PART TWO: CHANGE THE SYSTEM Section One The Impacts of Police and Policing

On the whole, study participants’ reactions to engagement with police ranged from exhaustion at constant experiences of displacement, to anger as a result of a lifetime of harassment, to absolute fear.

As we made our way around the toward them was connected to public they’re breaking your rights, but province, it became clear that safety. it’s your word against theirs, so regardless of demographics or good luck. You’re better off to just regions, both the police, as an A participant experiencing let them do what they’re going institution, and policing, as a set of homelessness summed it up when to do, otherwise they just kick practices, were top of mind for study she recounted a recent interaction the shit out of you and then do it participants. In every community we between her boyfriend and a local anyway. – 175 visited, we learned that there were Royal Canadian Mounted Police very high rates of interaction between (RCMP) officer: “Just about five days It is important to note that police and people who lived in public ago, they came to our camp and they particularly in smaller communities, space, with many people reporting called [name] a worthy target (181),” where people are known to one that police approached them more she said. “And he was like, ‘How am another and the police, a single than once a day. For the people we I a worthy target? I live in a fucking officer can have a profound impact on talked to, these interactions were tent.’” the lives of the individuals with whom only experienced as helpful in a they interact. In some communities, Despite the concerns people had small minority of circumstances. there were officers whose names with police behaviour, few had ever On the whole, study participants’ became familiar to us within hours made a formal complaint. Many reactions to engagement with police of arriving because participants and participants expressed that they ranged from exhaustion at constant service providers alike felt targeted are resigned to the fact that they experiences of displacement, to and harassed by these officers. are not considered credible when anger as a result of a lifetime of However, we need to place those they speak out against police due harassment, to absolute fear. individualized experiences in the to their homelessness, reliance on context of a set of institutional As they attempted to survive with government assistance, use of illicit policing practices in BC. The striking minimal access to resources, people substances, involvement in sex work, similarity and continuity of stories we who took part in this study found it and criminal histories. heard across the province attests to difficult to make sense of how the this idea. Most of the time they don’t even level of police attention directed ask, they just tell you to get up against the car. And I mean, yeah,

44 Pivot Legal Society In BC, “the police” comprise several FINDINGS RELATED TO POLICE RCMP officers are only one institutions. Eleven municipalities Current policing practices are element of an all-encompassing are policed by their own municipal not creating safety for people and oppressive network of police forces; the rest of the province experiencing homelessness, people policing that also includes bylaw is policed by the RCMP, the largest who use substances, people scraping officers and private security police body operating in BC. The by in the grey economy (the informal guards; Metro Vancouver Transit Police economy in which labour standards • Indigenous people living in also provide cross-jurisdictional do not apply and which serves as a deep poverty, particularly policing services on transit property crucial form of income generation those who live in public space throughout the Lower Mainland. As for many people experiencing or consume alcohol in public, part of this project, we visited two homelessness or using substances, are especially over-policed municipalities policed by municipal this includes things like collecting and routinely subjected to police forces and eight municipalities recyclables and panhandling), or the arbitrary punishment and policed by the RCMP. broader communities in which they detention, especially in northern Our sample size does not allow live. Specifically: communities; for a full, structured comparison • in the context of longstanding • people affected by over-policing, of policing experiences in different public health efforts to discrimination, harassment, jurisdictions within BC, and it is reduce rates of Human destruction or seizure of beyond the scope of this study to Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) belongings, detention without offer a point-by-point comparison of and Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) charge, or use of force by police differences in practices between the among people who use drugs do not feel that there is recourse various police forces that operate and an unprecedented opioid available to them; and in BC. However, some key issues crisis, police are routinely • across BC, regardless of seem to be more prevalent in RCMP disrupting harm reduction jurisdiction, people who took jurisdictions, which are detailed in activities and contributing to less part in this study are extremely this chapter. safe substance use practices; distrustful of police and most • for participants living in public would be reluctant to call the space, municipal police and

PROJECT INCLUSION 45 police if they were in danger or The cops were going to [take my had been a victim of a crime. harm reduction supplies] and I said that I work with these guys [the POLICE INTERFERE WITH HARM street nurses], making sure that REDUCTION ACTIVITIES people have this shit, and then they left me alone after that. The Despite a strong commitment to street nurses tell folks to say that harm reduction at the provincial they’re working for them so they level,89 police in communities are harassed less by police and across BC continue to disrupt harm bylaw. – 105 (focus group) reduction activities. In many cases, policing practices misalign with local One woman explained that because health authority initiatives aimed at police search suspected substance reducing new HIV and HCV infections users for harm reduction supplies, and preventing overdose deaths. people often hide or discard supplies less safely. This leads to harms for We learned that in several “That is a hell of a lot of the individuals who are forced to communities, harm reduction money to put out harm use less safely. It also means harm supplies provided by health reduction supplies are more likely reduction supplies just authorities and local service providers to be left outdoors or improperly to have the cops take are being seized or destroyed by disposed of. Plus, health authorities them, it’s stupid because police. One man told us: have to purchase more supplies than health gives them out.” Police take all my supplies all the would otherwise be necessary. “That – 221 time. I was doing what I thought I is a hell of a lot of money to put out had to do and just because I had harm reduction supplies just to have supplies doesn’t necessarily mean the cops take them (221),” she said. that I had drugs on me all the “It’s stupid because health gives them time, either, because I didn’t. Once out.” in a while I had drugs on me, but In some cases, participants reported that is [neither] here [nor] there. that the police in their community are That is irrelevant. – 165 inconsistent in how they handle harm Police seizure of harm reduction reduction supplies. supplies points to a clear disconnect There are times where I’ve had between provincial health policy and a pocket full of dope, and crack policing practices. On the one hand, pipes, and speed pipes, and shit people who use substances are on me. And they ask me if I have actively encouraged to access clean any pipes on me and I tell them harm reduction supplies and on the yes. And you know, sometimes other hand, carrying those supplies is they smash them, sometimes resulting in punitive responses from they just put them on the ground police. and walk away and say, ‘When I’m One focus group participant gone around the corner, you pick explained that police seizure of harm it up.’ – 28 reduction supplies makes it difficult What is clear is that despite for people who use substances participants’ commitment to using to engage in peer outreach. He substances more safely, seizing harm explained that local health nurses reduction supplies does not deter must educate people who use substance use. drugs not only about effective harm reduction practices but also how to However, as one man explains, avoid having supplies taken by police. seizing these health care supplies does cause measurable harm,

89 The province supported Insite, North America’s first supervised consumption site, was the first province to declare a public health emergency in April 2016 in response to the mounting death toll from opioid overdoses, supported overdose prevention sites operating without S. 56.1 exemptions from the federal government, created a new Ministry of Mental Health and Addiction in 2017, and supported the introduction of a new Overdose Emergency Response Centre.

46 Pivot Legal Society regardless of the lengths that most Police Presence and Access to Safe In one RCMP jurisdiction, we had the participants will go to secure safe Consumption Services opportunity to witness the impact supplies. One participant revealed In some communities, people who of over-policing outside the OPS to us that he contracted HCV use drugs now have access to firsthand. The site in this community because he was forced to share harm Overdose Prevention Sites (OPSs) is only open a few hours each day. reduction supplies with his partner. where they are able to consume One weekday afternoon, we were “[The police] pulled us over, ran our illicit substances in the presence of having a conversation with a service names, searched us, and taken stuff someone trained to provide rapid provider who was explaining that like that before (459a),” he told us overdose intervention without fear the police often patrolled the area about police checks that resulted in of arrest. Not only does this mean around the nearby OPS, when a client having their harm reduction supplies that a person can get immediate chimed in and told us that the police confiscated. When asked about medical intervention in the event of were out front arresting someone whether he had to reuse or share an overdose, it also means that they right at that moment. We walked equipment because of such police can take steps to prevent overdose in over to the site expecting things to seizures, he replied, “Yeah. I ended the first place, including using more be wrapping up by the time we got up contracting Hep C because of— slowly, and in some cases, receiving there. Instead, we arrived on the we’ve had to share equipment and assistance from peers as needed. scene to find a police car, lights on, she had it and didn’t know.” Despite parked directly outside the OPS in their efforts to find and purchase The success of the OPS model the middle of the two-lane street. more supplies from local drug stores, in saving lives is undeniable. For There was an old car parked directly they were unable to secure sufficient instance, between December in front of the door to the site with all supplies to meet their needs. 2016 and March 2017, OPSs across four doors and the trunk open. Two the province saw approximately uniformed officers were searching Distribution of harm reduction 66,600 visits, 481 overdoses, and the vehicle. supplies is one of the most widely zero fatalities.91 Even more striking, accepted measures that public between December 25, 2016 and By the time we arrived the search was health officials can take to prevent October 9, 2017, the grassroots, well underway. Based on its contents, 90 blood borne infections. Choosing largely peer-run Overdose Prevention it seemed likely that someone lived to carry and use clean supplies is an Society running in Vancouver’s in the car. The officers worked slowly, important step that most people who Downtown Eastside alone had removing item after item, placing it use drugs are eager to take to protect 108,803 visits, 255 overdoses, on the street and sidewalk directly their health and that of other people. and zero fatalities.92 Despite the outside of the OPS. We watched life-saving feats carried out in the events unfold for nearly an hour. Police officers across BC should be During that time, we saw several actively promoting the use of harm OPSs throughout BC, heavy police presence in the vicinity of these sites people come around the corner reduction supplies and encouraging toward the site, see the police, and drug users to hold on to used can and does make people reluctant to use these life-saving services. turn and walk away. We also watched supplies until they can dispose of one woman leave the site in a state them safely. If we are to achieve One woman described the police of extreme distress because she saw the goal of minimizing harms, the presence around the OPS in her the police outside and was fearful types of police actions described community: “There is a safe injection that they were there for her. by participants, including actively site downtown and the cops are not obstructing the delivery, use, and allowed to arrest you on that site The negative impacts of heavy police proper disposal of harm reduction whatsoever…outside of there…the presence around OPSs and other equipment, cannot continue. These cops are still harassing people…they places where people access harm practices must be recognized as a just drive in the parking lot and harass reduction equipment and support clear threat to public health and to people (100).” An officer known to are compounded for the significant the health and safety of people who community members “likes to hang number of study participants who use drugs. out there,” she added. She told us have red zones imposed by either she has used the safe injection site— police or the courts. Red zones are designed to serve as a safe space geographic areas that people are and point of community support for prohibited from visiting by court or people who use drugs—only once. police order. People do not have to

90 “Harm Reduction Guidelines”, BC Centre for Disease Control (2018), online: http://www.bccdc.ca/health-professionals/clinical-resources/ harm-reduction/canadian-best-practices. 91 “The BC Public Health Opioid Overdose Emergency: March 2017 Update”, BC Centre for Disease Control (17 March 2017) at 14, online: http:// www.bccdc.ca/resource-gallery/Documents/Educational%20Materials/Epid/Other/Public%20Surveillance%20Report_2017_03_17.pdf. 92 Heather Mann et al, “Findings and Analysis for Overdose Prevention Society”, Data For Good (2018) at 12-13, online: https://vancouver.datafor- good.ca/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2018/06/OPS-Report-Small.pdf.

