The rise in police ethics complaints dealing with racism or racial profiling continued in 2021, and those related to traffic stops have almost doubled since 2019, according to information obtained by The duty. These interventions remain the blind spot in the fight against racial profiling, according to a recent judgment invalidating traffic stops without cause. Moreover, no amount has yet been allocated by the Ministry of Public Security for the Police Ethics Commissioner to set up a prevention program.
“I have been intercepted much more often in Montreal than in the United States in recent years, notes Romel Dérival, a 47-year-old Montreal engineer of Haitian origin who has been living in California for nearly twenty years. What’s sad is that I’m used to it. »
Mr. Dérival is one of three citizens since 2019 to have won against police officers before the Police Ethics Committee, which concluded that he was the subject of racial profiling during a road interception.
He visits his relatives several times a year. In September 2018, he was intercepted without cause behind the wheel of the Porsche Carrera 911 lent to him by his best friend who lives in Montreal. The police claimed that the vehicle belonged to a woman. On his way to a dinner with friends, Mr. Dérival is looking for a parking space on the Plateau Mont-Royal when he is intercepted.
“I’m about to turn left. The policeman, on the right. He stops next to my car and we exchange a look, the kind of look where I know I’m getting arrested, that’s unequivocal! “recalls Mr. Dérival.
Two or three minutes after making his turn, Mr. Dérival saw the gleam of police flashing lights in his rear view mirror. “He was surprised to see my California driver’s license. I explained to him that the vehicle belonged to a longtime friend. He said to me: “Ah yeah, she lent you that car, like that?” he says in an interview.
After a few minutes, the policeman gives him his papers, emphasizing that he is “very strong for this kind of vehicle”.
“I resume my journey to look for parking and then I see the flashing lights again. The police come out and say that my name has been “flagged” in the United States and that they have to do additional checks. I say to myself, “I just got through customs without a problem, it’s only been two weeks”. After 15 or 20 minutes, they returned my papers to me again and told me that everything was ok,” recalls Mr. Dérival.
Shocked by Mr. Dérival’s interception, the owner of the vehicle and friend of the latter filed a complaint against officers Mathieu Lachance and Vincent Marcotte. “Are your agents able to conceive that certain visible minorities have succeeded financially? Are they able to conceive that we too can drive Porsches, Range Rovers, Denali? Or are these luxury cars exclusive to native Quebecers? she asks in an email sent to the commander of the officers involved. Seeing the commander come to their defence, she decides to file a complaint with the Police Ethics Commissioner.
It therefore took four years for the case to end up in court and for the judge to declare that the police had breached their code of ethics.
“The intervention of the two officers is racial profiling while the police testify that they only carried out a random interception for a routine check”, can we read in a judgment rendered last July.
“I thought it wasn’t going to work. I really got into it when my friend told me that one of the police officers had had complaints before. That’s when I said to myself that I had a duty to continue my efforts,” explains Mr. Dérival.
The sanction of the two police officers will be debated before the Police Ethics Committee on Wednesday. Since then, the situation has not improved for Mr. Dérival, who again during his last visit to the metropolis, was intercepted for the umpteenth time, still without reason.
1% of complaints sanctioned
Although his 2021-2022 annual report is not yet public, the Police Ethics Commissioner has confirmed to the To have to that the upward trend in complaints received had continued last year. Complaints in the context of roadside interceptions are still twice as high as those recorded in 2019.
Last year, 60 to 65% of complaints received for racism or racial profiling were refused after a preliminary analysis. Generally speaking, about 30% of the complaints retained go to conciliation, a meeting with a mediator to reach an amicable settlement. “Generally, if there were no words of a clearly racist nature, it is very difficult to prove the guilt of the police officers”, estimates Massimiliano Mulone, researcher in criminology at the University of Montreal.
It takes four to six years between the filing of a complaint and the end of proceedings before the police ethics committee, the administrative tribunal that deals with these cases. According to Mr. Mulone, only 1% of complaints lead to a sanction from the police.
In May 2021, the Green paper on the police reality in Quebec recommended the establishment of a prevention program by the Ethics Commissioner which should be followed by the police. The proposal, however, has not received funding from the Ministry of Public Security, according to our information.
