And Christie Blatchford reports in the National Post that a judge who issued injunctions lifting blockades of rail lines expressed dismay that the OPP refuses to enforce the law. The story is reproduced under the Fair Dealings provision of the Copyright Act.
Judge slams Ontario police for not breaking up Idle No More protests
Christie Blatchford | Jan 7, 2013 12:03 PM ET | Last Updated: Jan 7, 2013 12:09 PM ET
TORONTO — Saying “I do not get it,” an Ontario Superior Court judge Monday bemoaned the passivity of Ontario police forces on illegal native barricades and issued a lament for the state of law-and-order in the nation.
“…no person in Canada stands above or outside of the law,” Judge David Brown said in a decision that was alternately bewildered and plaintive.
“Although that principle of the rule of law is simple, at the same time it is fragile. Without Canadians sharing a public expectation of obeying the law, the rule of law will shatter.”
Judge Brown was formally giving his reasons for having granted CN Rail an emergency injunction last Saturday night, when the railway rushed to court when Idle No More protesters blocked the Wymans Road crossing on the main line between Toronto and Montreal.
That protest ended about midnight the same night, but as Judge Brown noted dryly, “not, as it turns out, because the police had assisted in enforcing the order” he granted.
When the judge read in the media Sunday morning that the blockade had ended, he asked CN to submit an affidavit how it had happened.
As the same judge who last month watched — “shocked,” he said later, at “such disrespect” — as Sarnia Police ignored his court orders to end another Idle No More blockade on a CN spur line, he was right to be skeptical.
And sure enough, what Judge Brown learned was that once the local sheriff got a copy of his order, by about 10:30 p.m. Saturday, she contacted the Ontario Provincial Police on scene.
The staff-sergeant there told her “it was too dangerous” to attempt to serve the order – on all of 15 protesters.
But, the judge said, he’d made “a time-sensitive order” precisely because the evidence showed that the railway suffered “from each hour the blockade remained in place, yet the OPP would not assist the local sheriff to ensure the order was served…
“Such an approach by the OPP was most disappointing,” Judge Brown said, “because it undercut the practical effect of the injunction order.
“That kind of passivity by the police leads me to doubt that a future exists in this province for the use of court injunctions in cases of public demonstrations.”
Judge Brown said that while he appreciates that Ontario Court of Appeal has said the rule of law can be applied in a “highly textured” or “nuanced” way when protesters are aboriginals involved in a land claim dispute, that doesn’t apply “to 15 people standing on the CN Main Line saying they were showing support for First Nations Chiefs in a forthcoming meeting with the Prime Minister.
“Such conduct had nothing to do with the process involved in sorting out land or usage claims…” the judge said.
“…it was straight-forward political protest, pure and simple. Just as 15 persons from some other group would have no right to stand in the middle of the Main Line tracks blocking rail traffic in order to espouse a political cause close to their hearts, neither do 15 persons from a First Nation.”
The judge expressed “astonishment” that Sarnia Police failed to enforce court orders for almost two weeks, and then that protesters again blocked the Main Line for five hours, just a week after another demonstration in the same area.
He already had concerns, he said, stemming out of what occurred in Sarnia, about the willingness of police forces to enforce injunctions involving native protesters, but issued the order Saturday night because CN lawyers showed how serious were the effects of the blockade of the main line.
Furthermore, Judge Brown said, police already have sufficient tools under the Criminal Code to remove illegal protests. “In light of those powers of arrest enjoyed by police officers,” he wondered, “why does the operator of a critical railway have to run off to court to secure an injunction when a small group of protesters park themselves on the rail line bringing operations to a grinding halt?
“I do not get it,” he said.
As a member of one part of the law-and-order equation, Judge Brown said, “I remain puzzled why another part – our police agencies and their civilian overseers – does not make use of the tools given to it by our laws to ‘ensure the safety and security of all persons and property in Ontario’,” which he said is the first principle governing police services.