PROJECT INCLUSION 47 “You’re avoiding them [the police] all the time, so it pushes you further into like—into hiding, basically, and you’re going to unsafe spaces or wherever, really.” – 313

have been convicted of a crime to One woman experiencing to reinstate an exemption for Insite, be subject to a red zone. If a harm homelessness described being North America’s first supervised reduction hub falls inside a person’s disrupted by police while using. injection site. Recognizing the red zone, they could be charged with circumstances of people who use a breach of a court order for being I…actually hadn’t had anything in drugs while entrenched in poverty, in the vicinity of these services.93 two days because I was sleeping. the Court affirmed that fear of police See Part 2.2 for a more complete So I woke up and I went to go can override everyday safety habits. discussion of the application of red get some—I need to get myself This can lead to needle-sharing, zones and their impact on health and unsick. I was so disgustingly sick, hurried injections in clandestine safety. like could barely move. And I was locations such as back alleys, and actually shooting up at that time the use of unsanitary injection One participant explained his ongoing and I had the rig and I had flagged equipment. All of this, the Court difficulty with accessing his local it, I was just about to push it in. acknowledged, can result in severe OPS because of how police enforce And it was like, ‘You are under red zones in his community, despite arrest’ and I looked over my describing a notably positive working shoulder and there’s two white relationship with his Probation Officer cops that came on to me. Two (PO). guys…just like tackled me with the rig in my arm. I was like, ‘I’ll I had to get special permission go in, I’ll go in— just like to get from my PO if I want to go to the myself better first,’ and they’re [local overdose prevention site like, ‘No.’ And so, I had my hand and harm reduction hub] there. on the rig, right. But then they—it So, between certain times Monday was already in my vein. And then through Friday…I had to carry that they bent it. And then pulled it piece of paper on me. So, if I did out. So it kind of turned into like get stopped while in my red zone a fish hook and ripped it out. And I had my papers saying this was it was disgusting. And I grabbed signed by my PO, saying it was it back and pulled the plunger out okay. But a lot of times that didn’t and drank it. And then they’re like matter. They arrested me, took me ‘You’re resisting arrest.’ – 313 in…then it would take me to get a hold of my PO for them to release That experience affects how she uses me out. Oh my God there were now: times when I went all the way back to jail, all the way down here to Keep it really hidden, definitely for [location of cells] and then they sure—like go somewhere where health and safety risks including would release me from [location there’s nobody around…you don’t infection, mismeasurement of of cells] to fucking nothing. – 165 want to do it in public, right. You’re avoiding them [the police] all the substances to be consumed, and Many communities do not have time, so it pushes you further into fatal overdose away from medical 94 an OPS at all, and several are only like—into hiding, basically, and aid. open limited hours each week. As you’re going to unsafe spaces or The relationship between policing a result, many people experiencing wherever, really. – 313 and harm reduction is a matter of life homelessness are still using illicit or death. It is therefore critical that substances in public space. This woman’s experience supports the evidence put before the Supreme police consider the circumstances of Court of Canada in its 2011 decision people who are using drugs and who

93 Marie-Eve Sylvestre et al, “Red Zones and other Spatial Conditions of Release Imposed on Marginalized People in Vancouver”, (2017), online: https://observatoireprofilages.files.wordpress.com/2017/10/vancouver-red-zones-report_2017-10-30.pdf. 94 Canada (Attorney General) v. PHS Community Services Society, 2011 SCC 44 at para 10.

48 Pivot Legal Society do not have access to privacy before federal government has recognized • in some communities, the police reactively responding. that overdoses are medical are often the first responders at emergencies warranting unrestricted an overdose and do not always As one participant living in a access to emergency services and in intervene medically when they municipal police force jurisdiction May 2017, the Good Samaritan Drug arrive on scene; explained, police sometimes use their Overdose Act (GSDOA) became law.95 discretion in ways that build rapport • at times, police interfere with with people who use substances and The GSDOA has been characterized people trying to administer promote public health and safety: as a mechanism to “encourage and naloxone; and protect people who are witnessing • police are perceived to be using It was like 6 o’clock in the an overdose so they can seek help, overdose calls to monitor and morning…I just woke up basically and ultimately, save lives.” The investigate drug users. in the bush, and I had my sleeping law offers some legal protection bag and my dog with me and for people who find themselves One man described his experience all that…I woke up one morning at the scene of an overdose when with police attending an overdose and fixed my morning shot and emergency help arrives, including the incident at his building: the cops rolled up right as I was caller, the person who overdosed, My neighbour OD’d [overdosed] fighting to get it into me. And he and any other bystanders. However, about a year ago. She is now dead, came over and he’s like, ‘Stop.’ He these protections are not absolute. she actually had OD’d, not this was like, ‘Pull it out of your arm.’ Whereas the GSDOA provides time, but another time she OD’d. I Normally I would have just fired it immunity against charges of ran down the hallway, this was like anyway but for whatever reason I simple possession and breaches of three in the morning, I heard the stopped, and I have my dope out conditions where the underlying police kicking her door in and I ran and still I had about half a gram offense is simple possession, it does down the hallway once they got of powder sitting right there. And not protect against outstanding the door open, I said ‘You got it they rolled up and I said, ‘Listen, warrants or against charges and open, is she in there?’ and they are if you take that, I’m going to have breaches related to other offenses.96 to go do something fucked up to like, ‘Yes and she’s OD’d,’ so I ran get it because I’m going to be sick. and grabbed my Narcan kit and I Like I’m going to have to go steal ran down there. I tried to hand it to the officer and she almost like or rob or just do something to get The relationship my fix for the day, right?’ And he took a jump back and said, ‘I can’t understood that kind of, I guess, between policing and take that.’ And she’s like, ‘No, no, and just he said, ‘Okay, I’ll give you harm reduction is a no, no, you can’t administer that.’ 10 minutes to clear out of here, matter of life or death. I said ‘She is on opiate overdose. I we’re going to be back here again can see she is on opioid overdose. and whatever and don’t leave a She is not breathing. She needs mess, take your shit with you.’ So, this.’ And they are like, ‘We have to that was kind of cool actually, that Given that Project Inclusion wait for the ambulance.’ – 239 he didn’t take my dope or charge interviews began two months A respondent in another RCMP me. – 342 before the GSDOA became law jurisdiction also stated that, in and concluded five months after her experience, police actively This type of discretion is the bare it was enacted, it is too soon to prevent other people on scene minimum of what police can do determine the full impact of this from intervening in the event of to promote trust and rapport with legislative change. However, there is an overdose. “If cops are there, if people who use substances while evidence to suggest that the GSDOA anything, they’ll interfere (313),” concurrently protecting public health is misunderstood—both by police she explained, describing how she and safety. and individuals seeking protection and her friends now take it upon under the Act—or that police are themselves to carry and administer Police and Overdose Response deliberately applying it in a way that naloxone (also known by its brand undermines its intended public health In cases where a person does name Narcan), which reverse the purpose. overdose, especially outside of an effects of an opioid overdose. “We OPS or supervised consumption site There are three interrelated issues to don’t even call the ambulance where immediate medical help is on police attendance at overdoses that anymore, or cops, or anything like hand, it is imperative that people feel should be monitored: that…we’ll do the Narcan ourselves that they can call 911 to get help. The

95 SC 2017 c 4. 96 Melanie Webb, “Drug overdose act weakened by limited immunity from prosecution”, The Lawyer’s Daily (12 October 2017), online: https:// www.thelawyersdaily.ca/articles/4827/drug-overdose-act-weakened-by-limited-immunity-from-prosecution.

PROJECT INCLUSION 49 and help each other and bring each federally-sanctioned supervised uses drugs is living with an addiction other back.” consumption sites. Yet many policing and is therefore in need of support. agencies in BC appear to be working A person who deals drugs, on the They do this, she said, because police in misalignment with public health other hand, is a person who needs have “stood in the way and even agencies. One fundamental reason is to be criminally sanctioned. As is cuffed people trying to administer that, despite widespread recognition the case with how we conceptualize Narcan (313).” Asked why they of substance use as a public health what it means to be homeless in don’t call ambulances anymore, issue, the possession of illicit the popular imagination, the way she replied, “It takes a while to get substances remains criminalized. So we conceptualize people who use there. A couple of minutes, like does trafficking those substances, and deal drugs does not hold up usually you can just do it yourself despite the fact that for most users in the real-world, as the real-world right away. And…usually the cops there is no legal way to obtain them. experiences of study participants get there first…there’s cops [in the made clear. Several people who took area]…the cops will be there before This sets up a paradox for people part in this study sell, trade, or share the ambulance arrives…it’s…never who use drugs. A person can use small amounts of the drugs they use. helpful.” a substance safely and without Procuring drugs is a way of helping fear of arrest once they are inside out friends, of benefiting from With the introduction of the GSDOA, a supervised consumption facility, economies of scale, and of financing the government recognized that but it is impossible to secure one’s own substance use. police interference at the scene those substances and transport of an overdose, whether actual or them to the site without fear of In some cases, this informal economy perceived, can deter people from criminal sanctions. As described is exploited by police, resulting in seeking help. in participants’ stories earlier in the deliberate criminalization of this chapter, this situation is made the very people the public health Across the province, police need to even more precarious by the fact response to the opioid overdose embrace the spirit of the GSDOA that police appear to be lingering crisis is meant to protect. While so that fear of arrest no longer has outside of OPSs and monitoring their conducting research for this project, a chilling effect on calls to 911. This clientele. we were contacted by a service means treating overdoses as medical provider who let us know that several emergencies. In the event that police This contradiction is most obvious residents of the low-barrier shelter are the first emergency responders in relation to simple possession, but where he worked had been charged on scene, they should be intervening also points to the broader issue of with trafficking fentanyl. All of the in a medical capacity only (such as criminalizing supply while attempting residents identified as being addicted administering naloxone) and not to mitigate harms related to use. to fentanyl and were living in abject using the call as an opportunity to poverty in a homeless shelter. They investigate or interrogate individuals One woman who was chastised for had each been approached, over a who have called for help. asking if anyone had cocaine for sale period of months, by undercover inside the local OPS summed up the RCMP officers who asked them to In addition, police need to recognize disconnect. the experience and expertise of drug find them fentanyl. As a result of their users who medically intervene during I’m talked down to…at the needle own need to finance their substance overdoses. All police departments exchange down there. I said, use and/or willingness to help out should also be encouraged to what the fuck [are] you [service another drug user in need, these adopt policies of non-attendance providers]…doing here…[letting] people are now facing trafficking in the event that overdoses occur, people come in here and do charges including newly increased jail 97 intervening only at the explicit needles and I’m not allowed to ask time for fentanyl trafficking. request of Emergency Medical for something, I said what the fuck While conducting interviews, we Services (such as in the event of [is] this place open for, then? – 13 heard similar stories, including this violence or a fatality). In the popular conversation and one from another RCMP jurisdiction: public imagination about substance Prohibition and Harm Reduction: A The trafficking charge was, a girl use, our tendency to categorize Fundamental Conflict come up to me just like you, and people in binaries produces a false she said ‘can you help get some As a province, we have invested conceptual distinction between speed’…So I get the dope, I give in evidence-based programs that people who use drugs and people it to her, get the money, give it to approach substance use from a public who deal drugs. Even among people him, that’s it. If she had asked me health perspective, including the who believe that addiction is a to fix her bike, if she asked me to provision of harm reduction supplies, public health issue, conventional find her puppy, if she asked me grassroots OPSs, and supporting thinking goes that a person who

97 “BC Courts’ response to fentanyl”, Provincial Court of BC (15 August 2017), online: http://www.provincialcourt.bc.ca/enews/enews-15-08-2017.