Marie-Ève Bilodeau, Secretary General and Head of Prevention for the Police Ethics Commissioner, regularly gives training to Quebec police officers, but firmly believes in the benefits of prevention in the fight against racial profiling.
“The best would be to avoid complaints. We know the criticisms, we are able to work upstream. Even if they are not always proven, we can also work on the perceptions of the facts, we must not minimize the importance of perceptions. We want to draw up profiles by police organization, identify trends in order to raise awareness [les policiers]. We could thus say to the police: “you have had so many complaints on this subject, is it possible that you have a problem at this level?” she explains.
Mme Bilodeau believes that the police must also better popularize their role when they intervene with a citizen. “The citizen is not aware of his rights and duties, and the police officer must explain the reasons for the intervention, make sure he is understood. The police will tell us: “I asked questions, but the person overreacted”. Overreacted compared to what, to whom? To the white citizen? You have to try to put yourself in the other person’s shoes. There are good police officers, but others, for their own reasons, do not make the effort to understand, ”she notes.
An article that saves lives?
The story of Romel Dérival is reminiscent of that of Joseph-Christopher Luamba, a Montreal student of Haitian origin, who had been intercepted without reason three times in 2019 and 2020 without ever receiving a statement of offense. The young man had turned to the courts, arguing that the random interceptions were nothing but the source of many cases of racial profiling.
The case was heard before Judge Michel Yergeau. At the end of the trial, the latter concluded on October 25 that the random interceptions were “a vector of racial profiling” and contravene the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Judge Yergeau thus invalidates the power of the police to intercept motorists without reason in a 170-page decision.
I have been intercepted much more often in Montreal than in the United States in recent years. What’s sad is that I’m used to it.
The day after this important judgment fell, the Association of Quebec Police Directors (ADPQ) said it was worried about losing this power which “saves lives”. However, noted Judge Yergeau in his judgment, “at the present time, no police service in Quebec systematically compiles” data on race “that would make it possible to establish the link between these interceptions, based essentially on intuition let us remember, and the number of unlicensed drivers removed from the road, the number of stolen cars found, the number of vehicles unfit for driving or the number of impaired drivers”.
The governments of Quebec and Canada, against whom this legal action was directed, defended the importance of this power without, however, being able to “explain how the specific type of police stop would lead to societal benefits more important than the negative effects it creates for racialized people and their loved ones, ”underlines the judge.
The duty notably communicated with the police forces of Montreal, Laval, Longueuil, Repentigny, Saint-Jérôme, Terrebonne, Gatineau and Quebec as well as with the Ministry of Public Security, in order to find out whether the latter had in their possession data concerning the road interceptions. None of them was able to provide data to the To have to.
All the police forces also affirmed that no form of profiling was tolerated. For the sake of confidentiality, however, they were not able to say how many police officers had been subject to disciplinary proceedings in relation to a case of discrimination or profiling.
Several police forces claim to make their officers aware of the problems related to racial profiling, whether through workshops or discussions. However, Judge Yergeau pointed out in his judgment that to date, “despite the education and training efforts deployed in recent years among students in police techniques, recruits and serving police officers , there is no evidence of the results of these efforts in terms of reducing unreasonable roadside stops targeting Black communities.”
The Ministère de la Sécurité publique is currently working with the Commission des droits de la personne et des droits de la jeunesse, the École nationale de police du Québec and the Police ethics commissioner to set up a training offer to Quebec police officers aimed at combating racial and social profiling.
In the course of his work, Massimiliano Mulone was able to observe that there is no data to differentiate interception without reason from interception with reason. “There is also no data that shows that if you replace pointless interceptions with roadblocks, it will be less effective,” he notes.
He is also worried about the reaction of Prime Minister François Legault, who, the day after the Yergeau judgment, declared that “we must let the police do their job”. “It’s as if he took the side of a majority and said to the minority: ‘It doesn’t matter what happens to you, to be stopped and intercepted in a useless way repeatedly. It does not matter. It is more important the hypothetical effect of these arrests”, he argues.