George Floyd’s life being taken at the hands of a white police officer in Minneapolis last week “speaks to the value of why we need body-worn cameras” right here in Toronto, police chief Mark Saunders said.
“There isn’t any law enforcement officer that I can think of that did not have a horrible feeling in their stomach when they saw– it still bothers me,” the chief said during a news conference held at Toronto Police Headquarters on Thursday afternoon.
“Take 1940 for example,” he said. “A Black man was hung because he did not address the officer by Mr., he said his first name. These types of atrocities have happened and a lot of people tend to forget that.” “You can figure out how you want to define recent versus past,” he continued. “If my mom and my dad were alive, then it is recent enough for me to say there was a problem, we have gotten better, but the incremental change is why people are so angry right now.”
Body-worn cameras have been absent on the vests of police officers in Toronto for several years now. A pilot project that saw 100 front-line officers be equipped with the cameras for 11 months ended in April 2016. “We have had community town halls on the very discussion on: what are the things that you would like put in play to make sure that we at all times respect privacy, but at the same time have the ability of recording what’s necessary,” he said.