50 Pivot Legal Society to paint her garage door I’d have factor for HIV and HCV infection,98 and which does not have negative done it for her and that’s what increases the risk of overdose upon consequences, intended or not, for she asked me to do and I did. Two release,99 and increases their risk of drug users and the community at weeks later they come up with a sustained homelessness.100 large. warrant and charged me with a trafficking. I fucking put up such a In some jurisdictions, police regularly Alcohol and Harm Reduction fuss all the way to the cop shop, confiscate illicit drugs and release Many of the ways in which policing I’m not a drug dealer…So I made a people without charge. On the undermines harm reduction flow big mistake about it and the cops surface, this appears to be a gentler from the legal status of those know I’m not a drug dealer and yet approach to drug law enforcement substances. However, in some I’m still charged with it because because people do not end up communities we visited, alcohol was there’s one indiscretion. – 208 facing criminal charges. The lack of documentation also means the most frequently used substance that official rates of drug-related among people who live in public enforcement can appear relatively space. low despite high levels of interaction Policing organizations Alcohol is a legal substance, but between police and people who use alcohol addiction is a serious medical and individual officers drugs. need to approach issue and alcohol withdrawal can interactions with people Along with putting people into a be life-threatening. In some cases, people whose alcohol is confiscated in possession of illicit desperate situation if they are in withdrawal, the confiscation of end up in withdrawal while living substances in a way that substances creates drug debts and outdoors. Alcohol withdrawal is a recognizes the chronic can increase danger and violence on medical condition that can have and relapsing nature of the streets. serious negative consequences addiction, and which when entered into without adequate I’ve gotten into debt, and I’ve supports, including medical does not have negative been beat up because police have intervention if necessary.101 When consequences, intended taken drugs that I had taken from police restrict consumption based or not, for drug users one person and was bringing to on the fact that it is occurring in and the community at another person. And I’ve even told public, they risk interfering with large. the cops, ‘You guys are going to measures people may be required to get me killed for this. And then take in order to stay well. The most it’s—I mean you’re not even going severe type of alcohol withdrawal, to do any paperwork, you’re going known as delirium tremens (DTs), is to throw it on the ground and a medical emergency. Symptoms Ultimately, criminalization and stomp it into dust and it’s going to for a person experiencing DTs harm reduction are incompatible get me killed.’ And they just laugh, include heart disturbances, seizures, approaches to addressing a complex they don’t care. I mean, I shouldn’t extreme agitation and confusion, issue. As long as the possession of say ‘they,’ because some of them and hallucinations—all of which are certain substances is illegal and there are good. – 175 dangerous in any context, and even are no legal avenues for securing more so when living in public space, the substances on which they are While the move toward not without supports.102 dependent, people who took part charging people with possession in this study will continue to face is positive, policing organizations The over-policing of people who unnecessary risks to their health as a and individual officers need to live in public space and use alcohol result of a toxic, unregulated supply, approach interactions with people is having devastating effects on and the threat of criminal sanctions. in possession of illicit substances in people’s well-being and their Criminalization then puts people at a way that recognizes the chronic relationships with police. One person risk of incarceration, which is a risk and relapsing nature of addiction, we interviewed told us that the

98 Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network, “HIV and Hepatitis C in Prisons”, (2008), online: http://librarypdf.catie.ca/PDF/P48/HIVandhepatitisCinpris- ons.pdf. 99 Fiona G. Kouyoumdjian et al, “Mortality over 12 years of follow-up in people admitted to provincial custody in Ontario: a retrospective cohort study” (2016) 4:2 CMAJ Open at 153, online: 10.9778/cmajo.20150098. 100 Stephen Gaetz & Bill O’Grady, “The Missing Link: Discharge Planning, Incarceration and Homelessness”, The John Howard Society of Ontario (2006), online: http://homelesshub.ca/sites/default/files/The_Missing_Link_-_Final_Report_June_2007.pdf. 101 The National Clinical Guideline Centre, “Alcohol Use Disorders: Diagnosis and Clinical Management of Alcohol-Related Physical Complica- tions”, The Royal College of Physicians (2010) at 15, online: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0047849/pdf/PubMedHealth_ PMH0047849.pdf. 102 The National Clinical Guideline Centre.

PROJECT INCLUSION 51 police frequently dump their liquor. because you dumped my shit…it’s are seemingly without meaningful “We want to cry when they do that a vicious cycle. – 102 oversight or management, that (108),” she said, particularly in cases is a departmental issue. In RCMP when the police are disposing of Given the level of alcohol jurisdictions the issue is bigger than the only bottle they have to stave dependence that an individual may any one detachment. Officers are off the debilitating effects of alcohol be experiencing, the confiscation of sometimes moved from community withdrawal.103 When we asked the alcohol may also lead to a situation to community, leading to a belief, interviewee if she felt the police where that person has no choice but justified or not, on the part of understood her circumstances, “I to resort to non-potable alcohol such participants in this study, that when doubt it,” she replied. as hand sanitizer or rubbing alcohol. an officer develops too adversarial a relationship with the local population Two of our focus groups included While it is illegal to drink in public, it or engages in misconduct, they participants in alcohol harm reduction is important to recognize that there are simply moved to another town, programs. Some belong to a drinker’s are harm reduction implications where the cycle begins again. when alcohol is seized from very co-op, wherein members pay a marginalized and dependent drinkers monthly deposit in exchange for a In a number of cases, people report who don’t have the option of drinking quantity of homebrewed alcohol. that they are often searched during inside a private home or licensed Participants reported that this frequent stops by police. They do not establishment. Some participants program had very positive impacts feel that they can say no. reported that even unopened alcohol on their lives. Others participated in is seized by police. Managed Alcohol Programs (MAPs), Interviewer: where participants receive a certain They search you? An Indigenous participant with a amount of safe alcohol at regular history of alcoholism going back to intervals. These programs have Interviewee: early childhood described a recent proven harm reduction benefits They ask me to empty my occurrence in his life. including increased access to pockets, if they can look in my housing, decreased non-beverage backpack. If you say no, you’re We had two bottles of unopened alcohol (NBA) use, reductions in obstructing justice. wine, we are waiting for hospital admissions, and reduced Interviewer: somebody…Yeah, haven’t cracked rates of police contacts.104 it. The cops just roll up and then Do they ever threaten you with that? they’re like ‘Oh, let me see that QUALITY OF LIFE POLICING AND wine.’ They just dumped both on TARGETING PEOPLE WHO LIVE IN Interviewee: us. I was like ‘What, it’s not even PUBLIC SPACE Oh, yes. Yes. And I think if you open.’ We’re not doing nothing. ask that question you find that’s We’re just waiting and they just A consistent theme among study a normal answer, or at least for a dumped the booze on us. – 102 participants who live in public space and rely on low-barrier services, like certain percentage of us. – 318 He explained that losing alcohol soup kitchens, is that every element Part of Pivot’s legal programming has serious effects on his life and of their lives in monitored. Meeting includes rights education. Our his relationships in the community. even their most basic needs such as organization produces wallet-sized People complain about panhandling, sleeping and eating is complicated by “know your rights” cards that include he told us. But the police “are the police presence. a written statement for police and are reason…we are doing the cycle all intended to be used during an arrest. over again,” he said, describing the In one RCMP jurisdiction, the majority When we arrived in one small town, tough hustle of asking for change of people who took part in this study we were excited to see that a local after police confiscate his alcohol: talked about a specific bicycle officer they felt was targeting them. The service provider was handing out the I try to be polite and courteous officer was even disrupting access card. That excitement faded when and stuff. And when people to food services, doing patrols in the we learned that the cards are not complain about [panhandling], soup kitchen (294). changing police practice in this RCMP the police—the reason why—like jurisdiction. you know, they dumped our shit. While specific officers came Interviewee: And now we’ve got to go back out up repeatedly as the source of Like I had that little paper thing, there, get caught stealing, or you harassment in some communities, But… know—why am I doing this? Oh, the issue is larger than any one “bad apple.” If problem officers

103 The National Clinical Guideline Centre. 104 “The Canadian Managed Alcohol Program Study (CMAPS)”, Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research, University of Victoria, online: https://www.uvic.ca/research/centres/cisur/projects/map/index.php.

52 Pivot Legal Society Interviewer: Your conditions paper?

Interviewee: No.

Interviewer: The statement for police?

Interviewee: Yeah…The [service provider] is giving them out. Nope, they took that too. – 102

In January 2017, Ontario released new rules restricting the practice of arbitrary police street checks, known as carding, in part due to the disproportionate negative impact on the Black community and other communities of colour in that province.105 “Know your rights” card

Among participants in this study, the there is no winning, there is no place It’s ridiculous. They were on us use of arbitrary stops was perceived for them to go.” this morning at 6 o’clock this as less formalized than “carding” morning. They were on us in camp operations in Ontario but no less Interviewer: this morning. Dead asleep, not damaging. Many participants in And have you ever been able to bugging anybody and they come smaller communities explained that use a tent or anything? and harassed us and told me that there was no need for the police it was because somebody was Interviewee: to ask them for ID during a stop causing a disturbance. Everybody No. because all of the local officers in the whole camp is asleep. The already knew their names, offering Interviewer: only one causing a disturbance them no privacy. For the people who No? Is there anywhere you feel was that cop. They say they don’t took part in this study, the reality of you could set up a tent if you want have protocol…they don’t have living in public space means that the to? to make a quota but you watch challenge of needing to find places to it in this town and you can tell sleep, store belongings, and simply Interviewee: that’s not true because come spend time is compounded by having Not here, no. the end of the month, they’re to constantly avoid police. writing everybody up for nothing, Interviewer: absolutely nothing. – 135 Several participants described the No, they would just…? effects of having nowhere to go that Participants described the process as is free from police engagement. Interviewee: an unending chase that completely “There’s no place that I can sleep Destroy it. wears them down without resulting during the day (74),” one person in any real change in their lives or in Interviewer: said. “Cops wake you up, people call the community at large. Yeah. So, nobody here sleeps in a the cops when they see somebody tent? sleeping. It’s just crazy.” It’s horrible, I mean people are off on a trail, where you would never Interviewee: Another participant explained the even see them, they are certainly No. – 395 police presence in her community not bothering anybody, why are this way: “You see them riding up and In some communities with a you using all those resources for down by the boulevards, harassing larger, more organized homeless police to go through the bush, the same people, ‘Take down your population, policing of people living search for them, find them, tarp (252),’” she said. “It seems like in public space is recognized as being ‘Okay you are two hours past the 106 more systematized. deadline, your tent should be

105 Akwasi Owusu-Bempah, “Ontario’s ‘ban’ on carding isn’t really a ban at all”, CBC News (18 January 2017), online: http://www.cbc.ca/news/opin- ion/ontario-carding-ban-1.3939558. 106 Many municipalities have bylaws that allow for camping during particular hours in some places.

PROJECT INCLUSION 53 taken down.’ Really? I don’t get it, it’s like a cat and mouse game and it doesn’t seem right. – 252

One participant explained how constant displacement feels as a person who is experiencing homelessness:

Like you don’t belong here, like you’re a second-class citizen that there’s no room for you even in a spot where there’s bugs and birds and thorns and it smells bad and nobody wants to come near the spot except I’m not allowed to be there. You know, like there’s a parking lot and you could park your car there and it could leak oil and antifreeze, drunk people can come there and piss or throw up, but I’m such a piece of garbage I am not allowed to sit there and that’s how it feels. – 208

The BC Supreme Court has recognized that the constant movement and displacement of people who are homeless exacerbates their already vulnerable positions and has a serious negative effect on their psychological and/or physical integrity.107

The Court noted that routine displacement also undermines the ability of service providers to locate and provide aid to their clients who are homeless. In light of these findings, the Court ruled that bylaws prohibiting the overnight camping of homeless people in public spaces are allowed to spend time anywhere, everything. Every time they see unconstitutional, while concluding most participants in this study me, ripping all my shit apart. Back that there is a legitimate need for described the regularity with which then I had a little bit more than a people to shelter and rest during the all of their belongings were taken backpack. I had a suitcase and a day. and destroyed by police and bylaw duffle bag and shit. I had some officers. stuff and they would go through Despite this, police continue to it all the time and take my meds… displace people on a daily, or even Routine confiscations contribute to You get everything back and as hourly, basis in municipalities across the frustration and sheer exhaustion soon as you do that, they are the province, with participants that people face when they do not taking everything again and you consistently confirming the harms have access to a home or consistent are back to square one and then identified in the aforementioned space in which they and their you got to fight to get everything case. belongings are welcome. back so it is like a losing battle. I was constantly angry and no My space was limited where I Seizure of Belongings wonder I had a fucking attitude could go so I always interacted against the cops, I wonder why Along with the challenge of being with them. It was a gong show. awoken, moved along, and not They are always searching me and

