True police reform requires defunding police
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1. Dr. Barnett sues Halifax police
Halifax Regional Police headquarters on Gottingen Road in June 2021. — Picture: Zane Woodford
“A physician wrongly accused of kid pornography offences after a cross-border identify mix-up is suing a number of Halifax Regional Cops in search of greater than $3 million in damages, citing the ‘highhanded, surprising, contemptuous conduct of the defendants,’” reports Zane Woodford:
Dr. David Barnett, a household doctor in Dartmouth, was arrested in December 2020 on suspicion of possession and distribution of kid pornography. The Nova Scotia Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons suspended Barnett’s licence, and he was launched beneath situations, together with that he steer clear of faculties and computer systems.
Costs had been by no means really sworn as a result of it turned out to be a case of mistaken id primarily based on a transparent error.
In January 2021, the Crown threw out the fees, the school restored Barnett’s licence, and the police blamed the screw up on American counterparts who referred the case to them.
As alleged within the swimsuit, the Halifax police division is making an attempt guilty others, nevertheless it was complicit within the wrongful arrest.
An American police division requested Google for particulars a couple of gmail account for somebody named Dustin Barnett, however mistakenly gave the corporate an e mail tackle utilized by Dr. Barnett (as the 2 males share a typical final identify and the identical first preliminary, the 2 e mail addresses are related however not equivalent).
The error was apparent — when Halifax police utilized for a search warrant to grab Dr. Barnett’s pc tools, the magistrate noticed the error and refused to approve the warrant. The Halifax police ought to’ve dropped the matter there after which however as an alternative seem to have “decide shopped,” writes Woodford:
“As an alternative of conducting an intensive and correct investigation into the problem raised by the magistrate, Officer [Jennifer] Murray merely modified the preliminary [Information to Obtain] indicating that the second e mail tackle was Dr. Barnett’s restoration e mail for one more e mail account and the search warrant was granted,” Falconer and James wrote.
…
The defendants “wilfully ignored” the variations within the emails, “failing to hold out even essentially the most rudimentary investigation earlier than effecting arrest,” Barnett’s attorneys declare.
That is past egregious. Dr. Barnett, a very harmless man of apparent good character, was very publicly named as somebody suspected of trafficking in youngster porn; his world was upturned, he was suspended from his job, and he needed to face family and friends who knew of the arrest. I don’t understand how you set a worth on the trauma he suffered and should nonetheless endure.
Named within the swimsuit are Detective Constable Jennifer Murray, Constable Scott Fairbairn, Constable Shaun Carvery, Constable Angela Balcom, Officer(s) Jane/John Doe of Halifax Regional Police, Halifax Board of Police Commissioners, Constable Ericka Giguere, Officer(s) Jane/John Doe of Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and Her Majesty The Queen in Proper of the Lawyer Basic of Canada (The Royal Canadian Mounted Police).
Past the simple injustice performed to Dr. Barnett, this case will get to how police receive search warrants. In September 2020, I wrote about how Decide Del Atwood rejected a search warrant as a result of it appeared an RCMP officer lied within the Data to Acquire submitted to the court docket:
“It seems that the officer labours beneath the misapprehension — shared by quite a few policing providers on this a part of the Province — that the position of the court docket within the warrant-issuance course of is an computerized one, merely to rubber-stamp purposes by investigative businesses,” wrote Atwood. “Not so. It is because the choice whether or not to challenge an order or warrant includes the train of judicial discretion.”
…
Decide Atwood can’t be unaware of Nova Scotia’s lengthy historical past of wrongful convictions, together with the wrongful convictions of Donald Marshall Junior and Glen Assoun, amongst others. There are repeated themes within the wrongful convictions, and with shocking directness, Atwood pointed at precisely that downside:
That is harmful territory. I say so as a result of virtually each fee of inquiry performed in Canada into confirmed cases of wrongful conviction has recognized investigative tunnel-vision as being a significant component resulting in miscarriages of justice. Tunnel imaginative and prescient includes focussing prematurely on an individual of curiosity, then gathering and analysing proof selectively: proof that confirms the id of the individual of curiosity because the offender will probably be preserved and made outstanding; proof that may be exculpatory will probably be discounted and written off.
