The day after George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis, a documentary about merciless beatings by Toronto police in 2010 had its world premiere
That’s the mightily reserved way Barack Obama described what police officer Derek Chauvin did during the arrest in Minneapolis on Monday. I would prefer to simply say that Chauvin killed him. A criminal investigation will determine the legal nature of that death: murder, negligent homicide, manslaughter or justified use of force.
The TVO documentary, made by veteran journalist and war correspondent Martin Himel, reminded me of a lacuna in my own columns. I have written dozens of them about the wrongfully convicted; I have neglected to point out that the abuse of police power can begin with the arrest. Do not think that wealth or power is protection against that, even if most wrongful arrests are of the poor and the weak. Remember the case of Vice-Admiral Mark Norman, second-in-command of Canada’s armed forces. Being vice-chief of the defence staff did not prevent him from being arrested and charged with leaking confidential government information. He lost his job.
Davin Charney, the lawyer who is the hero of Himel’s documentary, was himself subject to a wrongful arrest and imprisoned for two weeks on dubious charges of which he was acquitted.
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