107 Abbotsford (City) v. Shantz, 2015 BCSC 1909 at paras 209 and 276.

54 Pivot Legal Society that is. They didn’t treat me very disposing of all their belongings, Disrupting Income Generation nicely. – 472 they began carrying medication People engage in a variety of with them at all times. She told us income generating activities to get One couple we met in an RCMP that they now carry their weekend jurisdiction described the devastating by, sometimes without access to methadone prescription with them at even meager rates of government loss of their camp and all of their all times because police officers have belongings earlier that week. The assistance. Participants reported that previously confiscated it. When the they are often heavily policed while woman, who is HIV-positive and prescription is taken from them, they identifies as having a significant attempting to generate income, go into withdrawal. Asked what she including activities such as collecting intellectual disability, told the story does in that situation, she replied, “I from her perspective. recyclables. “Every time you open will sit at emergency and hopefully your eyes you got to worry about the they’ll help you (343).” The next day we moved it up police, right (28),” one person told us there, and then we weren’t on Other participants in this study of his experiences collecting bottles his land anymore, and then [the raised the loss of prescription for cash. property owner] seen our tent go medication due to police searches Panhandlers also report being heavily up and he shook his head and he and confiscation as well. got the cops again that day. The policed in some communities: cops came again that day and said They went through everything all I’ve probably got like 300 or no, you can’t be here, you can’t be the time. Like they had no right 400 fines that I will never pay. anywhere around here, you guys doing that either but what are you Basically, I’m just waiting for the have to go to the shelter if you going to do? Me fight the law? warrant to go out and fucking put don’t have a place to live. And he They took all my meds all the me in jail for these unpaid fines, said you got to get out of here, so time…Then I would have to wait right? I probably have $4,000 or we started packing our stuff up a month because I wouldn’t get it $5,000 dollars in fines just for slowly and bringing it up the hill. replaced like I just got them taken panhandling…I haven’t even made It’s hard to move all that stuff, your by the cops. I come here and try that much in panhandling. – 58 house. to get a…like refill and they tell me I have to wait until my prescription The effects of police presence And so, we were getting half of it ran out. – 472 and harassment can be especially up there and then we came back, profound for people who make we were bringing our stuff to our money by engaging in sex work, even friends, and we came back, our though selling sex is not against the tent was all slashed up and stuff law. was in the river, just thrown there. “I probably have $4,000 We could see it, it was not gone or $5,000 dollars in fines Interviewer: but all soaking wet. just for panhandling…I Well, do the cops ever stop you from working in this area? So, we had some of our stuff haven’t even made that anyway, so we went even further much in panhandling.” Interviewee: down the river, hoping that they – 58 Yeah, they try. couldn’t see us, right, and that our cat would. We didn’t have a tent or Interviewer: anything, we just made something They try, what do they do? with a tarp and then they came People who took part in this study Interviewee: again that day. We were out are living with a host of medical getting our medicine and we had Well, they come and they tell you conditions including addiction, to get the fuck out or they say we groceries and we saw it all over chronic pain, mental health issues, the riverbank. They took whatever know what you are doing, here HIV, HCV, heart disease, and is a warning, we won’t be so nice else we had and got rid of it in the cancer. The confiscation or loss of garbage or whatever. They threw next time, or they just straight out prescription medication has serious grab you, put you in the back of out our cat food too…they threw health and safety implications. It may it out, he had to get food from the car and then basically they’ve seem obvious to point out that police been watching you or they have somewhere, and they got rid of all must be cognizant of the effect that that. – 343 someone who ratted out on you confiscations have on people who are or they just know, because they both ill and without access to storage Her partner explained that on know what you are doing, it’s a facilities or a home, but as many of past occasions, they had kept small town, right, it is what it is. – our participants affirmed, it bears prescriptions at their camp, but after 416 repeating. they were lost in the process of police

PROJECT INCLUSION 55 When asked if she continues to work rights to security of the person care if it’s day or night—you will even when she is harassed by police, under s. 7 of the Charter. The get ticketed. I’ve seen them walk she simply said “I have to.” Court recognized that the ability to past a guy that was just napping communicate is an essential tool for in the park, obviously he had a We also asked whether police sex workers that can decrease risks to house and parked his car there and presence affects her safety because their health and safety.109 was napping on his lunch break, she has to get into cars more quickly; and hassle and chase away the she said “Always.” Communication allows sex workers homeless that are sitting there. I to negotiate wages and terms get chased away, I get fined, I get In a larger RCMP jurisdiction with a (including the use of condoms or harassed. – 332 (focus group) well-known stroll, a woman explained safe houses) and screen clients who how police use their presence to might be intoxicated or prone to Another participant from the disperse women who are working violence. Police across the province same community explained that by scaring away their clients, who must honour the spirit of that holding onto possessions is almost are criminalized under Canada’s decision and refrain from impeding impossible because of bylaw 108 prostitution laws. the tools that sex workers rely on for enforcement activity: their own health and safety. Two nights ago, this is where all Sometimes they’ll just come the working girls go…the cops, Bylaw Officers and Private Security up, and if you are like, just over they’re just parked right here—like there, they’ll grab your shit and right where we are in this street. Participants noted that displacement, once it’s in the van, you’re done. And they just put their cherries disruption of income generation, Yeah, if you’re getting coffee [red emergency lights] on—like and seizure of belongings by police is or going to the bathroom or not pulling anybody over, but just amplified by local bylaw officers and anything it doesn’t matter… leave their cherries on just to kind private security. Anything and everything, like of disperse anything. – 313 bikes, work clothes, like my ex For years I slept outside one actually works at a day job, he is a This does not mean that women of the churches in town and a construction guy and they threw stop working. Instead, they are lot of other people that were away his boots, and his helmet dispersed to more isolated and less homeless would come sleep and everything. I couldn’t believe familiar areas. One woman explained outside there alongside me. They it. – 416 how police harassment forces her put up signs saying no sleeping to go back out to work in a more outside; bylaw [officers] would A third participant in the same desperate state. “They’ve taken my come and go through people’s municipality explained that along purse and dug through it you know, tents. They would destroy the with tickets, people are also forced to taking my rigs and…they just take it. tents, destroy the property. They pay to get their belongings returned No charges. They take my drugs, my could confiscate everything. They if they are seized by bylaw officers. money (395),” she explains. “It’s hard could chase people away. RCMP, “If we want to go somewhere and because I’ve worked all day for that the same as the bylaw, they keep warm, they are on us like flies… and I worked the streets.” would do the same thing, they and they’ll confiscate your shit. Each would destroy people’s property. belonging or thing is $40 [to get In the end, this approach is at odds They would harass anybody for back] (100).”110 with the goals of keeping sex workers whatever reason. – 332 (focus safe by ensuring they can take group) This same participant described precautions while working and reach being ticketed under the out to police if they need help or to In some communities, bylaw officers municipality’s anti-paraphernalia report suspicious activity. target and ticket people who live in bylaw less than a year before: public space on a regular basis: In 2013, the Supreme Court of One time in the park, get this: Canada found that laws prohibiting If I go into [Name] Park to use bylaw and the cops, they go sex workers from communicating the outhouse after 11 and I get around together on their bikes with clients in public are seen by bylaw, most of them and I am in the bathroom unconstitutional because they have no problem writing a ticket. changing and I have two black unjustifiably violate sex workers’ If you’re sleeping—they don’t sharps containers and she makes

108 For a full analysis of Canada’s prostitution laws and the impacts on sex workers, see Brenda Belak & Darcie Bennett, “Evaluating Canada’s Sex Work Laws: The Case For Repeal”, Pivot Legal Society (2016), online: http://www.pivotlegal.org/evaluating_canada_s_sex_work_laws_the_case_ for_repeal. 109 Canada (Attorney General) v. Bedford, 2013 SCC 72 at paras 158-159. 110 Authors were able to verify that local bylaws allow for this charge to be levied. We are not, however, able to cite to the specific bylaw in question in order to protect participant confidentiality.

56 Pivot Legal Society me open the fucking sharps security guards are employed by box and charges me for fucking private companies and contracted paraphernalia…It was in my purse by private citizens, corporations, and and I was literally changing. I public entities to provide security wasn’t shooting up. – 100 services on both public and private property, as well as on property that A fourth participant in the same most people experience as public, like community explained that despite shopping malls and libraries. provisions for getting seized items back, financial barriers can make Private security guards are not police reclamation impossible: officers, but as evidenced by the stories above, in many municipalities “They come to the park I have got very poor success in across BC, they often engage in work actually getting my stuff back. And that closely resembles that of public and say like you’re they want money before they— not allowed to have police. They wear uniforms and drive they want money first before they marked cars, which provide an air of a blanket down and even look into the matter…Yeah, presumed authority not afforded to sitting in the park and like I paid $40 and I didn’t get any other citizens. we were just having of my stuff back. There was no recourse for that. – 208 Some guards seem to restrict their lunch…he said, well, activities to private property. In other look at you. Look at the In other communities, people did not communities, it seems that private way you look…They’ll talk about fines or fees when dealing security guards are also operating literally follow you with bylaw officers. Instead, they on public sidewalks, greenways, and simply never see their belongings parks: around.” – 262a again. They come to the park and say Not very nice to the homeless. like you’re not allowed to have a They take their stuff and throw blanket down and sitting in the it in the garbage and everything park and we were just having else. And it’s like, people work lunch…he said, ‘well, look at you. hard to get the shit that they have Look at the way you look’…They’ll and it’s like all that they have. To literally follow you around. – 262a have someone take it away, it’s not right…They are supposed to In some cases, private security store it, but they don’t. They wreck guards are interrupting legal it. They’ll wreck it right in front of income-generating activity. One you. – 397 woman explained that most of her interactions with private security In some communities, the activities happen when she is trying to of police officers and bylaw officers find clothes or earn money by are supplemented by private security collecting items from recycling bins officers. and dumpsters. “Usually in a bin somewhere…they will find me and [Local security company] fucking tell me I can’t be there, I got to get waking me up when I’m sleeping… out,” she said. “Anywhere…you are anywhere, all over the town… settling in for a few minutes, they wake up and then if you don’t get want you out of there (439).” up and move they call the cops… make you go somewhere else, and then when you get there and RACISM get comfy, they make you move People who took part in this study again. – 396 were selected mainly on the basis of experiences living in public space and In BC, security businesses and the with substance use. However, 38% guards they employ are governed of participants who engaged in one- 111 by the Security Service Act (SSA) on-one interviews—also identified as and regulated through the Provincial Indigenous. Registrar of Security Services. Private

111 Security Services Act, SBC 2007, c. 30.

PROJECT INCLUSION 57 Many participants saw or experienced deserved. How many of us work racism either by police departments on or near reserves and are getting as whole, or by individual officers in fed up with the race card being their communities. used every time someone gets caught breaking the law? The CC [RCMP officer] was transferred [Criminal Code] is there to protect six months after he got there for the criminals and there’s a growing harassing the citizens, mostly wave of hard working people who Natives. Since he is targeting are sick of being victims of crime race, it’s most of us Natives that without real justice.112 have the worst problem with him. And I think he just has a problem These incidents are more than with Natives…And the thing is, examples of “a few bad apples.” he never even pulls out his book Individual actions are embedded when he does it. He is not writing within a larger organizational culture shit down. – 318 where racism has been allowed to persist. RCMP Commissioner Bob Individual actions are One non-Indigenous participant Paulson, speaking at an Assembly embedded within a from the same community, who of First Nations Meeting in 2016, is marginalized and uses drugs, larger organizational recognized that anti-Indigenous explained that despite his own racism is a problem within his culture where racism criminalization, he perceives a organization. has been allowed to difference in how he is treated by the persist. same RCMP officer: I understand that there are racists in my police force. I don’t I am not First Nations myself. But, want them to be in my police well…I do see that I get treated force. I would encourage you all, differently, my privilege. Yes, I do though, to have confidence in have white privilege. Even me… the processes that exist, up to just from my take of things, it and including calling me, if you seems to me that he treats Native are having a problem with a racist people a little differently than he in your jurisdiction, or any other treats white people. – 239 problem.113

The same week we were reviewing Despite Paulson’s formal this interview data, the Aboriginal acknowledgement that individual Peoples Television Network (APTN) police officers can be racist and his reported on racist comments on invitation to bring concerns forward, a private Facebook group used by participants in this study felt that police officers across Canada. police are always treated as more credible than low-income Indigenous One post by an RCMP officer claiming people. to police a First Nations community on the Prairies responded to the One woman described how police acquittal of Gerald Stanley in the racism plays out against people like killing of 22-year-old Colten Boushie her, Indigenous people experiencing in Saskatchewan: homelessness in her community:

This should never have been There are some cops out there allowed to be about race…crimes [who are] really racist. There are were committed and a jury found some of them that just do not like the man not guilty in protecting street people. They treat them his home and family. Too bad mean and nasty, say some nasty the kid died but he got what he

112 Kathleen Martens & Trina Roache, “RCMP Facebook group claims Colten Boushie ‘got what he deserved’”, APTN News (15 February 2018), online: http://aptnnews.ca/2018/02/15/rcmp- facebook-group-claims-colten-boushie-got-deserved/. 113 “Racism within RCMP stirs debate over bad apples or systemic problems”, CBC Radio (5 January 2016), online: http://www.cbc.ca/radio/thecurrent/the-current-for-janu- ary-5-2016-1.3389695/racism-within-rcmp-stirs-debate-over-bad-apples-or-systemic-prob- lems-1.3389736.