I consider that this investigation is contaminated with that very frailty. The investigator doesn’t search to scrutinize circumstances of ambiguity; fairly, he has determined already who’s accountable and he seeks proof to verify what’s clearly a untimely conclusion. That’s an improper investigative goal.
I’ve tried for years, unsuccessfully, to get extra into this challenge: what number of search warrant purposes are denied, and why?
I can’t reply that query, however my suspicion is there aren’t many, because it appears doubtless that regardless of the occasional Decide Atwood, most JPs do actually rubber-stamp the purposes.
I’ll attempt to take one other stab at this challenge.
And past that challenge, can we discuss defunding police?
Whether or not he will get the complete $3 million+, there may be little doubt that Dr. Barnett will get a deserved substantial settlement. How might anybody argue that he shouldn’t?
However the place will that $3 million come from? By some means, it should come from town treasury. Both it’s off-loaded to the bigger metropolis funds or comes instantly out of the police funds, however both means, it represents a cloth value of the police division.
But, it doesn’t matter what, the settlement (which is able to doubtless be certain to a non-disclosure settlement in any case) won’t be talked about when the police chief requests a rise within the police funds — Dan Kinsella won’t inform metropolis councillors, “oh, we want $3 million extra as a result of we ruined a man’s life.” Moderately, it will likely be all about operational prices and such.
That is the way it goes. When the police fuck up, they want extra money to repair the fuck-ups. Once they discriminate towards Black folks by overly concentrating on them with police stops, they want extra money for sensitivity coaching. When there are allegations of police brutality, the police funds have to be elevated to pay for physique cameras and the large prices of storing the info and paying the authorized prices associated to utilizing the info.
There is no such thing as a police wrongdoing that may’t be solved by growing the police funds, besides doing so by no means solves the issue.
In what different line of labor is incompetence rewarded with bigger budgets?
Right here’s an concept: each time the police fuck up, the division funds must be decreased, not elevated.
Damage a health care provider’s life? The settlement cash comes out of the police funds. An individual dies in custody? The division funds get cuts by 10%. Beat up an harmless Black individual? Two million {dollars} off the highest.
There may be nothing that focuses the thoughts of managers greater than the prospect of seeing their budgets reduce. True police reform means defunding police.
2. Postmedia to purchase Brunswick Information
Postmedia has introduced that it’s shopping for Brunswick Information for $7.5 million in money and $8.6 million in Postmedia inventory:
The proposed transaction contains BNI’s proprietary distribution software program powering its parcel supply enterprise. New Brunswick every day and weekly newspapers — together with the Telegraph-Journal, Occasions Globe, Occasions & Transcript, The Each day Gleaner, Miramichi Chief, Woodstock Bugle-Observer, Bathurst Northern Gentle, Kings County Document, The Campbellton Tribune and The Victoria Star — will even be part of the Postmedia community of media properties.
Postmedia is owned primarily (66%) by Chatham Asset Administration, a hedge fund that recurrently slashes information operations after buying them. Reports the New York Times:
Chatham’s observe document as an proprietor of a serious newspaper chain is grim, based on 10 present and former Postmedia workers who spoke with The New York Occasions on the situation of anonymity as a result of they feared retaliation.
Since Chatham took a majority stake in Postmedia, the corporate has reduce its work pressure, shuttered papers throughout Canada, decreased salaries and advantages, and centralized editorial operations in a means that has made elements of its 106 newspapers into clones of each other.
…
Since 2017, Postmedia has paid out over $6.2 million Canadian, or about $4.5 million, in bonuses to its 5 prime executives, together with Mr. MacLeod, the chief govt, and Paul Godfrey, the manager chairman of the board.
In that very same interval, the editorial ranks at The Nationwide Submit, its flagship paper, have been decreased by a couple of third, based on three of the folks. The variety of journalists at its Vancouver papers — the Vancouver Solar and The Province — has been reduce in half, based on Mr. Gibson. Altogether, the corporate has reduce over 1,600 workers since 2016, or 38 p.c of its employees, primarily based on firm filings.
Brunswick Information operates each English language every day newspaper in New Brunswick, and is presently owned by the Irving household, which presents apparent conflicts of curiosity.
I feel it doubtless that quickly after the sale goes via we’ll see a number of the Brunswick Information papers closed solely and the others consolidated even additional than they already are.
