Police brutality: cops walk, again.

More evidence that cops are not subjected to the same *justice* system standards that ordinary citizens are.

Two police officers charged after an incident with an elderly man that court heard involved a Taser, won’t have to face trial since the case was delayed too long.

RCMP Const. Mitchell Spears and Transit Police Const. Ken Jansen were both charged with assault after an incident at Surrey Memorial Hospital with patient Keith Booker that was witnessed by a nurse, court heard previously.

Spears, the officer who arrested Booker on April 22, 2010 and took him to hospital, was also charged with assault with a weapon.

B.C. Provincial Court judge Ronald Lamperson decided Wednesday all charges in the case, which saw an “institutional delay” of 22 months, would be stayed.

Meanwhile, research has confirmed the presence of a two-tier criminal *justice* system, with regard to First Nations, Metis and Inuit peoples.

Aboriginal people are so vastly over-represented in Canada's federal prison system that current policies are clearly failing them, according to a new report by the Office of the Correctional Investigator.

The report found "no new significant investments at the community level for federal aboriginal initiatives. No deputy commissioner dedicated solely to and responsible for aboriginal programs, planning, implementation and results. And worst of all, no progress in closing the large gaps in correctional outcomes between aboriginal and non-aboriginal inmates," Howard Sapers, the correctional investigator for Canada, said during a news conference in Ottawa.

The report was tabled in the House of Commons Thursday morning — only the second special report ever written by the investigator since the office's creation 40 years ago.

The trail of many social policies which have marginalized one group of our population "defines systemic discrimination," Sapers said.

Grand merci to Ikwew for source material.

Are we in the 21st century?

Everything *old* is new again.

In a political climate where the ideological dogma & lies of christian Sharia influence public policy and legislation, this casual display of racism should come as no surprise.

Who would believe that items on the menu from Toronto's Holy Chuck Burgers called "The Half-breed" and "The Dirty Drunken Half-Breed" are appetizing?

What, no "Lard Black Beef Pucky" dusted with gold flakes?

via a tweet from Lynda Kitchikeesic.

ADDED by fh: Check out twitter timeline. Seems Holy Chuck Burger got larned a lesson.

UPDATE, August 28/12: Confirmed by enterprising tweep. Lesson learned.

@fernhilldammit @ladysnarksalot @holychuckburger and items are removed from menu now. Thank you.

— LeCorbusier (@DavisvilleHabit) August 28, 2012

When Ignorance and Disrespect Collide.

In spite of the fact that I've often watched ice dancing/skating events on television - a not-so-secret-vice/indulgence - I'm not sure what the technical term is for the above. A double klutz supported by cultural ignorance?

The judges' panel may have given them high marks, but the oddly designed clothing, free-form "jungle" moves and world fusion music chosen by Oksana Domnina and Maxim Shabalin have offended a great number of people.

In dark-toned bodysuits, complete with what they claim are authentic Aboriginal paint markings, the pair easily won their national ice dance competition three weeks ago at their first performance of the routine, making them favourites for gold. But while the judges in St Petersburg may have been impressed, many in the Aboriginal community are not. [...]

Domnina, 25, and Shabalin, 27, they recently spoke to ice-skating website Golden Skate about their motivations for the dance. [...] Asked about their research of Aboriginal culture, Domnina said: ''We've watched video clips on the internet of these dances and it is really like this - complete with the leaves around the knees.''

The music the Russians perform to has also raised questions. Ice-skating fans have identified the track as being composed by Sheila Chandra, a Briton of Indian descent. [Asian Indian, that is.]

From here. And more:

The Four Host First Nations that are helping Olympic organizers sponsor the 2010 Games have asked to meet with a pair of Russian skaters who have been criticized for wearing loin cloths and dark-skin bodysuits in their dance routine. [...] "My first reaction is that I feel really disheartened that this took place, particularly given how the indigenous people in Australia feel about it," Tewanee Joseph, CEO of the Four Host First Nations, said yesterday. [...]

"They are coming into our territory. They should feel comfortable here but at the same time, we want to educate them on our culture [...]

Victor Kraatz, a world champion ice dancer from Vancouver, said he felt the Russians had "decided to go a little bit Hollywood'' in their depiction of the Aboriginal dance and that they had "dumbed down a little bit" the character of the dance.

Oh noes! Dumbed down the culture of First Nations and Aboriginal people. Like that rarely happens. For a good blogpost regarding the deliberate and hypocritical misrepresentation of Aboriginal people, go read stageleft.

However, Olympic judges don't subtract performance points when athletes' ignorance and disrespect are displayed.

Teaching Old Farts New Strategies.

In spite of decades of work done by feminists and women's organizations with police, it appears that there are lessons that many cops and their administrator bosses are unwilling to learn.

A women's studies professor is criticizing police for not warning women in Edmonton about a man who allegedly sexually assaulted four women within a week after luring them on a social networking site.