58 Pivot Legal Society stuff to them. And they say that of being moved along, and of thrown in the drunk tank a lot we try to resist arrest, which we personal items being seized. In a few here? don’t, where they rough us up a communities, an additional issue was little bit more. And then when it top of mind among participants: the Interviewee: Yes. comes to court, they have more frequency with which Indigenous Interviewer: power than we do. – 71 people are taken to the “drunk tank” Yeah? Do you mind me asking is it and their treatment once inside city the mainly Indigenous people who Another participant also expressed cells.114 the view that some officers may get put in the drunk tank or is it not even understand the biases and “This has got to stop…especially for that anybody who is…? stereotypes that are shaping their First Nations…It’s been happening Interviewee: interactions with Indigenous people. for years and I’ve seen it all (170),” First Nations. one participant told us of how police I think they target mostly the treat Indigenous people in the drunk Interviewer: Native because if it was a white tank. He expressed understanding First Nations people? person, they wouldn’t stop them for why police may be motivated to the way they do with us…They take a person who is intoxicated in a Interviewee: need to take classes on racism public space to the drunk tank, but Mm hmm [yes]. – 108 because they think they are being he takes issue with what police do to nice but they are racist. – 96 people in the drunk tank once they’re She explained the severity of the there. “They treat them like we’re situation in her town and her recent When we asked one participant fucking animals,” he said. “We’re experience spending 11 days in city whether there were any signs that human beings. Just because we have cells, during which time she was things were changing between the a different colour doesn’t mean we’re denied medical assistance: local Indigenous community and the fucking dogs…This has got to stop.” RCMP, she responded with a story: Interviewee: In law, a state of intoxication occurs Every other day there was Nope…About three months ago when a person is “stupefied from the somebody from town here that an old guy, he was brown just consumption of alcohol or drugs to was drunk and got thrown in. like us, [police] pepper sprayed such a marked degree that a person him and they whipped out their Interviewer: is a danger to himself or others or is batons, lot of people got that on So, they just sort of patrol around causing a disturbance.”115 The police recording. Like, they can’t do that and if they see people, they think can arrest a person without charge if to people. – 170 are drunk, they bring them in? they are intoxicated in public.116 This In order for our police forces to phenomenon was most prevalent in, Interviewee: uphold their responsibilities under but not exclusive to, the communities Mm hmm [yes]. the Charter and human rights we visited in the northern region, law, and before Canada can even where nearly all the participants in Interviewer: begin to uphold is commitment to this study identified as Indigenous. Do you, did you get to see a reconciliation, that has to change. Some people in these communities, doctor when they are in there, do like this Indigenous woman, talked you know? CITY CELLS AND THE DRUNK TANK matter-of-factly about the frequency with which they, their friends, and Interviewee: Acts of overt racism by law family members were taken into cells: No. Even if you are on meds. Like enforcement are often treated as for example, I have high blood isolated, attitudinal issues. However, Interviewer: pressure and I am supposed to even with our limited sample size, So what happens if people are take my pills every day. And even if some clear systemic trends related to sleeping inside the sort of city I have them on me, they won’t. the treatment of Indigenous people limit, not out in the bush? emerged over the course of this Interviewer: study. Interviewee: Okay, that’s really so—RCMP picks Get thrown in a drunk tank. you up? In every community we visited, participants told stories of harm Interviewer: Interviewee: reduction activities being disrupted, Just for sleeping? Do people get Mm hmm [yes]…

114 “Cells” refers to a jail cell in a police detachment. The cell may be a designated sobering cell, or a regular jail cell. The RCMP have an internal and national cell policy, and each municipal police department has an internal cell policy regarding duration, medical care and release. 115 Besse v. Thom (1979) D.L.R. (3d) 657 (BC Co. Crt). 116 See Criminal Code s. 175(1)(a)(ii), Liquor Control and Licensing Act RSBC 1996 c. 267 s. 74(1)(2), or Offence Act RSBC 1996 c. 338 s. 91(1).

PROJECT INCLUSION 59 Interviewer: Interviewee: So, when you were in cells for Yeah, they wrote it in the those 11 days, you didn’t get your newspaper…and I was like, oh, pills? they shouldn’t have even put my name in there. Interviewee: No. – 108 Interviewer: And they just wrote that they’d Participants told us that there were picked you up 200 and whatever few safe spaces for them to go times and put you in the drunk where they could be free of police tank? encounters. Even when they travelled outside of town to sleep in the Interviewee: bush, the police would arrive at their Yeah, I know, I know I’m an encampment to take them to the alcoholic and got no place to stay. drunk tank. – 12

“He dropped it onto One man who, like many project Another woman explained that drunk participants, is homeless and lives tanks are largely an issue for people the floor and crushed with alcoholism, shared with us his struggling with alcoholism and that it with his boot and experiences with police. He told us it can be dangerous both because of they were shoving chalk of instances of trying to sleep in his the risk of withdrawal and because down my throat until I tent in the bush, only to have police people aren’t receiving care for other puked and it still never “open it right up and they’re like, health conditions while there. okay, you’re coming with us (12),” as came up. And then he described it. They arrived at his They do that to mostly yeah—that was a pretty tent, opened it, and took him directly alcoholics…And when they see good beating.” – 90 to the drunk tank. While detained them, they take their booze and in city cells, the police didn’t let him they dump it, and then they just exercise, “didn’t let me out for a have a…bad attitude towards smoke, they let me shower once.” He them. And then if they don’t listen, stayed in city cells for 10 days. that’s when they [the RCMP] start roughing them up…and The experience of being held in city then some of these people [living cells while detoxing from alcohol with alcoholism], they’re just was particularly harrowing. “I got so—they get so sick [from alcohol hallucinations (12),” he said. When withdrawal]. At times, they get asked if he was given anything to help seizures. They don’t understand him, he replied, “No…I know they that, them RCMP… don’t understand what we’re going through, right, because they’re not My friend, her boyfriend. They alcoholics themselves.” threw him in the drunk tank…and he needed his medication. Then He went on to describe the frequency they found him dead the next with which he is taken into the drunk morning. They didn’t do nothing; tank and the public shaming he ‘It’s just another Native, they’re received in the community: just drunk.’ When they say they need medication, they should do Interviewer: something about that. That just How many times have you had to happened, not even a year ago or spend the night in the drunk tank? last year, this time of year I think… he had real bad seizures. I guess Interviewee: I actually made a he had a massive stroke too when record in the newspaper: 286 he had his seizure. So, he passed times. away of that… Interviewer: They don’t check on people Okay can you explain “in the enough—especially when people newspaper” to me? have alcoholic seizures and stuff like that, they can—one of my

60 Pivot Legal Society friends already passed away from The troubling responses of police to us out like 7:30 in the morning. She that. They should be charged matters of addiction and substance had no shoes, no jacket, anything for things like that if they don’t use are paralleled by a similar (96),” she remembers. “I had some check on…because they already disregard for the needs of people in clothes in my stuff. I gave her a pair know that they get seizures and moments of crisis and distress. of my clothes…I’m always packing everything…They should have a a pack because you never know if doctor or something there at the One woman described the the shelters are too full or if I have RCMP office 24/7. – 40 circumstances of a recent detention, nowhere to stay.” ostensibly because police believed One woman told a story about she was suicidal. This story is similar to another story being in withdrawal from opiates we were told by a woman who had while in city cells. She asked to go Interviewee: woken up, in the drunk tank, in her to the hospital, but the guard only [Service provider] called the cops underwear. She told us: threatened her with violence. “One on me once because I was talking guard says to me, ‘You fucking bitch, crazy and she just cared about I woke up with my clothes off in you better clean up that mess or I’m me, because she was worried [small nearby town]…And I came going to put some girls up to beat the about me because I was like really to, and my clothes, I just had my shit out of you.’ I was dope sick, I was drunk…The cop was real rude and shirt on and my underwear. So, I puking. I had my mattress right by the I was like I’m going to just sit here try not to end up in the city cells toilet (289a),” she remembers. “I said, and wait till they close and then here now because I don’t know if ‘I need a hospital.’ He [the guard] I’m gonna walk to [the shelter] but that would happen [again] down said, ‘You don’t need no hospital, I’m I ended up saying it out loud. I’m here. – 96 going to put a couple of girls to beat just going to take off when they These stories were not exceptional the shit out of you if you don’t shut go and they arrested me. And in the lives of participants from some the fuck up.’” they had my arms up like this and he kept pulling my arms up and communities. They were daily or It is important to note that being hurting me and they only held me weekly occurrences. Some of the released from cells after a period for four hours till I sobered up and stories we heard were happening in of withdrawal can leave people at they were asking me why I was real time while we were in town. elevated risk of overdose.117 Another talking about killing myself, hoping In one community, an Indigenous participant spoke to us about an to die and stuff…They just called participant arrived for his interview experience he had in cells after he because I was like, suicidal. They with a big swollen bump and a big cut swallowed a small amount of an illicit said I was. on his face. He explained that he had substance he was carrying. Interviewer: sustained the injuries the evening I swallowed a little bit of drugs in But then the police didn’t take you before, when the police took him to cells and they gave me a beating to the hospital, they took you to the drunk tank. He said there was and the sergeant came down cells? blood on the floor when he woke there they had me pinned down up that morning. He was released there, punching me in the gut, Interviewee: at 8 am, about two hours before trying to get me to, to get sick…So Yeah. And the second time they his interview started. “Yesterday, I I couldn’t—I wouldn’t get sick and took me to cells, I wasn’t even was trying to stop a fight, and then I said look, man it’s just a couple bothering, and I don’t even know somebody called the cops (102),” he joints. I just didn’t want the charge. how I got to town. I was just real told us, describing what happened. And he goes, you know, well puke intoxicated and they are real rough After one of the people in the fight it up. And I said, I can’t puke it up. with me then too…And they kept biked away, he had a drink with his So they hit me more until they me in. It was, yeah, it was the mother in a public space. “Then knocked me out. And then I woke same cop…So, I try not to get in the cops just swarmed us,” he said. up and the sergeant was holding trouble anymore because I don’t He said they made the assumption a piece of chalk like a chunk of want that same cop to bother me. that he had been violent: “They just chalk that you write on a board. – 96 assume stuff like that. And then I was And he dropped it onto the floor like, ‘I wasn’t doing nothing. I’m just She explained that she did not see and crushed it with his boot and going to the shelter.’ And I was just health care staff while she was in they were shoving chalk down my walking towards the shelter, they’re cells. She described helping out throat until I puked and it still never like, ‘Quit resisting.’” From there, he another woman who was released came up. And then yeah—that was said the cops threw him down, put without proper clothing. “One girl a pretty good beating. – 90 him into the police car, arrested him, was screaming her head off…They let took him to the police station, and

117 Fiona G. Kouyoumdjian et al, “Mortality over 12 years of follow-up in people admitted to provincial custody in Ontario: a retrospective cohort study” (2016) 4:2 CMAJ Open at 153, online: 10.9778/cmajo.20150098.