Oh, and there may be little question that Postmedia is trying on the Saltwire community of papers. My guess is that the one factor that has prevented a purchase order of Saltwire is the ongoing lawsuit between Saltwire and Transcontinental, with the 2 events haggling over $10 million. I feel it doubtless {that a} nanosecond after the lawsuit is resolved, Postmedia will purchase Saltwire.
None of that is good. As horrible as it’s to have the newspapers in New Brunswick run as an organization city and the newspapers in the remainder of Atlantic Canada run by the incompetent Mark Lever, it will likely be far worse to see all these papers run by the slash-and-burn Postmedia.
The Halifax Examiner does what we will, however compared to these corporations we’re a tiny, tiny operation. Nonetheless, I’ve lengthy had the concept of opening an Examiner-like operation in New Brunswick, to the purpose of buying some URLs and performing some back-of-the-envelope calculations, however nothing additional as but.
The pandemic has constrained that New Brunswick ambition and I’m personally stretched very skinny operating the Halifax Examiner as is. Nevertheless, the concept continues to be on the desk, and hopefully later this 12 months I’ll be capable to put some legs to it, growing a real marketing strategy and investing what little cash I’ve into it. However, to be sincere, to get to that time requires a rise within the subscriber rolls such that I can dedicate the time essential to establishing a New Brunswick firm (I’ve no intention of working in New Brunswick myself). If you want to help…
3. An unlikely friendship
Recollections Hooked up, Anne Misfeldt, 2022 (contributed)
“’Mom, there’s a Black individual on the couch.’ These had been the primary phrases I ever heard spoken by the Danish collage artist Anne Misfeldt,” writes Evelyn C. White, who goes on to narrate her unlikely friendship with Misfeldt.
After I learn this piece, my first response was, “Evelyn certain is subversive.”
4. Dump
Cell 7A at Otter Lake — the one presently in use — is seen in a photograph in a slide deck included within the employees report back to council. — Picture: HRM
“Halifax’s auditor basic says the municipality must be conducting its personal monitoring of the Otter Lake landfill,” reports Zane Woodford.
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5. Felicity Ace and a reporter with a Porsche
The Felicity Ace is on fireplace within the mid-Atlantic. Picture: Ron Aaron/ Fb
The Felicity Ace is a ship that recurrently carries Porsches and Volkswagens from Emden, Germany to North America. The primary vacation spot is Davisville, Rhode Island, which is one of the largest auto importing ports in the United States, however typically the ship will cease on the Dartmouth Autoport to drop just a few automobiles off right here en path to Davisville.
Felicity Ace wasn’t scheduled to come back to Dartmouth on its present voyage, nevertheless it wouldn’t have made if it had been, as a result of it’s now on fireplace in the course of the Atlantic. Reports CNN:
On the time of the fireplace’s outbreak, the ship was crusing 90 nautical miles southwest of Portugal’s Azores, based on a press release on Wednesday by the Portuguese Navy.
After the fireplace broke out within the cargo maintain, it unfold and compelled all 22 crew members to desert ship. In accordance with one other assertion by the Portuguese Navy, the crew was safely picked up and brought to a neighborhood lodge, with the rescue coordinated by the Ponta Delgada Maritime Search and Rescue Coordination Middle. There was no noticeable supply of air pollution from the fireplace, based on the assertion.
The ship’s homeowners have organized for a tow because it continues to burn. Registered to Panama, the Felicity Alice is operated by Japanese transport line Mitsui O.S.Okay. Strains (MOL).
One of many automobiles on the ship was a Porsche supposed for Matt Farah, a former reporter with Highway & Monitor journal who now runs The Smoking Tire YouTube channel.
I used to be going to do an entire factor about how a reporter can afford a Porsche, however automobiles are Farah’s factor. He runs a car storage business on the facet, and has a fame as a incredible driver and mechanic. He has a net worth of $3.3 million, which within the scheme of issues means he’s a comparatively profitable enterprise individual however not outrageously wealthy. (1,000,000 {dollars} was some huge cash, however not any extra.)
Within the 10 minutes it took me to google Farah this morning, I made a decision I like him, primarily based solely on his Twitter account, which he makes use of to assault the established financial order. “I don’t know who wants to listen to this,” he tweets, “however capitalism shouldn’t be a system value defending. See: the complete world round us.”
