Police “hesitate to act against gangs”
I believe we’ve heard this before: SPVM police moaning that they’re unwilling to act against gangs for fear of being called racist.
In view of Isabelle Hachey’s piece Thursday on police in Repentigny, consider this from Friday’s TVA piece: “Les patrouilleurs connaissent bien les individus criminalisés et avaient l’habitude de les interpeller régulièrement.”
Compare this to Hachey’s analysis that Repentigny police rely on their flair policier – an instinct that mostly leads them to stop, search and question law-abiding Black residents going about their business. Is this any different?
DeWolf 11:04 on 2021-09-24 Permalink
So the cops are saying they can’t crack down on gangs unless they can indiscriminately stop and search Black people. In other words, they’re admitting they have no intelligence on who actually is a gang member and who isn’t. Is the SPVM incompetent?
Considering that they’ve given up on enforcing traffic laws, and they don’t seem inclined to do anything about property crime, I’m wondering what the point of this police force is. All they seem to do is harass people and tear gas protestors (and hockey fans).
steph 11:14 on 2021-09-24 Permalink
> Is the SPVM incompetent?
yes. ACAB.
walkerp 11:38 on 2021-09-24 Permalink
To reinforce steph`s answer: Yes.
Ephraim 12:13 on 2021-09-24 Permalink
Not just incompetent, but clueless. You can’t police from a car and from a camera. You have to be approachable and part of the community. You need to stop the random stops and reach out to understand the community to be able to actually get them to trust you and therefore to give you relevant information.
The whole thing on the black cars, black uniforms and fearing the police doesn’t work. They need to be respected and trusted and it’s the very last thing that is true about them. They would be better off with gong back to wearing light blue shirts, white or light blue cars and the realization that not only are they subject to the law, but that WE are watching them at all times and that they need our respect to police.
PS: Police crime statistics aren’t correlated with crime but with “reported crime”, because a lot of crime isn’t reported, like credit card theft, internal theft, rapes and even shoplifting. So the police rely on crime numbers to suggest that crime is going down, but it’s a societal value that it is going down and has nothing to do with their actual work, because the greatest part of crime today is online and most of these guys couldn’t even trace an IP address.
Mark Côté 13:25 on 2021-09-24 Permalink
The whole “thin blue line” idea, that is, that the cops are the last line of defence holding back violent social chaos, is a terrifying ideology.
GC 15:16 on 2021-09-24 Permalink
Also, they already look racist. That’s not going to get worse if they do their jobs.
qatzelok 17:48 on 2021-09-24 Permalink
The police can certainly follow gang members, hassle them, and even arrest some of them. But it is NOT the police who are going to make the gang phenomenon go away.
Ensuring equal access for all youth to participate in better socialization… is a job for a lot of other departments and social institutions. And for society in general. Schools, sports programs, apprentice programs, school clubs, employment opportunities, and more spontaneous neighborhood involvement in child-rearing and socialization would help. But giving cops yet another group to target… is a cop out. (heh heh)
And even *asking* the police to intervene… could be seen as a sign of ongoing failure on the part of our “rich” society to offer our youth any hope for a decent future.
Kevin 20:48 on 2021-09-24 Permalink
Police who don’t live in your neighbourhood aren’t members of your community.
jeather 20:54 on 2021-09-24 Permalink
Never agreed with you more, qatzelok.
Max 08:54 on 2021-09-25 Permalink
I suppose I would despise them less if they got out of their cars every now and again. But we’ll never know, will we?