PROJECT INCLUSION 61 “One of the officers, I don’t know, I can’t remember everything, how everything went down, but had somehow cut me by slamming me…palm in the ground or something, he cut me, and another officer started saying, ‘Oh, watch out for that, he is a fag, you know you’ll get AIDS from him,’ and words to that effect.” – 239

then carried him into the drunk tank. issue. They interviewed Indigenous communities with almost no “They dragged me into the drunk women and girls, as well as service public transportation), while white tank and then they slammed my providers, who reported that the girls in the same situation are likely head on the ground, put their knees police appeared to target Indigenous to be driven home by the police.120 on my neck.” people for public intoxication arrests and even abused their discretion We did not talk to youth as part While there, he told us the police did by detaining people who were not of this project and therefore, we not allow him to wear more than one intoxicated.118 likely missed this important area layer of clothing to stay warm. When for inquiry. Human Rights Watch he asked them if he could wear his Participants in the Human Rights recommended that BC expand non- own sweater instead of the t-shirt Watch study raised a number of incarceration options for publicly he had on, they denied his request. issues that directly mirror what we intoxicated individuals, including When we asked if he saw a health heard in the course of research for sobering centres where medical professional about his injuries, he Project Inclusion, such as being held personnel can provide appropriate answered no and described how he for extended periods without food, care.121 A sobering unit is a short-term feels when interacting with police: being kept in cold temperatures facility where intoxicated people are “They don’t even care. If I like— if I without blankets, and being cared for until they become sober, died in there, they wouldn’t even released with inadequate clothing, typically within 4-24 hours. This is care. They would just like— oh, so— in grave danger of hypothermia and a recommendation that has been you know, just assume—just assume frostbite.119 heard before in BC, including in the because my history, because of my recommendations of the Davies alcoholism, they’re just going to— One victim services worker told Commission Inquiry into the death they’d just let me die. They won’t care Human Rights Watch that this issue of Frank Paul in Vancouver122 and (102).” disproportionately affects young multiple BC Coroner Inquests.123 Indigenous girls: There are six sobering units in BC: Concerns about the overuse of Vancouver, Surrey, Victoria, Duncan, Police routinely incarcerate drunk tanks and the treatment Nanaimo, and Port Alberni.124 In the Indigenous girls for intoxication of Indigenous people in city cells remainder of the province, the police if they are found to have have been documented by other may bring an intoxicated person to consumed alcohol and are in researchers. In 2012, Human Rights a jail cell or a hospital emergency need of transportation home (a Watch visited 10 communities in unit.125 Expanding non-incarceration particular challenge in northern northern BC to investigate this options for publicly intoxicated

118 Meghan Rhoad, “Those Who Take Us Away: Abusive Policing and Failures in Protection of Indigenous Women and Girls in Northern British Columbia, Canada”, Human Rights Watch (13 February 2013), online: https://www.hrw.org/report/2013/02/13/those-who-take-us-away/abu- sive-policing-and-failures-protection-indigenous-women. 119 Rhoad. 120 Rhoad. 121 Rhoad. 122 “Alone and Cold: Davies Commission – Inquiry into the Death of Paul Frank”, Davies Commission (12 February 2009), online: https://iiobc.ca/ wp-content/uploads/2016/03/davies_commission_report.pdf. 123 See for example BC Coroner files #2007-159-0012, 2008-0228-0303, 2008-0217-0158. 124 Vancouver (Vancouver Detox), Surrey (Quibble Creek Sober and Assessment Centre), Victoria (Island Health Withdrawal Management Services), Duncan (Canadian Mental Health Association Sober Assessment Centre), Nanaimo (Island Crisis Care Society Crescent House), Port Alberni (Alberni Valley Sobering Centre). 125 “Alone and Cold: Davies Commission – Inquiry into the Death of Paul Frank” (2009) at 176.

62 Pivot Legal Society individuals should be addressed Interviewer: Police Violence immediately in communities across And different RCMP officers? The prevalence of police violence BC. Interviewee: that participants described to us was extremely concerning. Use of force ABUSES OF AUTHORITY AND Yes, I don’t know how they can get away with that. – 395 appears to be targeted along racial EXPERIENCES OF VIOLENCE and other lines of marginalization, Beyond day-to-day harassment HIV/AIDS related stigma was raised including class, disability (including and problematic treatment in cells, by another person living in an RCMP addiction), and social condition. people who participated in this study jurisdiction, in a different region of Several participants in this study also told specific stories of verbal the province. described routine and repeated abuse, humiliation, and violence by episodes of violence being carried police. One of the officers, I don’t know, out by police in their communities. I can’t remember everything, One woman shared a story from the Humiliation how everything went down, but had somehow cut me by evening before we spoke with her. We heard several stories of slamming me…palm in the ground humiliation at the hands of police, or something, he cut me, and We had a young man show up but the story of one Indigenous another officer started saying, ‘Oh, in camp last night that was so woman’s regular humiliation during watch out for that, he is a fag, you beaten. I’ve known this kid his interactions with the RCMP had a know you’ll get AIDS from him,’ whole life. I used to babysit him profound impact on us. and words to that effect. – 239 when he was a kid. He was so badly beaten up. I didn’t even Interviewee: Humiliation can also take a more recognize him until he started to Well, they just run me in and the physical form, as one participant in talk to me…He was walking home next thing is—I don’t like this— a jurisdiction policed by a municipal from the bar and he was cutting When they run me in, they say I’m force described. through the park and they [the HIV positive over the radio and it police] come from behind him, goes everywhere and everybody Just last week I was sleeping…I felt right over here at the skate park, hears it and I want that to stop. the nudging of the foot and then and he tried to brush him off and It is so embarrassing. You know, a good hard boot in my leg. Then, keep going. They didn’t take that ‘Watch it, she’s HIV positive.’ all of the sudden, I was getting well. And he got handcuffed and wet. A cop was pissing on me. He a dirty beating and they released Interviewer: pissed on me to get me up. He him right there. – 153 Sorry, I just need to understand fucking pissed on me. I wish I had that. They are talking to you on his name. – 74 She explained that, for people the side of the road? experiencing homelessness in her The practice of police habitually community, an incident like this was Interviewee: waking people who are sleeping not isolated. Yes. on the street in the morning is so commonplace that it’s known as “the My husband has been beaten up Interviewer: seven o’clock wake-up call (74),” as many times by the police, many Then they go into the car and say one participant describes it. “They times. He was sleeping here in over the radio that ‘you’ve got to come around to boot people out the park…a cop kicked him in watch her’? of the doorways and clean out the the head, he was dead asleep Interviewee: streets. That’s what they say. That’s sitting there. Kicked him in the, Yeah, ‘She’s HIV positive.’ And the words they use,” he said. “They square kicked him in the head. I everybody that has one of those clean up the streets of the human was coming across the park with things can hear my name and filth, I guess, I don’t know, the human [name], she was our street nurse I’m HIV positive. And I want garbage.” at the time. We were coming that to stop. It’s so…It’s very looking for him because he was This type of humiliating behaviour, embarrassing. I don’t know how to sick and he had an abscess. when directed at very marginalized make that stop. Looking for him and she’s seen it people, does not make news happened. She watched that cop Interviewer: headlines. But it has a profound effect kick him in the head and she just And that’s happened to you on on the psychological well-being of freaked. – 153 multiple occasions? individuals and entire communities’ relationships with police. It fractures Despite the severity of police Interviewee: their willingness to reach out for help violence, she found no recourse for Yes, every time they stop me, it after a serious crime or when in the the violence her husband endured. goes like that. midst of an emergency. “And again, nothing came of it.

PROJECT INCLUSION 63 Nothing ever happened just because was lying, so they dragged him up too by the cops. It’s because we’re drug addicts (153),” she said. right out and were like, ‘Quit your they thought that she was stealing “They didn’t do anything.” bullshit,’ and now he’s in a cast. and then she didn’t have anything Now they probably look at him and she got pretty banged up… “No Way to Treat Somebody” and they can see he wasn’t [lying]. she uses a walker. – 84 – 170 The sense of injustice and the Despite these incidents, “most of striking power imbalance between Sustaining injuries as a result of a them are good,” this participant said citizens and police are widely felt police encounter is so common for of local RCMP officers, “But there’s a among the people we interviewed some participants that they grow few of them that are, like, racist.” for this study. Participants clearly felt to expect it. “I knew I had warrants that police should be working to a and I was going to get arrested Another participant told us about higher standard than they are in the anyway (313),” one participant how elders are particularly vulnerable community. told us, describing an incident in a to injury. McDonald’s restaurant where police Another participant, in the same Because they are elders they have burst through the bathroom door RCMP jurisdiction as the woman old injuries…they have to watch that she was in and demanded her whose husband was badly beaten how they do that. Sometimes name. “They jumped on me outside by police, told us about an incident they don’t know, so they [might]… there and basically kicked the shit out in which she tried to come to the aid rip their ligament or whatever of me,” she said. of her friend’s son while police were when they pull them back or when beating him up. But she was met with It wasn’t the first time something like they put them in the car they are even more violence. this has happened. hold[ing] you up this way and they are trying to pull this way…it’s like This guy is smaller…they got The time in the [location] over you are hurting their ligaments… him, and they beat his skull on there, they did too. Like, my face their old injuries. They make it the cement everywhere. They was all fucked up. In my pictures look like he is resisting [arrest] knocked him out. So I jumped. even, you can see like there’s like or whatever when they are not, I went underneath and I put my a big welt on my face, like on my and they put resisting on their knees underneath his head, my skin was like taken down—like paperwork…when the person hands were going through his taken—like hammer grinded off my isn’t…they still beat us anyways back, the cop caught my hands face. – 313 they will say, ‘No, that’s not how it twice, then he stopped, and then went.’ – 13 there was a bunch of other cops She was worried that she would lose and around and then they pepper three of her teeth as a result of the These instances of police violence sprayed me. – 289a injury. “When I was in jail, I went to go cause harm in their own right and see a dentist because I thought they create an antagonistic relationship The violence that the officers used were going to fall out. And she’s like, between police and entire on her friend seemed excessive. “I ‘Whatever you do, just resist the urge communities of people. didn’t know what he did, but that is to wiggle them if they go black, then no way to treat somebody,” she said. they’re dead, they’re going to fall out.’ INACCESSIBLE, INEFFECTIVE “No matter what they’ve done, you’re But I listened to her and didn’t wiggle COMPLAINT PROCESSES a cop; you’re supposed to protect them. And about a year later now, Despite the high level of negative them.” they’re all, like, actually reset.” interaction with police, most Made to Feel like Liars participants in this study had never Indigenous Elders Endure reported harassment or abuse. Most Many participants in other regions Mistreatment did not feel like a formal complaint shared stories of being injured by Several Indigenous participants was an avenue that was open to police. shared stories of mistreatment of them. Elders by police. Last week one of my buddies was Interviewer: trying to get back to the camp… I actually videotaped some elderly Have you or anyone you know from what I heard the RCMP guy getting dragged around by ever made a complaint about the went in there. I guess they heard one of the RCMPs here and I police officer? somebody screaming around in showed it to [service provider]. there and it was dark and he was There is actually another woman Interviewee: trying to go back to the tent, he too, this woman doesn’t even I did a couple of times, few years actually broke his leg and the cops drink. She was shopping in No back. were literally dragging him out Frills. She got accused of stealing by the collar and they thought he or something and she got roughed

64 Pivot Legal Society Interviewer: not require them to report directly to Did anything happen? police.

Interviewee: The CRCC and OPCC complaint No. Who would they believe: them processes are difficult to navigate, or me? – 170 both practically and legally, and there are few resources available to assist In communities policed by a a complainant with the complaint municipal police force, complaints process.128 Depending on the police can be made to the Office of the jurisdiction, each complaint process Police Complaint Commissioner is governed by different legislation (OPCC). The OPCC is an independent and requires different submission office of the BC Legislature and criteria, investigative, and review retains jurisdiction over complaints processes. The nuances of what against municipal police officers in police actions constitute misconduct, 126 accordance with the BC Police Act. which agencies are involved, avenues for submitting a complaint, and In RCMP jurisdictions, police the admission and investigative complaints are not covered by the processes that proceed are unlikely OPCC. Instead, pursuant to the to be clear or accessible to any Royal Canadian Mounted Police Act, complainant, let alone people who complaints related to the RCMP are are criminalized and struggling with handled by the Civilian Review and challenges such as homelessness. Complaints Commission for the 127 RCMP (CRCC). The CRCC is an The CRCC and OPCC present independent government agency several analogous technical and and, similar to the OPCC, it is limited logistical barriers for marginalized in its legislative authority to review complainants. However, there are complaint decisions made by the some added challenges in RCMP RCMP when the complainant is not jurisdictions, which constitute the satisfied with the handling of their majority of municipalities in BC. complaint. As outsiders looking in on the RCMP In both cases, in order to initiate a complaints process, it appears that complaint against the police, the the RCMP has a lot of latitude to claimant must submit a complaint investigate themselves, and that they in-person at the police station or act as gatekeepers in complaints by email, fax, or mail. This poses brought against them. This creates difficulties for those who do not own barriers to people trying to access a cellular phone, computer, or printer, the complaints process. When a or do not have access to the internet. complaint is submitted to the CRCC, It is unrealistic to expect people to the RCMP determines admissibility be comfortable walking into a police and whether the complaint will be station to submit a complaint given investigated. The RCMP provides their lived experiences of negative a report to the complainant. Only interaction with police and fears of after that process is complete can retaliation. People require active the complainant make a request support and a mechanism that does

126 RSBC 1996, c. 367. 127 Royal Canadian Mounted Police Act (R.S.C., 1985, c. R-10) Part 6; Royal Canadian Mounted Police Public Complaints Commission Rules of Practice (SOR/93-17); Royal Canadian Mount- ed Police Regulations, 2014 (SOR/2014-281) Part 3 (the RCMP Act in subsequent footnote). 128 In 1992, Commissioner Wally Oppal was appointed by the Attorney General of BC to conduct an inquiry into policing that included inquiries into public complaints and accountability. In 2002, the BC Legislative Assembly Special Committee reviewed the Police Complaints Process. In 2007, the Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General instructed the Director of Police Services to conduct a review of the Police Complaints Process. Each final report called to harmonize complaint processes between municipal police and RCMP.

