A 44-year-old black man is suing the City of Montreal and two officers from his police force in the hope of obtaining compensation of $125,000 following a “brutal” arrest which he associates with a case of racial profiling.
On November 3, Brice Dossa, a beneficiary attendant from Benin, was walking to his car after going to a restaurant in the Central Market, in Ahuntsic-Cartierville, when he noticed a vehicle immobilized behind his. .
“As he is about to touch the handle of his door, he feels someone behind him brutally pull his right arm to bring him back”, details an originating application filed Tuesday at the Superior Court of Quebec. . The Montrealer is represented by lawyer Fernando Belton, who specializes in racial profiling cases.
Another plainclothes policeman then comes to lend a hand to his colleague to subdue Mr. Dossa, who fears being the victim of a “gratuitous or intentional attack by two civilians”, the peace officers not having yet identified. “Not understanding what is happening, he is very scared”, details the lawsuit.
The two policemen then put handcuffs on the wrists of the man, who then asks why he was thus arrested. “Following questions from Mr. Dossa concerning the intervention, the two individuals in civilian clothes identify themselves as police officers and tell him that his Honda CR-V vehicle has been identified as stolen property”, indicates the lawsuit.
Error
However, the police did not ask Mr. Dossa for any identification and instead carried out a telephone check lasting 10 to 15 minutes after handcuffing the father of the family. The two police officers then realize that they have made a mistake: the vehicle in question does indeed belong to Brice Dossa, who has acquired it legally.
Mr. Dossa then asked the police to remove the handcuffs, which injured his wrists. It was then that the police noticed that they did not have the keys to them in their possession.
“Indignant, Mr. Dossa asks the two SPVM police officers [Service de police de la ville de Montréal] if he has this treatment because he has black skin, since the SPVM police officers told him that the vehicle was stolen when there had been no investigation before arresting him, ” mentions the lawsuit. However, “a simple check in their system”, on the part of the police, “would have made it possible not to use excessive force or to intervene illegally with Mr. Dossa”, adds the document.
This police intervention, at the end of which Brice Dossa was finally released from his handcuffs, had also attracted a crowd of pedestrians intrigued by this event. A video of the scene was then shared on social media and viewed thousands of times. Faced with the popular indignation aroused by this arrest, the SPVM announced a few days later that it had opened an investigation to shed light on this affair.
However, since then, “at least one complaint” has been filed with the Police Ethics Commissioner, who has started his own investigation in connection with this event, the SPVM said on Wednesday in an email to Duty. This investigation takes precedence over that conducted internally by the police force. “If, at the end of the investigation, the file is submitted to the Police Ethics Committee and sanctions are imposed, the SPVM has, like any police force in Quebec, a legal obligation to apply them”, adds the written declaration. .
Mayor Valérie Plante’s office and the City refrained from commenting on this lawsuit. Brice Dossa, for his part, is claiming an amount totaling $125,000 from the City, as the employer of the SPVM, and from the two peace officers involved in this case.
The man claims to have suffered in particular racial profiling and post-traumatic stress disorder associated with this police intervention, which forced him to be absent from work for two months, on the recommendation of a doctor. He then suffered significant financial losses that prevented him from fulfilling his financial obligations to his parents and his 15-year-old daughter, the lawsuit says.