He warned “we seem to be drifting into dangerous waters in the life of the public affairs of this province when the courts cannot predict, with any practical degree of certainty, whether police agencies” will assist in enforcing court orders.
Judge slams Ontario police for not breaking up Idle No More protests
Christie Blatchford | Jan 7, 2013 12:03 PM ET | Last Updated: Jan 7, 2013 12:09 PM ET
TORONTO — Saying “I do not get it,” an Ontario Superior Court judge Monday bemoaned the passivity of Ontario police forces on illegal native barricades and issued a lament for the state of law-and-order in the nation.
“…no person in Canada stands above or outside of the law,” Judge David Brown said in a decision that was alternately bewildered and plaintive.
“Although that principle of the rule of law is simple, at the same time it is fragile. Without Canadians sharing a public expectation of obeying the law, the rule of law will shatter.”
Judge Brown was formally giving his reasons for having granted CN Rail an emergency injunction last Saturday night, when the railway rushed to court when Idle No More protesters blocked the Wymans Road crossing on the main line between Toronto and Montreal.
That protest ended about midnight the same night, but as Judge Brown noted dryly, “not, as it turns out, because the police had assisted in enforcing the order” he granted.
When the judge read in the media Sunday morning that the blockade had ended, he asked CN to submit an affidavit how it had happened.
As the same judge who last month watched — “shocked,” he said later, at “such disrespect” — as Sarnia Police ignored his court orders to end another Idle No More blockade on a CN spur line, he was right to be skeptical.
And sure enough, what Judge Brown learned was that once the local sheriff got a copy of his order, by about 10:30 p.m. Saturday, she contacted the Ontario Provincial Police on scene.
The staff-sergeant there told her “it was too dangerous” to attempt to serve the order – on all of 15 protesters.
But, the judge said, he’d made “a time-sensitive order” precisely because the evidence showed that the railway suffered “from each hour the blockade remained in place, yet the OPP would not assist the local sheriff to ensure the order was served…
“Such an approach by the OPP was most disappointing,” Judge Brown said, “because it undercut the practical effect of the injunction order.
“That kind of passivity by the police leads me to doubt that a future exists in this province for the use of court injunctions in cases of public demonstrations.”
Judge Brown said that while he appreciates that Ontario Court of Appeal has said the rule of law can be applied in a “highly textured” or “nuanced” way when protesters are aboriginals involved in a land claim dispute, that doesn’t apply “to 15 people standing on the CN Main Line saying they were showing support for First Nations Chiefs in a forthcoming meeting with the Prime Minister.
“Such conduct had nothing to do with the process involved in sorting out land or usage claims…” the judge said.
“…it was straight-forward political protest, pure and simple. Just as 15 persons from some other group would have no right to stand in the middle of the Main Line tracks blocking rail traffic in order to espouse a political cause close to their hearts, neither do 15 persons from a First Nation.”
The judge expressed “astonishment” that Sarnia Police failed to enforce court orders for almost two weeks, and then that protesters again blocked the Main Line for five hours, just a week after another demonstration in the same area.
He already had concerns, he said, stemming out of what occurred in Sarnia, about the willingness of police forces to enforce injunctions involving native protesters, but issued the order Saturday night because CN lawyers showed how serious were the effects of the blockade of the main line.
Furthermore, Judge Brown said, police already have sufficient tools under the Criminal Code to remove illegal protests. “In light of those powers of arrest enjoyed by police officers,” he wondered, “why does the operator of a critical railway have to run off to court to secure an injunction when a small group of protesters park themselves on the rail line bringing operations to a grinding halt?
“I do not get it,” he said.
As a member of one part of the law-and-order equation, Judge Brown said, “I remain puzzled why another part – our police agencies and their civilian overseers – does not make use of the tools given to it by our laws to ‘ensure the safety and security of all persons and property in Ontario’,” which he said is the first principle governing police services.
He warned “we seem to be drifting into dangerous waters in the life of the public affairs of this province when the courts cannot predict, with any practical degree of certainty, whether police agencies” will assist in enforcing court orders.
anytime chum.