PROJECT INCLUSION 65 for a review by the CRCC.129 If the Women we spoke to in one RCMP fear of the police was paired with “a CRCC is satisfied with the RCMP jurisdiction were so tired of the lack notable matter of fact manner when finding (whether the claim was of accountability that they tried to mentioning mistreatment by police, substantiated, or if misconduct was take matters into their own hands by reflecting a normalized expectation found and discipline determined), gathering evidence. But they found that if one was an Indigenous woman the file is closed. If the CRCC is not that process only led to more hostile or girl police mistreatment is to be satisfied with the RCMP finding, the interactions with police. anticipated.”131 CRCC may send an interim report with findings and recommendations The cops just creep up on you, In this context, the lack of an to the RCMP Commissioner.130 like sneak up. The cops do accessible, fully civilianized However, the recommendations are whatever they want basically. complaints process leaves not binding on the RCMP, and the They don’t follow the book or marginalized victims of police abuse CRCC has no legislative authority to code of conduct. And that’s why and harassment without recourse. determine or enforce discipline. some people have been trying to videotape things. But then they NO ACCESS TO POLICE This process, and the role of the basically assault you and break PROTECTION RCMP in investigating themselves, your phone if they see it or they’ll Most participants in this study stated may help to explain why people harass you, just make life really emphatically that they would never felt like there were no mechanisms hard on you if you try to expose call the police if they were in trouble, available to make a complaint in them for what’s going on. You with only a small minority stating that RCMP jurisdictions. feel like they’re kind of more of a if the situation was dire enough they gang themselves. They’re more may consider placing a call. Interviewer: Has anybody, any like—they’re just like they’re bullies, of the people that have been basically. – 313 Given the high rates of violence assaulted ever, tried to make a against Indigenous women, women formal complaint? who engage in sex work, people who are likely to experience or witness an Interviewee: Given the high rates They don’t let you. They just—they overdose, and people experiencing don’t, the watch commander of violence against homelessness, we are concerned doesn’t let you do that. He hangs Indigenous women, that people who took part in this up on you, he walks away, he women who engage in study do not believe that the police doesn’t take, when you go to the sex work, people who are there to protect them or their communities. police station trying to talk to him, are likely to experience he won’t come out and talk to One participant, a woman in her 40s, you. He just doesn’t let it happen. or witness an overdose, stood out because when we met her I’ve gone to it under community and people experiencing she was in the midst of her first bout and tried to file complaints in homelessness, we are of homelessness and had no criminal another community and they say I concerned that people record. She expressed surprise at have to bring it up with the watch who took part in this what she perceived as the lack of commander here. Well, how do protection from law enforcement you do that when he won’t talk to study do not believe that when she called for help because you? – 153 the police are there to protect them or their she was afraid of her boyfriend while living on the streets. “When I asked Other participants, expressed fear of communities. retaliation if they spoke out against the police, I wanted help, like I wanted police. One Indigenous woman we to go away for the evening (252),” spoke with has experienced violence she said. She was looking to stay in a at the hands of police, but when protected women’s shelter or a place These findings mirror Human Rights we asked if she felt she could ever where she could go without fear of Watch’s 2013 findings from northern complain to anyone about it, she her partner finding her. BC, where researchers described replied, “No. And if we do, we get levels of fear they would expect to They phoned, ‘Everything’s full,’…I even more harassed (71).” see in post-conflict countries such thought, what do you mean, like I as Iraq. They went on to note that did not understand, so you mean

129 “Civilian Review and Complaints Commission for the RCMP”, Government of Canada (11 Aug 2016), online: https://www.crcc-ccetp.gc.ca/en/complaint-and-review-process-flowchart. 130 “Civilian Review and Complaints Commission for the RCMP”, Government of Canada (11 Aug 2016), online: https://www.crcc-ccetp.gc.ca/en/complaint-and-review-process-flowchart. 131 Rhoad.

66 Pivot Legal Society like, if I am scared for my life, there Interviewee: when policing in Indigenous is nowhere you can take me? No, I don’t think so, never, they’re communities. According to Like isn’t that like a basic human mean, like when my ex beat me survivors of domestic violence prevention thing? They say no they arrest me, not him, put me and the community service and the security guard that called in jail and I’m bleeding from my providers who work with them, them, he just sat in his vehicle the head, I’m bleeding, my fingers are Indigenous women and girls often whole [time], he didn’t come out bleeding, they believed his story do not get the protection afforded to see if I was okay. – 252 that I got hurt outside. by these policies. Women who call the police for help may find Most participants seemed resigned Interviewer: themselves blamed for the abuse, to the fact that their local police What did they arrest you for? are at times shamed for alcohol or force was not there to protect them. substance use, and risk arrest for Interviewee: “A lot of women around here, they actions taken in self-defense.132 have a lot of problems. Even the Causing a scene, I don’t know, RCMP, they don’t help or nothing having a couple of drinks. Some respondents made it clear when they call them because they that there are differences among Interviewer: know they’re Native and they know officers and that some officers are Because you had a couple of that they’re always alcoholics and supportive, but they cannot choose drinks? drug addicts and stuff like that who responds if they call for help: (40),” one participant said, noting Interviewee: Interviewer: what they perceived as a disparity Yeah, I got put in the drunk tank, Do you feel like the police between how people in northern even though I wasn’t drunk…I would protect you if you call communities are treated and the got jail time for five days, I got them because you were being access to accountability mechanisms charged, I got two because they victimized by somebody else? as compared to people on BC’s south picked me up and I didn’t know coast. “They don’t help up here as I wasn’t allowed to drink, at the Interviewee: much as they do down south.” time I was drinking lots. I had just That’s hard to say. I don’t—it’s up, lost my kids, and my ex and I were Many participants were speaking sometimes I do and then there are separating, I drank every day for from firsthand experience when they some police that absolutely, not. two years straight. told us that the police would not They look at me like I’m the bad person. protect them: Interviewer: What you are saying is that you Interviewer: Interviewer: didn’t know you weren’t allowed to Do you feel that the police will Okay. Does it depend on the drink? Why weren’t you allowed to protect you if you call them for officer or the— drink, was it a condition? yourself? Interviewee: Interviewee: Interviewee: Yeah. Yeah. – 135 Yes. I don’t know, depends how I, I am People living with a mental illness not going to do that, no, that’s just Interviewer: are also disproportionately likely the few times I have felt I am the Bail condition? to require emergency assistance. victim but then the police come in While we did not specifically ask and so I am the culprit. – 58 Interviewee: about mental health in the context Yes, I guess they have it in there, of policing, a few participants raised The experience of being punished but they never gave me the concerns about reaching out for for attempting to access police paperwork when I asked for it. – any kind of help during a mental protection is especially pronounced 289a for people who are have court- health crisis because police are imposed conditions such as This story parallels a Human Rights generally first responders. “They’re abstinence requirements, which are Watch finding related to Indigenous not sensitive and then the whole largely understood to be untenable women’s experiences with police in process is so terrible. It’s just like for people who are dependent on northern British Columbia: being arrested for committing a substances including alcohol: robbery (358),” said one participant, The RCMP has instituted describing the actions of police Interviewer: progressive policies addressing during a mental health crisis Do you feel like the police would violence in domestic relationships, protect you if you called them for but it appears the police do not Why don’t they just send a couple help? apply those policies consistently of orderlies in an ambulance with

132 Rhoad.

PROJECT INCLUSION 67 British Columbia is a province where at least 2,443 people died of overdoses in 2016 and 2017. It is where Indigenous women have gone missing and been murdered at alarming rates. BC is the site of a continuing epidemic of physical, sexual, and colonial violence against sex workers, trans, Two-Spirit and genderqueer people, youth in the foster care system, and Indigenous people— people who face intersecting barriers in all facets of their lives, some of whom participated in the Project Inclusion study. The experiences they shared overwhelmingly point to an indisputable problem with how police and policing practices interact with vulnerable people. This must be resolved through swift and determined leadership by federal, provincial, and municipal governments working in partnership with affected communities.

an ambulance attendant? And swift and determined leadership by We can learn a lot about what phone you and say ‘Well, your federal, provincial, and municipal genuine community-based policing doctor wants to see you.’ ‘Oh, governments working in partnership could look like in BC from stories okay, I’ll come right out.’ Instead of with affected communities. about individual officers who have boot the door, come in, and four built trusting relationships with the big giant guns…There’s usually A LEGACY OF MISCONDUCT, A participants in this study. four of them. One with a Taser, LACK OF ACCOUNTABILITY one with pepper spray, one with Now [Indigenous officer] walks Commissioner Wally Oppal, QC handcuffs and the other one with with another white cop…And he found that “the initiation and conduct a club or a gun. – 358 doesn’t throw his weight around of the missing and murdered like the other cops do…he talks British Columbia is a province women investigations were a blatant to them. And when we see [him], 134 where at least 2,443 people died failure.” That failure is rooted in we wave at him…you know, of overdoses in 2016 and 2017.133 It racism, misogyny, and contempt for communication…He deals with a is where Indigenous women have people who are homeless, people lot of the Natives downtown and gone missing and been murdered who use drugs, and people who do I’m glad he does because I have at alarming rates. BC is the site of sex work that appears to persist in known him back in my reserve. – a continuing epidemic of physical, policing institutions across BC. In 13 sexual, and colonial violence the context of Project Inclusion, a against sex workers, trans, Two- complex array of serious allegations Another participant told us about an Spirit and genderqueer people, arose against police. But when we extraordinary offer she received from youth in the foster care system, discussed what people wanted from a police officer one freezing night. and Indigenous people— people a police force, their answers were She noticed that I had dropped a who face intersecting barriers in fairly straightforward. blanket behind when I was picking all facets of their lives, some of I just want them to know even cans and bottles. And she had whom participated in the Project though my circumstances are asked very sincerely, ‘Do you have Inclusion study. The experiences messed up at this moment some place to go? Are you going they shared overwhelmingly point and I’m an Aboriginal, I may be to be warm enough? We can give to an indisputable problem with alcoholic, I may be homeless, like you a place at the RCMP station, how police and policing practices I have rights. I need like—I need not that you would be under arrest interact with vulnerable people. them to know that. But they don’t or anything like that.’ But it was This must be resolved through care. – 102 really cold that night. She actually

133 British Columbia Coroners Service, “Illicit Drug Overdose Deaths in BC January 1, 2008 – July 31, 2018”, (22 August 2018), online: https://www2. gov.bc.ca/assets/gov/birth-adoption-death-marriage-and-divorce/deaths/coroners-service/statistical/illicit-drug.pdf. 134 Wally T Oppal, “Forsaken: The Report of the Missing Women Commission of Inquiry Executive Summary”, Missing Women Commission of Inqui- ry (19 November 2012) at 26, online: http://www.missingwomeninquiry.ca/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/Forsaken-ES-web-RGB.pdf.