Of late, Farah has been railing towards the widespread observe of corporations delaying funds to contractors as a method for maximizing earnings, which has lengthy been one in every of my complaints. They even teach that practice in business schools, which illustrates the rot on the core of our system — making folks wait to receives a commission to allow them to eat is key to enterprise ideas.
Is it hypocritical {that a} man who buys Porsches complains about capitalism? Hey, all of us should live in the world.
Mister Gotcha, by Matt Bors
6. Higher Hammonds Plains Hearth Corridor
The primary govt of the division. Picture: Gina-Jones Wilson.
“Within the Nineteen Sixties, Elizabeth Mantley donated a portion of her land in Higher Hammonds Plains for what turned the primary all-Black volunteer fireplace division in Canada’s historical past,” writes Matthew Byard:
This previous Sunday, at a church service at Emmanuel Baptist Church in Higher Hammonds Plains, Mantley’s daughter, Doreen Mantley, was there to simply accept honours on behalf of her late mom.
The all-Black volunteer fireplace division was based in 1966 and included in 1970. The concrete constructing that housed the division nonetheless exists and was not too long ago reacquired by the Higher Hammonds Plains Group Improvement Affiliation. The affiliation has since launched a capital marketing campaign in search of sponsorships and donations.
The plan is to develop the previous fireplace corridor into the Elizabeth Mantley Youth Leisure and Cultural Arts Centre.
7. Rick Mehta v. Wolfville Animal Hospital
Rick Mehta. Picture: Twitter
This week, the courts revealed a December abstract judgment by Supreme Courtroom Justice Jeffrey R. Hunt in the case Rakesh (Rick) Mehta v. Wolfville Animal Hospital, Dr. Carrie Terry Household Dentistry Inc.
Mehta, you’ll recall, is the “free speech advocate” and Acadia College prof who was fired after insulting his college students.
However this case is actually weird, even by Mehta’s customary. Mehta introduced swimsuit towards the animal hospital as a result of it was implementing Public Well being orders that clients put on masks. Writes Justice Hunt:
Earlier than partaking in an evaluation of the relevant Civil Process Guidelines and caselaw, I intend to evaluation the pleading filed by Dr. Mehta. The Assertion of Declare is basically comprised of assertions across the points of presidency response to the worldwide pandemic and authorities overreach on the query of pandemic response mandates.
The pleading makes clear Dr. Mehta’s view that, actually, there isn’t any international pandemic — his suggestion is that it exists solely as a part of a conspiracy.
If one had been to aim to determine the underlying argument it seems to be that public well being authorities have develop into corrupted by the need to make use of the declared international pandemic to unjustifiably infringe on particular person liberty. Whereas a correct continuing primarily based round these points could definitely be attainable, this doc is crammed with abuse, private assaults and references to memes and conspiracy theories. The shifting events right here contend that the declare is certain to fail and is in violation of the Civil Process Guidelines.
The doc doesn’t have a readily obvious construction. It’s tough to observe what Dr. Mehta could also be trying to set out within the pleading. It begins by quoting quite a few bible passages and goes on to say that Covid-19 is a part of a “…international conspiracy towards God and humanity.” It quotes the 1960 Canadian Invoice of Rights and the following Constitution of Rights earlier than setting out his argument, as he touched on as we speak in oral argument, that these two paperwork are, as he says, “…mutually incompatible with one another.”
The pleading strikes on to refer at some size to an arbitration ruling apparently coping with his dismissal from Acadia College. How these points relate to the problems addressed earlier than or following these passages shouldn’t be solely clear.
He later returns to a dialogue of his view as to the failure of the labour arbitration and grievance system.
The pleading strikes on to a piece headed “Information of Mehta v. Wolfville Animal Hospital”. The next 13 paragraphs element, from his perspective, his engagement with the Wolfville Animal Hospital over the problem of face masking and the knowledge of complying with the well being suggestions of the Chief Medical Officer of Well being. At the least I assume his reference is to face masking. He employs the time period “face diapers” which, primarily based on his different submissions, I take to be his time period for face masking.
Dr. Mehta seems to point that he was unable to get service from the Animal Hospital as a result of he wouldn’t adjust to what he clearly believes is an unjust and overreaching pandemic response mandate.
