Sept 29, 2016

Blue Line News Week

Police body camera study released

Toronto police have made a request for funding to the Police Board to equip all front line officers with a body camera despite some reservations.  The cost is estimated at $85 million over ten years and one of major pre-occupations is the time it will take those same officers to identify and sort the material recorded for storage – some say from 39 minutes to 2 hours per shift.  A five hour battery life is another technical problem for officers often on 10 hour shifts.  http://blueline.ca/uploads/issue/pdf/663/BLNW_2016-09-23.pdf   (Cf p. 6 of the same link for a report on the decision by Ottawa police to adopt cameras after rejecting the idea.)

Toronto Star – Bob Hepburn

Beware: Kellie Leitch is on a winning roll – Tory leadership candidate looks to Europe for anti-immigrant strategy

Early in the Conservative Party leadership contest, Kelly Leitch, the MP for Simcoe (ON) opened her bid by announcing a plan for verifying that refugees and immigrants to Canada professed Canadian values, and for a while, we discussed what were, and even if there were, Canadian values.  Hepburn’s article offers a warning around the disposition of the Canadian voter for exactly some sort of determination on Canadian values as part of the admissions process.  Hepburn also offers a tour of the policies in various European countries on the status of refugees and the reaction of the population to them. https://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2016/09/29/beware-kellie-leitch-is-on-a-winning-roll-hepburn.html   Related article: National Newswatch – Glen Pearson    When Accepting Refugees Is No Longer Enough   http://www.nationalnewswatch.com/2016/09/29/when-accepting-refugees-is-no-longer-enough/

CBC Documentary Event – The Torture Files

Oct. 4, 2016 at 6 – 8PM   C-180, 1 Wellington Avenue, Ottawa

Please pre-register at cheryl.hardcastle@parl.gc.ca ASAP

The event will be hosted by Cheryl Hardcastle, M.P., Vice Chair of the Subcommittee for International Human Rights; Gary Anandasangaree, M.P (Scarborough—Rouge Park), as well as Scott Reid, M.P. (Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston) will serve as co-sponsors for the forum.  The event will feature three panelists:  Kerry Pither, author of Dark Days: The Story of Four Canadians Tortured in the Name of Fighting Terror; Alex Neve, Secretary General of Amnesty International Canada (English Branch);
Craig Scott, Professor of Law, Osgoode Hall Law School of York University, and expert in international human rights law.

Ottawa event:  Forum on justice for Abdirahman Abdi

Oct 2nd, 10 am- 5.30 pm (Hintonburg Community Center, 1064 Wellington Street West  or 5.30 pm- 8 pm Tom Brown Arena, 141 Bayview Road   http://muslimlink.ca/event/event/2964-justice-for-abdirahman-community-conference/0

CBC Radio Documentary:  To air Oct 12, 2016

Healing with the man, Glen Flett, who murdered her dad http://www.cbc.ca/beta/news/canada/nova-scotia/programs/informationmorningns/restorative-justice-is-on-the-rise-in-canada-1.3655643  (An 11 minute interview with Sawbonna founder Margot Van Sluytman at the recent RJ Conference in Halifax.)

VERA Institute (US)

Safe Alternatives to Segregation Initiative

VERA has been awarded a Department of Justice grant to expand its alternative to segregation to a number of other districts.  The VERA group has a resource page at the link and the second link is a video of a recent panel on the topic.  Resource page:  http://www.safealternativestosegregation.org/    Reforming the Use of Solitary Confinement: A Conversation (A one hour video with several expert panelists) https://www.vera.org/research/reforming-the-use-of-solitary-confinement-a-conversation