68 Pivot Legal Society offered that, which is for me very suggest that marginalized people’s who requested to join the class humane. – 120 fear of police is justified. continued to grow before the lawsuit settled in 2017.137 This was a memorable moment that According to a study in “E” Division made an impression on this person, (British Columbia), for example, The RCMP has not been able to but when we asked if the participant “frequent tales of retaliation against create meaningful change within its took the officer up on her offer, those who bring forward harassment organization in response to these they replied, “No.” Enduring freezing complaints can also leave victims allegations. The Gender and Respect temperatures, fatal as they may be, and bystanders feeling helpless Action Plan was launched in 2013 to is still more appealing than spending to try to address the problem [of respond to widespread allegations of time inside a policing institution harassment].”135 Indeed, a number workplace sexual harassment. It set because it has become such a site of RCMP members and employees out 37 “actions” to effect change, as of trauma for so many. “Because who spoke to the Commission were well as measures and milestones to generally I don’t like being in a cell. I’d preoccupied about being targeted as monitor progress. rather be outside 100% of the time a result of raising concerns about the than being in a jail cell, even though workplace. In some cases, members In 2017, the CRCC for the RCMP there is a mat there or whatever reported incidents of reprisal that wrote that: (120).” threatened both the safety of the The RCMP Commissioner member and the integrity of the committed to report internally These are examples of the ways investigation. in which small changes in how on the progress of these actions officers relate to the communities Two highly publicized lawsuits every 180 days to ensure they engage with most can lead to launched by former RCMP officers transparency and accountability. greater health, safety, and inclusion. highlight longstanding internal However, to the Commission’s However, it is not enough to change practices and cultural issues within knowledge, only one such update the system one officer at a time; the RCMP that have come under appears to have occurred, in the there is ample evidence that there public scrutiny in recent years. spring of 2014. Furthermore, while are systemic problems with how the In 2012, after speaking publicly the Commission was informed police are operating in BC. No police about gender-based harassment that the Gender and Respect force is exempt from criticism, but in the RCMP, Janet Merlo became Action Plan remains active, no the RCMP’s internal culture and lack the representative plaintiff in a one at the RCMP’s National of accountability has come under class action lawsuit, launched in Headquarters appears to hold particular scrutiny in recent years. BC, against the RCMP and the responsibility for this initiative. Given that the RCMP polices most Solicitor General of Canada. The There appears, therefore, to be communities in BC, we need to be lawsuit alleges that “female regular no one in a position of senior paying close attention. members, civilian members, and leadership who is accountable for public service employees were ensuring either that the 37 actions Abuse of Authority by the RCMP subject to systemic discrimination, have been implemented, or that harassment, and bullying on the basis they are achieving the desired For people who have not experienced 138 of gender and/or sexual orientation, goals. the intersection of extreme poverty, and that the RCMP failed to protect substance use, homelessness, and Despite all the publicity sexual the women from this treatment.”136 racism, some of the stories shared by harassment within the RCMP has Linda Gillis Davidson launched a participants in this study may be hard received, there is evidence to similar class action in Ontario on to imagine or accept. As a result, it suggest that a culture of sexual behalf of all regular members, is useful to evaluate these accounts harassment continues to exist civilian members, and public service through the lens of official reports on within the organization to this day. In employees. Davidson and Merlo’s the internal culture of the RCMP. February 2018, while we were writing lawsuits were consolidated into this report, the CBC reported on a a single claim before the Federal Even a cursory look at recent reports Facebook group purportedly created Court for the purpose of approving a into allegations of harassment, by and restricted to rank-and-file men settlement of the claims. The group abuse, and retaliation against officers within the RCMP. It contains sexually and civilian staff by RCMP officers of current and retired police officers

135 “Report into Workplace Harassment in the RCMP”, Civilian Review and Complaints Commission for the RCMP, Government of Canada (25 April 2018), online: https://www.crcc-ccetp.gc.ca/en/report-workplace-harassment-rcmp#toc.1. 136 “RCMP Sexual/Gender Harassment Class Action Settlement Website – FAQ”, Kim Spencer McFee Barristers P.C., online: http://www.rcmpclass- actionsettlement.ca/faqs.htm. 137 Colin Perkel, “Landmark deal in RCMP sexual-harassment class action wins court approval”, CBC News (31 May 2017), online: http://www.cbc. ca/news/canada/british-columbia/rcmp-sexual-harassment-class-action-1.4140138. 138 Report into Workplace Harassment in the RCMP.

PROJECT INCLUSION 69 Many of the stories we heard from people about their interactions with police on the street closely mirror the stories of discrimination, harassment, abuse of authority, and lack of transparency and accountability that have been identified as endemic within the RCMP.

suggestive material, including a The Human Rights Watch report, of the Minister of Public Safety, fictional frontier scene with an RCMP “Those Who Take Us Away,”140 is confirms that such problems officer in uniform with a burlesque based entirely on conversations continue to persist in the RCMP. dancer in costume performing what with Indigenous women and girls Despite the known problems, appears to be oral sex on him. The about their relationships with police the RCMP has been slow to secret men-only Facebook group in northern British Columbia. That change. While senior leaders have was apparently set up by RCMP report details that in five of the developed a host of “action plans” employees in BC, but has members ten towns they visited, they heard and “initiatives,” there has been from across the country. The CBC allegations of rape or sexual assault little real change in the day-to- was unclear how many of the 700 by police officers.141 day experiences of many RCMP members of the group were current members and employees; rather, RCMP officers, but was able to There is also reason to believe that their trust in the organization has confirm that administrators for the the RCMP will not change of its own only eroded further.142 group request regimental numbers accord. On February 4, 2016, with the before adding people to it.139 lawsuits ongoing, newly appointed The Commission’s report only looks Federal Minister of Public Safety Ralph into RCMP harassment in the context There is reason to believe that sexual Goodale requested that the CRCC for of the workplace. However, the report harassment is not limited to women the RCMP undertake a review of the states that: working inside of the RCMP. We RCMP’s policies and procedures on did not ask questions about sexual workplace harassment. The resultant Increasingly, such problems are misconduct, but a few women who report lays out a series of ongoing also eroding the trust of the took part in this study reported sexual concerns about the organization’s Canadian public, who are asking harassment by police. ability to protect its workers and whether the RCMP’s internal offer a workplace free from abuse of problems have “filtered outside” Interviewee: authority and harassment. and affected the treatment of You know in 2005, I was supposed members of the public. to be on house arrest, right, for 18 Over the last several decades, months. And a cop phoned me the reputation of the Royal The people who came forward and and asked if I wanted to go to the Canadian Mounted Police has shared their experiences as part movies. been tarnished by a seemingly of this project are members of the endless stream of reports of public, and among some of the Interviewer: workplace harassment, sexual most marginalized and stigmatized Really? harassment, bullying and residents of BC. In many of the intimidation. These problems towns we visited, we were forced Interviewee: have been well documented by to put limits on the number of And I told my probation officer external reviews, surveys, media participants we could speak to about it and he got shipped out of reports, and lawsuits. Indeed, and the amount of time we could town. the most senior leaders in the spend on each interview. It became apparent very quickly in the course Interviewer: organization have themselves of our conversations that no one He got shipped out of town but acknowledged that bullying and had ever come to their community you don’t know where to? harassment are endemic and that RCMP organizational culture must to ask about their experiences with Interviewee: change. This review, conducted police, nor did people feel they could No. – 84 by the Commission at the request access an appropriate channel for

139 Manjula Dufresne, “Men-only RCMP Facebook group crosses line of conduct, say female RCMP members”, CBC News (14 February 2018), online: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/men-only-rcmp-facebook-group-crosses-line-of-conduct-say-female-rcmp-mem- bers-1.4533910. 140 Rhoad. 141 Rhoad. 142 Report into Workplace Harassment in the RCMP.

70 Pivot Legal Society communicating this information, street closely mirror the stories of space. The stress and fear that such as through formal complaint discrimination, harassment, abuse they experience are no less real or processes. of authority, and lack of transparency worthy of attention than that facing and accountability that have been officers who have been harassed. As a result, we were inundated with identified as endemic within the In fact, abuse by police and the stories of serious misconduct and of RCMP. resulting feeling of powerlessness blatant targeting handed down by impacts everything from substance police, which we can only infer would For the people who took part in use, to access to health services, to otherwise go unheard. Many of the this study, there is no alternative decisions about whether to call for stories we heard from people about to the daily harassment that they help during a crisis. As a province, we their interactions with police on the experience while living in public must demand better from our police.

Recommendations

1. The Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General and the ii. ensure that civilian investigators and civilian staff Attorney General, working in full partnership with historically members are responsible for the entirety of the marginalized communities and communities with high complaint resolution process; and levels of police interactions, must develop a set of guiding iii. allow the OPCC to audit police complaints each values and principles for policing in British Columbia that are year, particularly where they involve discrimination grounded in human rights. based on race, gender, poverty, or health status, 2. The Attorney General must take immediate action to and publicly report on areas of concern for further increase access to justice for people who believe they have investigation or reform. been the victims of excessive force, discrimination, or 3. The Director of Police Services must develop the following harassment by police by: Provincial Policies for all policing agencies in British a. dedicating legal aid funding for: Columbia: i. a clinic to support people to make police complaints a. a Provincial Policy governing police interactions with through summary advice, short service, or full intoxicated persons, in partnership with people who use representation based on the needs of the individual drugs and people living with alcoholism, and fund the and the nature of the complaint; implementation of the Policy. This Policy should make it clear that: ii. public legal education workshops and materials to help people navigate the process of bringing a i. police interventions with a person who is intoxicated lawsuit against a police officer or police force; and must be minimally impairing on liberty and officers must make the security of the person (health) the iii. legal representation for families and/or victims in paramount consideration in determining whether to instances of police-involved serious injury or death to apprehend an individual; facilitate full participation in a Coroner’s Inquests and civil actions. ii. city cells are not the appropriate place to bring an intoxicated person for their own safety or other b. amending the Police Act to expand the mandate of the therapeutic reasons. Alternatives to detention Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner (OPCC) in including, but not limited to, sobering centres, order to: hospitals, and other community-based options must i. ensure that all police officers and forces operating in be made available; and BC fall under the mandate of the OPCC; iii. where an intoxicated person must be brought into cells, their health care needs shall be paramount and health care visits will be mandatory.

PROJECT INCLUSION 71 b. a Provincial Policy on harm reduction which should i. a strong statement that explains to all police forces include: the harm caused by the confiscation of homeless people’s belongings; i. a directive to deprioritize simple possession of controlled substances and an overview of the harms ii. deprioritize confiscating homeless people’s of confiscating substances (including alcohol) from belongings, especially necessities of life such as people with addictions and limited resources; shelter, clothing, medication, and important personal items; and ii. a directive to never confiscate new or used syringes, naloxone, and other harm reduction and overdose iii. a directive to issue receipts for belongings and cash prevention supplies; where they must be taken, with instructions for how to get them back. iii. a statement that harm reduction supplies, whether new or used, are not a basis for search or e. a Provincial Policy detailing people’s right to privacy in investigation; and tents and informal living structures akin to the right to privacy in private residences. iv. a directive that local police forces work with service providers to develop bubble zones around safe 4. The Director of Police Services must work with the consumption sites, overdose prevention sites, and Independent Investigations Office and the Coroners Service other harm reduction sites, taking into consideration to audit deaths and serious injuries in city cells in BC over policing practices that may deter access including the past 10 years, including an analysis of race, disability, visible presence, arrests in close proximity, housing status, and gender, and make the findings and undercover operations in and near, and surveillance recommendations for reform publicly available. of people using the service. 5. The Ministry of Housing and Municipal Affairs (MHMA) must c. a Provincial Policy on police attendance at overdoses make a province-wide commitment to supporting homeless which includes: people to maintain their belongings and to ensuring that homeless people have access to services without fear of i. a directive not to attend at drug overdose calls, losing their possessions. The MHMA must partner with local except where requested by Emergency Health governments in collaboration with groups of people with Services—usually in the event of a fatality or threats lived experience, to train local bylaw officers: to public safety; and a. to recognize and respect the belongings of homeless ii. a clear statement that the role of law enforcement people; and at the scene of a drug overdose is to deliver first aid if they are the only responders available, or to b. to work effectively with people experiencing protect the safety of Emergency Health Services homelessness to clean up or discard belongings and members of the public, not to investigate the where there is a pressing public safety, access, or individuals or circumstances at the scene unless environmental need to do so. police determine that there is an urgent public safety 6. The Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General, in concern, for example, if violence is occurring at the partnership with the MHMA, should issue a directive stating scene. that no public funds may be used for private security patrols d. a Provincial Policy on confiscation of belongings by on public property, including in public parks. police which includes:

72 Pivot Legal Society