Dr. Mehta depends on what he describes as “tweets by constitutional lawyer Mr. Rocco Galuti” and “…three books by Dr. Judi Mikovits (the scientist who blew the whistle on Dr. Anthony Fauci…)” because the factual underpinning for his perception that masks mandates aren’t primarily based in science.
The pleading subsequent strikes into a private assault. He writes that as a result of a selected individual’s e mail signature contained each a land acknowledgement and a press release of the author’s most well-liked pronouns, he concludes she is “not of sound thoughts”. Once more, the explanation for together with these feedback is unclear within the context of the pleading.
The subsequent paragraph strikes right into a facet dialogue of Dr. Mehta’s view that the Responsibility of Truthful Illustration within the labour arbitration context “exists solely on paper”. He relates this to his personal unsuccessful dispute with the Acadia College School Union and subsequent dismissal.
The subsequent paragraph accommodates assaults on the Nova Scotia Board of Examiners in Psychology, Wolfville City Council and a named particular person who Dr. Mehta claims had a sexual relationship along with her employer. I’ll chorus from naming this individual, for apparent causes. I make reference to this allegation solely to notice that this can be a additional instance of what the shifting events right here would level out as unwarranted private assault which might be discovered all through the doc.
The doc then strikes to its subsequent part headed “Information of Mehta v. Dr. Carrie Terry Household Dentistry Inc.” On this part of the pleading, Dr. Mehta touches on quite a few the identical components commented upon within the earlier elements of the pleading. Dr. Mehta seems to point that he was unable to get service from the dental clinic as a result of he wouldn’t adjust to what he clearly believes to be unjust public well being suggestions relevant to that service supplier.
Moreover, the pleading equates those that fail to withstand the enforcement of the masks mandate with those that failed to withstand the Third Reich. The top of this part closes close to the JFK assassination and the hazards of communism.
The pleading then continues with quite a few paragraphs showing to set out the treatments being claimed. Dr. Mehta claims the precise to an injunction and declaratory aid primarily based on his perception that Covid-19 is a part of a “international conspiracy towards God and humanity”. The Assertion of Declare ends with a concluding suggestion that Canada has been in a multitude because the Diefenbaker period ended.
In abstract, the pleading is a considerably complicated, rambling and exhausting to navigate set of principally disjointed claims, assertions and assaults. It seems to assert Constitution aid towards personal people and companies. It accommodates abusive feedback and unusual references to obvious conspiracy theories. At numerous factors it seems to be, or might arguably be, an try to relitigate his dismissal from Acadia College.
Dr. Mehta is clearly not a authorized draftsperson. Nevertheless, we don’t strike pleadings as a result of they don’t learn as if written by a legally educated individual. We do strike them, nevertheless, if they’re vexatious, abusive, and doomed to fail.
This man was instructing our youth.
Hunt dominated:
The claims as expressed on this pleading are certain to fail. It’s a jumble of complicated assertions, conspiracy idea and private assault. I’ve assessed whether or not there’s any portion of the pleading that’s non-objectionable and may very well be preserved and separated from the steadiness. I’ve decided this isn’t attainable. There is no such thing as a portion that may very well be saved which might be able to standing by itself and complying with the Guidelines that I’ve beforehand cited. The pleading is fatally flawed and have to be, in compliance with the Guidelines, dismissed in its entirety. That’s the conclusion of the Courtroom.
Hunt additional assigned Mehta $2,400 in prices.
Authorities
Metropolis
Price range Committee (Friday, 9:30am) — virtual meeting
Province
No conferences
On campus
Dalhousie
Planetary Well being Speaker Collection (Friday, 12pm) — online conversation with Samantha Inexperienced, College of Toronto
Pauli Murray and Bayard Rustin’s Queer Nonviolence (Friday, 3:30pm) — online talk by Simon Fisher from the College of Wisconsin-Madison
Within the harbour
Halifax
11:00: Star Pyxis, bulker, sails from Bedford Basin anchorage for sea
18:00: Thalatta, automobile provider, sails from Autoport for sea
18:00: Nolhanava, ro-ro cargo, sails from Fairview Cove for Saint-Pierre
Cape Breton
No arrivals or departures.
Footnotes
I’ve received nothing.
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