Police chief’s report shows use-of-force incidents up slightly in 2019 By: Ryan Thorpe and Michael Pereira Posted: 7:00 PM CDT Friday, Jun. 5, 2020 Last Modified: 8:27 PM CDT Friday, Jun. 5, 2020 Updates

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This article was published 05/06/2020 (1089 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

As the conduct of law enforcement has increasingly come under fire and sparked protests across the continent, the Winnipeg Police Service is set to present its latest annual report detailing how many times its officers used force on the public in 2019.

City police filed 857 use-of-force reports last year, according to the report Winnipeg Police Service Chief Danny Smyth is scheduled to table at Monday’s meeting of the Winnipeg Police Board.

The term “use-of-force” describes a wide variety of actions, ranging from physically detaining a suspect, to swinging a baton, discharging pepper spray or firing a service pistol. Officers are mandated to file a report each time force is used.

“The service recognizes the responsibility the citizens of Winnipeg entrust to police members regarding use of force. While police members strive to resolve incidents without applying physical force, occasionally it is required,” Smyth writes in the report.

“Formal training and the Service’s Use of Force procedures direct officers when they encounter situations where they must apply force to gain compliance or de-escalate situations in accordance with the law.”

The WPS responded to 231,688 calls for service last year, which means 0.37 per cent of calls resulted in police using force, according to the report. That marks a slight uptick over the previous year when 0.34 per cent of calls resulted in force, but a marginal decrease over the five-year-average of 0.39 per cent.

The number of instances where police utilized “intermediate weapons,” which include Tasers or batons, among other items, “show a slight increase” in 2019, according to the report.

The most drastic spike came in the number of times WPS officers fired Tasers and conducted electricity with them, which increased 73 per cent over the previous year — from 89 in 2018 to 154 in 2019.

“The types of resistance” local police are facing has not significantly changed, Smyth wrote, but there was a slight rise in the number of cases where suspects were armed with a firearm (37) or “edged weapon” (70).

The report makes no mention of the ethnicity of the people subjected to force by police. In a written statement to the Free Press, a WPS spokesman said that information — as well as details such as age or incident location — are not proactively released.

Human rights lawyer Corey Shefman said even without that internal WPS data, it’s possible to deduce from other public statistics that most of the people subjected to force by police are Indigenous.

“We have other data that already gives us the answer,” Shefman said. “We know 70 per cent of people in Manitoba correctional facilities are Indigenous…. We know 66 per cent, two-thirds of the people Winnipeg police have killed in the last 20 years have been Indigenous.

“We don’t need their data to know it’s Indigenous people in Winnipeg, primarily in the North End and the West End, who are facing the violence of the Winnipeg Police Service.”

While police use of force has long been the subject of criticism — both locally and across North America — in recent weeks protesters have mobilized and taken to the streets following high-profile deaths at the hands of police.

The slaying of George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, 44, led to widespread outrage, rioting and looting and peaceful protests.

Video of the killing showed Chauvin place his knee on the back of Floyd’s neck for more than eight minutes as other officers looked on. Chauvin, who was subsequently fired by the department, has been charged with second-degree murder, and three other fired officers have been charged with aiding and abetting the killing.

“We know 70 per cent of people in Manitoba correctional facilities are Indigenous…. We know 66 per cent, two-thirds of the people Winnipeg police have killed in the last 20 years have been Indigenous.” – Corey Shefman, Human rights lawyer

In solidarity with protests around the continent, local black activists organized a rally at the Manitoba legislature grounds Friday evening.

Fatal encounters between WPS officers and civilians have also long been subject to criticism. In 2019, five people were shot by the WPS, according to Smyth’s report — two of whom died. More recently, three people — including 16-year-old Eishia Hudson — were shot to death by Winnipeg police in a 10-day span in April. All three were Indigenous.

Smyth’s report notes excessive-force allegations against officers are reviewed by the internal professional standards unit, while any case leading to serious injury or death is turned over to the Independent Investigation Unit of Manitoba — the provincial police watchdog.

Manitoba also has the Law Enforcement Review Agency, which can take complaints about police directly from the public.

“Of the three excessive-force allegations made in 2019, one was unfounded, one was abandoned by the complainant and one was not sustained by evidence,” Smyth wrote in the report.

The three excessive-force allegations mentioned by Smyth refer only to cases handled internally by the professional standards unit. It’s not clear how many allegations of that nature were made to LERA or referred to the IIU.

Shefman said most people in Manitoba believe that law enforcement oversight — be it by the professional standards unit, IIU or LERA — is toothless. He said many allegations of police brutality are never reported, because people have no faith the systems in place will provide oversight.

As a result, Shefman believes it is “wildly unlikely” the use-of-force statistics presented in Smyth’s report are accurate because they are self-reported.

“It stretches the bounds of reasonable imagination. If you talk to Indigenous people, particularly those living in the North End and West End of Winnipeg, they will tell you those numbers certainly don’t reflect their lived reality,” he said.

ryan.thorpe@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @rk_thorpe

michael.pereira@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: __m_pereira

Ryan Thorpe
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Ryan Thorpe likes the pace of daily news, the feeling of a broadsheet in his hands and the stress of never-ending deadlines hanging over his head.

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