Cops versus COBPs

>> Court foils police attempt to clamp down on watchdog activists

by PHILIP PREVILLE

For someone who spent three full days in prison last week, including 28 consecutive hours in solitary confinement, Patrick Borden is surprisingly upbeat. With glee in his voice, he describes the police's reaction when he refused the release conditions that were presented to him last Wednesday, after he was arrested without warrant. "They were astonished," he says. "It's as though they had delivered their best and hardest punch, and nothing happened. What do you do then?"

Borden, along with fellow activists Yves Manseau and Davida (Dee) Lecomte, are now free after a provincial court judge released them on Friday afternoon. All three suffered a similar ordeal: early Wednesday morning, police showed up at their homes requesting they accompany them to the station, saying nothing about an arrest. Everyone saw the writing on the wall. "They had no warrant, but it was clear they were going to arrest me," Borden says. Police also approached the residence of Alexandre Popovic, who was not home at the time. Popovic's current whereabouts remain unknown; police are still looking for him.

All the activists are members of the police watchdog group Citoyen(nes) opposées à la brutalité policière (COBP); all three were also arrested at the time of the Dec. 3 anti-hunger demonstration at the Queen Elizabeth Hotel. But the charges behind their most recent arrest are part of a story that is becoming increasingly convoluted--and, they believe, part of a police attempt to clamp down on activism.

Following the Queen E arrests, a group of about 20 activists appeared in municipal court on Feb. 5 for their preliminary hearings. After six individuals had entered their pleas, and after a scene in which Borden was carted away by police to be fingerprinted, the remaining hearings were postponed. The assembled activists, angered by the court's decision, went to the office of city prosecutor Gérard Lagüe to demand an explanation.

By all accounts, the ensuing scene was less than courteous. Lagüe refused to speak with the activists, prompting some individuals to briefly bang on his office door. When Lagüe emerged from his office for lunch, he was escorted by six security guards. In the mêlée, Lagüe was bumped and shoved from behind.

It's this particular altercation that led to their arrests last week. Borden is accused of assault for shoving Lagüe; the diminutive Lecomte of smacking a security guard upside the head; and Manseau of unlawful assembly and breach of his prior conditions. And so what began last Dec. 3 as an anti-hunger demonstration has now become a direct confrontation between a group of activists and the judicial apparatus. In the process, police are ironically drawing more and more attention to the COBP, which did not organize the original Queen E action.

Lawyer Pascal Lescarbeau, who represents Borden and Popovic, says police are targeting specific individuals. "It's the same people they keep going after," Lescarbeau says, pointing out that both Manseau and Popovic were also singled out and detained following the Queen E action. "The charges are never laid in relation to the evidence at hand. I'm not being political here. I'm basing this on the facts that matter to the court."

Borden's conditions--particularly one which would have prohibited him from carrying a weapon--leads Borden to wonder about the police's motivation: "I've never owned a weapon in my life. They're trying to criminalize us."

All three were released on the conditions that they leave any demonstration once it becomes unlawful and that they stay away from the courthouse. But this week Manseau launched an appeal to the latter condition, saying it will prevent him from doing his job. "The Police Ethics Commission is located at the courthouse. So is the Ombudsman, so is the Minister of Justice, and so is the Poitras Commission (which is currently investigating the Sûreté du Québec)," says Manseau. "These are all people I deal with in my daily work."

Worst of all, says Manseau, is that he was charged with breaching his prior conditions when, in fact, he had none. "I appealed my prior conditions and they were all thrown out. That means I was arrested and detained for three days based on false charges. I don't know if people realize just how serious that is."

All three activists will appear in court again March 4, to set a date for future court proceedings.