FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) and Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish) territories / Vancouver, BC – Yesterday, the Vancouver Police Board considered two complaints filed by Pivot Legal Society and the BC Civil Liberties Association in September 2024 about the excessive use of force, discriminate treatment and surveillance of Pro-Palestinian protestors. The Police Board determined that the excessive use of force complaint would be deferred, and that the surveillance complaint would be resolved through an investigation pursuant to s. 171(1)(c), of BC’s Police Act, RSBC, 1996, c. 367.
The Police Board recommended that a former Vancouver Police Department (VPD) officer who served in the department for many decades, retiring in 2010 as Deputy Chief Constable be appointed as an external investigator. No timeline or assurance of an investigation independent of pro-police bias was provided, nor was any assurance that the challenged surveillance practices would be immediately suspended.
Meghan McDermott, Policy Director of the BCCLA, who made a public delegation at yesterday’s meeting, says:
“It’s absurd to expect that a former Deputy Chief of the VPD can impartially investigate the serious allegations of mass surveillance that we have put forward in the complaint. It’s incomprehensible that the Board made such an inappropriate selection after listening to our calls for a robust and unbiased investigation. We are strongly opposed to this appointment, which we think makes a mockery of the civilian oversight model for municipal police in BC.”
Simone Akyianu, Staff Lawyer at Pivot Legal Society, says:
“BC’s policing accountability systems are wrought with systemic and other structural barriers, including police bias, that block marginalized groups from achieving any meaningfully accountability. We are dismayed, yet unsurprised by the Vancouver Police Board’s decision to appoint an investigator without any expertise in human rights, and more specifically in addressing anti-Palestinian racism, which includes pervasive forms of anti-Indigenous and anti-Arab animus. The Police Board’s refusal of Pivot’s delegation request demonstrates continued barriers in allowing marginalized members of the public, and human rights organizations that work in community, to achieve any meaningful accountability in respect of the use of discriminate and excessive force against people exercising protected political expression relating to an internationally recognized genocide in Gaza.”
Meena Dhillon, Managing Lawyer South Asian Legal Clinic of BC, says:
“We recommended that the Vancouver Police Board appoint an external examiner with expertise in human rights. Instead, the Board appointed former Deputy Chief of the VPD. This is appointment does not meet the requirements of an impartial third-party examiner. It is imperative that an examiner with an intersectional lens and human rights experience investigate this complaint.”
