Democracy Gone Astray

Democracy, being a human construct, needs to be thought of as directionality rather than an object. As such, to understand it requires not so much a description of existing structures and/or other related phenomena but a declaration of intentionality.
This blog aims at creating labeled lists of published infringements of such intentionality, of points in time where democracy strays from its intended directionality. In addition to outright infringements, this blog also collects important contemporary information and/or discussions that impact our socio-political landscape.

All the posts here were published in the electronic media – main-stream as well as fringe, and maintain links to the original texts.

[NOTE: Due to changes I haven't caught on time in the blogging software, all of the 'Original Article' links were nullified between September 11, 2012 and December 11, 2012. My apologies.]

Tuesday, January 15, 2013

SIU closes investigation into alleged brutality by Toronto police — again

It was opened, then closed, then reopened, and now it’s closed again.

The province’s police watchdog said Monday there are “no reasonable grounds” to charge a Toronto police officer with a criminal offence in the case of 27-year-old Tyrone Phillips, who alleged he was beaten unconscious by police during an arrest last summer.

His case was the subject of a bizarre public dispute that played out between Toronto police and the SIU earlier this month, after the watchdog announced it had been forced to close the investigation because the force was keeping Phillips’s statement secret.

Phillips, an aircraft parts technician and father of a 17-month-old son, alleged he suffered a concussion after he was beaten by five officers during a July 28 arrest outside Tryst Nightclub in the Entertainment District. He faces charges of assaulting a peace officer and obstruction of justice.

An SIU officer called Phillips Monday to tell him the outcome of his complaint.

“I almost started crying on the phone,” he said. “I’m so upset. I’m so angry.”

“Did I kick myself in the head? Did I give myself bruises in the back of my ears? Did I slam my own face on the ground?”

A complaint investigation was launched after Phillips filed a handwritten statement with the Office of the Independent Police Review Director last August, following two hospital visits that confirmed he had suffered a concussion.

In September, the OIPRD sent Phillips’s complaint to the Toronto police for investigation. Toronto police then forwarded it in October to the SIU, which probes police-civilian incidents involving serious injury or death. But when SIU investigators asked Toronto police for Phillips’s statement, the force said it did not have the authority to hand it over because the statement belonged to the OIPRD.

The OIPRD, meanwhile, could not send the report to the SIU because its privacy policy says it can only send a complaint to the affected police force. It can, however, send the grievance back to the complainant upon request. Phillips made that request on Jan. 4, obtained the form, gave it to the SIU, and the investigation was reopened last Monday.

On the night in question last summer, Phillips and a group of people were leaving a nightclub when one of his friends got in an argument with a security guard. Phillips and his friend were then taken to the ground by a group of police officers and arrested.The SIU found “significant” discrepancies in the accounts given by Phillips and his friends, the security guard and police.

“All in all,” SIU director Ian Scott said in a news release, “I am not satisfied on reasonable grounds that the subject officer caused the injuries in question, and if he did that the force used was excessive.”

Original Article
Source: the star
Author: Amy Dempsey

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