Vancouver police face accusations of violence
By JANE ARMSTRONG
Globe and Mail
Monday, March 8, 2004 - Page A6
VANCOUVER -- The Vancouver Police Department is defending itself yet again from a complaint of excessive force, this time from a group of activists -- mainly women -- who say they were beaten and pepper-sprayed by officers on their way home from a bar last month.
The five women and two men plan to launch a civil suit against police and file an official complaint. They say one woman was hospitalized and another suffered two cracked ribs when police kicked her on the ground.
This complaint comes a little more than a month after two Vancouver police officers were fired and four suspended when they admitted they beat three suspected drug dealers in a park.
Megan Oleson, 27, a nurse who works in the city's Downtown Eastside, said she was knocked unconscious in the altercation. When she came to, she said, an officer was kicking her.
She said the beating started when police stopped the group on the city's notorious East Hastings Street. They singled out one woman, arrested and handcuffed her. When Ms. Oleson demanded why, she said police got aggressive.
"He told me to shut up," Ms. Oleson said in an interview yesterday. "He grabbed me by the shirt. I said: 'Why am I being arrested?' And he threw me on the ground. . . . [When] I woke up, I was being kicked."
Police, however, provided a dramatically different version. They said the trouble started when officers responded to a 911 call from a limousine driver who said an intoxicated woman was dancing on the roof of his vehicle.
When police tried to arrest the woman, the group swarmed police, said Vancouver police spokeswoman Constable Anne Drennan. One of the arresting officers was injured, Constable Drennan said.
"She was on the hood of a limousine, and when we stopped her to try to talk about it, she kept moving away," Constable Drennan said. "She in fact walked away several times and our officer had to walk over to her and catch up to her over again, and eventually she was taken into custody and she fought very, very hard."
The group's claim has raised eyebrows because it is the latest in a string of complaints alleging excessive force that have dogged the Vancouver Police Department for more than a year. Most complaints come from people who live and work in the city's drug-plagued Downtown Eastside.
Last year, the New-York-based Human Rights Watch criticized a police crackdown on drug traffickers in the Downtown Eastside. The human-rights group said police were trampling on the rights of individuals by hassling addicts. As well, a Vancouver legal society criticized police tactics, saying police abuse, beat, and even torture residents in the troubled area.
Ms. Oleson said she believes police singled out the group because all are outspoken activists in the Downtown Eastside. She said the group was not acting in a disorderly manner, nor was a woman dancing on a car roof.
"They [police] know who we are," Ms. Oleson said. "It's happened before in the Downtown Eastside. This is not an isolated incident."
The Feb. 29 dustup occurred after the group was leaving a bar where they had gone to watch a heavy-metal act. Ms. Oleson said she and her friends were walking on the sidewalk when a cruiser pulled up.
Another witness, Kathleen Yearwood, said an officer yelled out to one woman to stop. She said police then handcuffed the woman and Ms. Oleson demanded to know why.
"Megan asked them: 'What's the charge? You can't just arrest her,' " said Ms. Yearwood, who watched the incident from across the street. Ms. Yearwood was with the group, but said she was trailing behind and caught up with them as the police pulled up. She was the only person in the group not charged.
It was at that point, Ms. Yearwood said, that the police descended on the group. Several cruisers arrived for backup. She saw one officer push a woman into a fence while others kicked the arrested woman who was on the ground. "I saw three cops kicking and punching her," Ms. Yearwood said.
The seven accused face charges of obstruction, mischief and assault on police officers and are scheduled to appear in court tomorrow.
