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Experts Have Been Telling Ontario Cops To Be Less Violent For Years. They Aren’t Listening

Toronto cop James Forcillo's six year sentence for shooting Sammy Yatim highlights the need for better training.

James Forcillo shot Sammy Yatim nine times in 2013. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chris Young

In what many would consider a rare instance of police accountability, Toronto cop James Forcillo was sentenced to six years in prison Thursday for the attempted murder of Sammy Yatim.

Forcillo shot and killed Yatim, 18, unleashing a total of nine bullets on him during an altercation on a Toronto streetcar in 2013. Although Yatim died of his injuries, Forcillo was acquitted of second-degree murder because a jury ruled the first three rounds he shot were justified (Yatim had been wielding a small knife at the time); the additional six shots, fired when Yatim was lying down wounded, were at the crux of the attempted murder charge. Yatim's death sparked outrage and protests against police violence in the city.

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In delivering the sentence, Ontario Superior Court Justice Edward Then said Forcillo failed in his duty to protect Yatim, choosing only to protect his own life. The second volley of shots were "unreasonable, unnecessary and excessive," he said, noting Forcillo did not follow "crystal clear" training to use his weapon only as a last resort nor did he engage de-escalation tactics in convincing Yatim to turn over his weapon.

The sentence comes in the same week that two Ottawa cops are being investigated for the death of Abdirahman Abdi, 37, a mentally ill black man whom witnesses say was beaten by cops and left bleeding and handcuffed on the sidewalk. The province's police watchdog, the Special Investigations Unit, is looking into the matter but the group is notorious for its own accountability issues.

It's hard to say if Forcillo's sentence will have a bigger impact on violence in policing. (Only a couple of Canadian cops have ever been convicted of on-the-job murder or manslaughter.) But what's clear is Justice Then didn't say anything that law enforcement agencies in this country haven't heard over and over again.

According to A Matter of Life and Death, a recently released report by Ontario Ombudsman Paul Dubé, Yatim's death wasn't an isolated incident but rather was "sadly familiar, reminiscent of too many similar incidents dating back too many years." He listed other examples of men in crisis who'd been carrying small weapons—a hammer, pocket knife, table leg, scissors—when they were killed by police.

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"There have been scores of fatal police shootings in Ontario involving persons with mental illness in recent years—more than 40 just since 2000," Dubé wrote. In the three years it took to complete the investigation, 19 such shootings took place.

The deaths have resulted in 25 years worth of studies and reviews—more than 550 recommendations from Coroner's inquests alone, said Dubé, and yet training remains more focused on how to use weapons than on alternatives.

"Ontario officers have plenty of training on how to use their guns, but not enough on how to use their mouths."

Here are some examples of recommendations, many of which echo each other, that have come up over the years:

Torontonian Edward Yu, who was 35 when he was killed by police in 1997, suffered from schizophrenia. When officers arrived at a bus stop where Yu had assaulted a woman, they found him at the back of the bus alone; he held up a small hammer and was shot three times. An inquest two years later recommended an amendment to the Police Services Act, requiring an extra day of training for officers on "crisis resolution"—it was not followed up on. The inquest also recommended de-escalation tactics, including a greater emphasis on talking and listening when responding to calls.

The 2010 death of Evan Jones, shot four times by cops in Brantford after raising a cleaver above his head, resulted in Coroner's inquest that made 26 recommendations including a review of use of force training and training on dealing with mentally ill people.

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An inquest into the 2014 death of Jermaine Carby, a black man who was shot while being carded at a traffic stop in Brampton, recommended police implement a strategy to "measure the effectiveness of officer training for unconscious bias, mental health issues, de-escalation and use of force."

Implementing these regulations isn't an impossible task. In BC, after Robert Dziekanski was repeatedly tasered and killed by RCMP at Vancouver airport in 2007, a commission recommended more rigorous training on the user of tasers, that cops be made to write detailed reports when deploying the weapons, and that those using tasers be required to carry defibrillators. Thomas Braidwood, the judge in charge of that inquiry, later said he was "impressed" with how quickly the province moved to enact his recommendations.

So why aren't Ontario cops doing it?

Peter Harte, a Yellowknife-based lawyer who has spent years defending police in use of force cases, told VICE police are taught to gain compliance as quickly as possible in most situations—and that means using force.

"The impression I have is police officers are taught that the first response is force—any kind of non-compliance needs to be dealt with initially by force," he said, noting more junior officers seem to resort to force more quickly than their veteran counterparts. "I still see people getting physical right off the bat."

Harte said he think an old school mentality towards policing exists where the approach is if you're arresting somebody, you're dealing with a "bad guy."

As for the Forcillo outcome, he said it's rare that police are held accountable for violence that takes place in the line of duty because both juries and judges would tend to empathize with cops. He also said he doesn't think the sentence will deter cops from using force—and might even encourage the opposite.

"I think one of the lessons that will be learned is that more physicality, extracting compliance faster, is critical to being able to avoid pulling out your firearm," he said.

Ontario's Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services, which oversees policing in the province, has committed to adopting the ombudsman's 22 recommendations. If that commitment falls through, the way others seem to have, marginalized members of the public are the most likely to pay the price.

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