"It's quite possible had they alerted women that some of these assaults could have
been prevented. The police could have warned women using social networking sites or dating sites to be specifically careful of someone doing this particular thing," Lise Gotell from the University of Alberta said Tuesday. "And it's quite possible had they alerted women that some of these assaults could have been prevented."

Edmonton police first announced Tuesday afternoon that they had arrested a 22-year-old man in relation to four assaults that allegedly took place in the Millwoods area of the city. The suspect has been charged with two counts of sexual assault, two counts of sexual assault with a weapon, three counts of possession of an offensive weapon dangerous to the public, two counts of unlawful confinement and one count each of robbery and theft over $5,000.

Police allege the man contacted the women through a social networking site, developed a relationship with them over several days, lured them to a remote location, threatened and sexually assaulted them.

Note that Gotell, an award-winning prof at the University of Alberta, is first identified through her association with Women's Studies which is an interdisciplinary academic program that right-wing conservatives often attack and attempt to discredit.

In Manitoba, cold cases and historical homicides of women are to be re-investigated.

Justice Minister Dave Chomiak first told the Free Press last month that the RCMP and Winnipeg Police were dusting off the old cases. The news came shortly after 17-year-old Cherisse Houle was found dead, face down in a ditch, and Chomiak
himself wondered if a serial killer could be responsible. ...

Former Vancouver police officer turned serial-killer profiler Kim Rossmo told the Free Press that it wouldn't surprise him if a serial killer was at work in Winnipeg.
"It would be shocking to think that in a city the size of Winnipeg, that you wouldn't have one or more serial killers preying on prostitutes over a 30-year period," Rossmo said.

Do cops become so hardened by their obligation to view prostitutes as criminals, rather than human beings - a consideration always generously awarded to their clients who are offered an opportunity to bypass criminal charges by enrolling in "John School" - that when women are butchered, they shrug it off? Don't they care that these are someone's daughter, sister, mother? And is the fact that many of them are Aboriginal women lead to a somewhat desultory investigation of their murders?

If there are other versions of Willy Pickton (and his suspected accomplices at the pig farm, who have somehow escaped criminal charges) who are stalking and killing women in Manitoba, the police don't appear very committed to finding him to stop his campaign of murder and terror.

No-fault regrets profferred by Pope

Isn't that just so special? The Church Lady would have been quite pleased at Pope Benedict's performance at a private meeting held in the Vatican between the pontiff, Catholic clergy, Phil Fontaine and delegates from the assembly of First Nations.

Mr. Fontaine said the fact the Pope never used the word "apology" during the 20-minute meeting, which also included the Most Reverend James Weisgerber, president of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, and several B.C. aboriginal leaders, did not diminish in anyway the impact of the statement.

It would seem that the words "sorry", "asking forgiveness", "taking responsibility" or "pedophile priests" were also part of the vocabulary not ever used by the Pope, either in the private audience or in the public statement that the Vatican released. Chief Fontaine offered forgiveness, though the Catholic Church has never allowed individual priests to publicly acknowledge their crimes against the Aboriginal children who were entrusted to them. Some First Nations leaders took exception to the Pope's statement.

... Hereditary Chief Bill Wilson said Wednesday he was angry the Pope did not take direct responsibility for the harm caused by the residential schools experience. "There is no apology," Mr. Wilson said from Musgamagw Band in northern Vancouver Island. "He says he has great sorrow. Well, it's one thing to have sorrow for tragedies that happened in the world. It's quite another thing to accept responsibility for causing them. And the Catholic Church caused a great deal of misery and suffering in this country. And it's not apologizing for anybody."

One has to wonder if the pontiff was expertly coached by civil law specialists in order to ensure that no utterance could be viewed as an admission of guilt and thus be actionable.

Social deprivation, not genetics, accounts for children's deaths.

An international, groundbreaking new study led by Dr Janet Smylie of the Centre for Research on Inner City Health based at the Keenan Research Centre, St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto has released its findings. The infant mortality rate for native babies in Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand is higher, as much as four times that of non-native newborns. It also identified spikes in occurences of SIDs, injury, suicide and accidental death among aboriginal kids in all four countries.

"Every infant who dies … I believe is a tragedy we should follow up on," Smylie said. She also spoke of stereotypical and at times racist treatment received by native people.

"I saw a lot of challenges when I was delivering babies here in Ottawa. Young aboriginal moms who had perfectly good networks of family support — sometimes they were being referred to have the social worker see them even though their family was strong. I remember [another] … patient who had called into the hospital in a little bit of a panic. She had some anxiety and a strong accent. The triage nurse called me and said: 'There's something wrong with your patient. I think she's retarded.'"

"Those are stories that are just a little too frequent."

The organizations and researchers who instigated, implemented, charted and compiled the results of the study hope that the information produced by this report will become the basis for stronger policies and programs to improve children's health in the aboriginal and indigenous communities.