“I’m here to deal with what I see as really impressive about this particular public relations trick that was performed by our boss here.”
Beverly Bane, a professor at the University of Toronto and a member of the No Pride in Police Coalition, said in front of a room full of reporters and senior Toronto police officers on Wednesday.
“This has nothing to do with the Black Community. In fact, the Black Community never apologized. Nor did I think you were apologizing to the Black Community. You apologized to your ranks, “Bane said.
Bain’s comments were directed at Toronto Police Chief James Rammer, who apologized just minutes earlier after the release of the city’s racially motivated force.
“[You were apologizing] for a series of information that we have been telling you for decades, “Bane said in a more than five-minute address.
Data released on Wednesday, which focused on 2020, shows that, among other things, racists in Toronto are 20 to 60 percent overrepresented among those who have faced violence in their interactions with police in 2020.
In addition, the report found that blacks were 230 percent more likely to force a police officer to point a firearm at them when they appeared to be unarmed than whites.
READ MORE: Toronto Police Race Data for Use of Force Highlighted Undressing Demands
The data, presented today, was commissioned as part of the Ontario Government’s Anti-Racism Act, which in 2017 directed all provincial police across the province to begin collecting race-based data on incidents of using force to reporting ‘.
The survey found that 39% of the people against whom Toronto police used force were black. Moreover, only 24% of the people the Toronto police interacted with this year were black, meaning that 220% of blacks were overrepresented in law enforcement.
Rammer acknowledged that police had not done enough to correct the systemic racism that existed in the service, and apologized to the racist communities in the city.
“As police chief and on behalf of the service, I regret and apologize unreservedly. The release of this data will cause pain for many. Your concerns have deep roots that go beyond the publication of today’s report. We need to improve; we will do better, “he said.
In response, Bain rejected the apology and called on the chief not to provide specific examples of how the Office plans to correct the injustice shown in the report.
“You are not telling us how you will stop the violence against us. You have not told us how you will stop the killing of our people. You did not say how we can be sure that we can walk the streets safely without being stopped. You didn’t say anything about that. In fact, what we are witnessing will continue, “Bain said.
“Chief Ramer, we do not accept your apology.
Speaking to the Toronto Police Headquarters after the press conference, activist Desmond Cole dismissed Bain’s remarks, questioning the legitimacy of the internal report’s findings and saying a police investigation “would not reduce it”.
“We do not want the police to investigate each other and then tell us the outcome of their internal process and investigation. We have been very clear about this for a very, very long time, “Cole said.
“If the only thing we have is the police who say, ‘when there is an individual act of racism in the power of one man, we will take care of it,’ I mean, how does that work for all of us?” Isn’t that why the hell we’re standing here right now? Isn’t that why we’re here today? Because this process is a complete bankruptcy. “
With files from Chris Herhalt
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