she ended up handcuffed and thrown into the back of a police car.