The women who gathered in the conference room of a downtown office tower Tuesday morning, August 13, were ostensibly there for a single purpose: to call for yet another review of police conduct, this time in the wake of the Sammy Yatim shooting.
But the rare coming together of the mothers and sisters of half a dozen cop shooting victims was also a reminder that the uproar over Yatim’s death is about more than seeking justice for one family. His public gunning-down has left previous victims’ loved ones determined that, unlike the tragedies they endured, this one will lead to far-reaching changes for the police.
“Enough. Enough,” said Jackie Christopher, tears in the corners of her eyes as she sat before the cameras in the offices of the Urban Alliance on Race Relations at Yonge and Carlton. “Something has to be done. And until the system starts to hold the officers who do these things responsible, it’s going to keep happening again and again and again.”
When the news of Yatim’s slaying came on the television three weeks ago, Christopher said, she couldn’t bear to watch, so similar were his final moments to those of her son.
Like Yatim, O’Brien Christopher-Reid was shot to death by police after he pulled a knife and refused to comply with officers’ commands. Christopher says clearly the force hasn’t learned from her son’s shooting.
“All the wounds reopened again,” she said, “because I know that they have done nothing.”
As speakers took to the microphones, they uniformly described disappointment in the official response to their relatives’ deaths. Inquests and investigations were called, recommendations were made, but the shootings have continued, they said.
“How many coroner’s inquests do we have to go through, and how many recommendations have to come out of these coroner’s inquests for the police to listen?” asked Karyn Greenwood-Graham. Her son Trevor was shot by Waterloo police in 2007, and like Christopher-Reid, he had a history of mental illness.
“We cannot any longer accept the way people are gunned down while in crisis. We don’t want to accept that any more,” she said.
Officially, the press conference, co-hosted by groups including the Ontario Federation of Labour, the Urban Alliance on Race Relations and the Black Action Defence Committee, was held to call for an independent, top-to-bottom investigation into police training and policy. But the activists, lawyers and victims’ relatives who took part threw out their own suggestions as well, including overhauling the SIU, the provincial police watchdog prohibiting officers from carrying guns and compelling them to wear body-mounted cameras.
Beyond any specific solutions, organizers expressed cautious optimism that the widespread anger over Yatim’s death could be harnessed to prevent further police shootings.
“I think this is part of the tipping point,” said Greenwood-Graham.
Emotions over Yatim are still raw. After the press conference, a few hundred protesters gathered at Yonge-Dundas Square and marched to police headquarters. Yatim’s family walked at the head of the crowd, while from the back of a pickup truck his sister Sarah shouted into a microphone, helping to lead marchers in chants of “Don’t let him die in vain!” and “Justice for Sammy! Justice for all!”
Relatives of other police shooting victims also participated, among them Ruth Schaeffer, whose son Levi was killed by the OPP in 2009, and Tony Vega Jr., who held above his head a picture of his father, shot dead by a Toronto officer in 1992.
As the protesters gathered outside police headquarters on College, officials inside at a meeting of the Police Services Board did their best to demonstrate that they were taking public concern about the Yatim incident seriously. His family was quietly welcomed to the meeting room just as board chair Alok Mukherjee finished delivering a statement on Sammy’s death, his second since the killing.
While stressing that because the SIU is still investigating he couldn’t express any opinion on the incident, Mukherjee said the board was “committed very strongly to doing everything within our authority so that the risk of another such tragedy happening is greatly reduced.”
“The board shares the community’s determination that Sammy Yatim’s death should not be in vain,” the statement concluded.
After Mukherjee solemnly shook hands with the family, they were shepherded upstairs for a private meeting with Chief Bill Blair.
Three separate investigations have been launched as a result of the Yatim case: the SIU probe a provincial ombudsman’s review of de-escalation training and a major reassessment of police procedure for dealing with people in emotional distress, which at Blair’s request is being led by former associate chief justice of Ontario Dennis O’Connor.
After the meeting, Mukherjee told reporters he hopes these investigations will allow the board to determine why recommendations stemming from past shootings don’t seem to have taken hold.
Measures like enhanced de-escalation and mental health training have been put in place, he said, but “the question is, have they produced the results they were intended to, and if not, what’s the next course of action to take?”
He believes the service could be in need of “a cultural change” in terms of how officers use lethal force and de-escalate conflicts. But he was also blunt about his desire for the chief to have a freer hand when it comes to disciplining officers who don’t follow proper procedure.
The board is advocating for changes to parts of the Police Services Act that preclude suspending officers without pay (the cop who shot Yatim is suspended but still collecting his salary) and make it extremely difficult to fire members of the force who may be unfit for duty.
“Right now, it is very, very, very hard to terminate a police officer,” Mukherjee said. “And there are occasions when you say, How in god’s name is this person working here?'”
After meeting with the family, Blair spoke with reporters and defended current police practices. According to the chief, many recommendations from past inquests have been implemented. But, he said, the force remains “committed to continuous improvement.”
“I’m not going to pre-empt the review that Justice O’Connor will do on my behalf, and if we identify additional things we need to do, we’ll certainly do everything we can to improve the quality of our service,” he said.
Yatim’s won’t be the only family watching.
bens@nowtoronto.com | @bens
