G-20 Summit in Toronto

[Asterix]

d) officer numbers and transport capacity might have been lacking in the S. Yonge area, or perhaps, if adequate to bring several hundred officers into the area, not optimally pre-positioned to cordon off groups of people rapidly.

That, I think, is the biggest hurdle. Most people just do not grasp the logistics involved in this sort of thing.

Saturday evening, you've got the mob burning a police car at King and Bay. You're the police commander and you've got a few hundred police at your disposal.

First you get them organized in a coherent manner to retake an intersection that currently has the sort of people who will burn a police car. You move in and secure that area, obviously in a controlled manner and not just a free-for-all charging stampede.

Your rioters have then been pushed elsewhere, in this case presumably east. Once you've secured King and Bay, you now need to deal with the next event. But where? Will the rioters head south to try and get at the fence? Will they head north? Will they try and double back to Bay? If they head north, how far north? To Queen? To Dundas? All the way to Bloor?

You now hear they are breaking windows heading north of Queen, so you decide to load up several hundred officers to meet them. Those highway coach buses hold what, around 50 people (complete with all their equipment)? How long does it take to get a crowd of people, even police officers, on half a dozen buses? Some officers can jump in minivans, but those only hold a max of 6 (remember they need all their gear). Bike cops aren't about to be lugging shields with them either.

You need to ensure you've got adequate escorts for the buses (last thing you need is for a mob to surround a bus and prevent your officers from deploying), so this would mean bike cops, cruisers, motor cycle cops, and get everything moving north, presumably heading to Yonge and College.

Once you get there, you've now got to get everyone off the buses, hooked up with their shields, organized into sub-units, lined up, all while figuring out what your specific tactics will be for a situation you haven't had the chance to properly assess, let alone predict where it will move next.

How long does it take to load up a family of four to head out on a day trip? Is it any great surprise they can't instantly move 200 cops from one location to another a mile away on a moment's notice?

 

[AKS]

What I really question is, how come they didn't send in female officers to strip search the females? How come all the strip searchers are male? Weren't they expecting to take in any females? There are no female police in the police force? (I saw some in the photos).
What is the reason why they only used males? They seem like prisoners of war were females are stripped by males. I find in a civilization this like, it's unacceptable. If this happened in Hong Kong, you wouldn't hear the end of it from the citizens.

I don't know how much truth there is about sexual abuse (verbal, threats of rape, etc). But having males strip search females is already a mental abuse itself.

 

[Redroom Studios]

Standing within 5 M of a fence is only a threat to security in your weird little world where everyone is scared of their shadow.

It must be getting difficult for you to continually apologise ...especially when faced with hard evidence against your rose coloured opinion of the events.

ha... you don't know me very well do you? I'm not apologizing for Blair, merely pointing out that his mis-statement of facts is completely irrelevant to anything that went down. To myself and many others it would be a comon sense implied fact that approaching the fence as an angry mob could potentially lead to arrest. That's why I found it hard to understand why it was such big news that this 5m rule (whether stated accurately or not) was even brought up. I dont get the need for it, or the need to mis-portray it to the public. But to say that was in anyway harmful to public security is nonsense. At worst it was propaganda of the most harmless sort.

regarding the strip searches of females by male officers accusations, I wont believe it until I see pictures. I think it is one of the most basic things that police officers know in order to avoid sexual related charges is that only female officers search female prisoners. To me it sounds like these accusations have been trumped up to garner the highest level of reaction against the police. Propaganda of the most harmful sort...

 

[Roy G Biv]

regarding the strip searches of females by male officers accusations, I wont believe it until I see pictures....

Perv!

 

[AGTO]

ha... you don't know me very well do you?

I've read your posts, I know all I need to know......gee, that's almost as arrogant and condecending as you are.

 

[urbandreamer]

^Wrong. RR in real life is a harmless, sorta shy guy who finds me outrageously Right Wing. He gives money to homeless ppl; I don't.

I think in reality the protesters vs. cops debacle was a class war; many of those protesters at Q&Spadina looked like students and professional types while the cops are obviously proletarians. Having worked with both types of folk, I think class resentment was the big issue--swearing at cops by the educated kids--well, as a cop, I'd take delight in snatching these brats and arresting them!

 

[AGTO]

Wrong. RR in real life is a harmless

Wrong? You're a clueless drug dealer....you don't tell anyone they're wrong.

...and I'm sure your boy is a harmless wuss....that's a given.

 

[urbandreamer]

A drug dealer. That's funny. If anyone on UT honestly thinks I'm a drug dealer....wow, they take everything I say literally?

I thought personal attacks were illegal on UT?

 

[AGTO]

It's not a personal attack when it's true....perhaps you shouldn't have admitted to it in print.

Do you know what a hypocrite is? It's someone like you who whines about "personal attacks", while personally attacking everyone else.

 

[AKS]

I think all it really did was make people who live in the area nervous.

That's true. I stayed at home all weekend and never left my apartment because it was near the security border. I was afraid of getting arrested for passing by. I was thinking of going shopping at Eaton but I was afraid of getting rounded up by police if anything happened and put in detention and get a criminal record even if I got safely passed the security border.

I would think it felt like a Jail for everyone who lived downtown.

 

[christiesplits]

Terrifying police raid wakens couple at 4 a.m.

http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/torontog20summit/article/829462--terrifying-police-raid-wakens-couple-at-4-a-m?bn=1

A Toronto veterinarian says he awoke around 4 a.m. Saturday to the sight of a gun pointed at him by a black-clad police officer standing at the foot of his bed.

Then, says John Booth, he was told to keep his hands visible and to produce identification, asked questions about a man named Peter he had never met, detained on his lawn in handcuffs for half an hour, and informed he would be charged with the crime of conspiracy to commit mischief — before being released by apologetic officers who belatedly realized he had no connection with the alleged anarchist organizer they were seeking.

 

[Second_in_pie]

Terrifying police raid wakens couple at 4 a.m.

http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/torontog20summit/article/829462--terrifying-police-raid-wakens-couple-at-4-a-m?bn=1

There. That's one thing that's pretty indisputable, that's actually horrifying behaviour.

 

[spider]

Asterix,

Your logistics suppositions are invalid, there is a perfect alternative, it's called a subway. Faster than a speeding pedestrian protester and right on Yonge Street but not used. Why not?

 

[AKS]

regarding the strip searches of females by male officers accusations, I wont believe it until I see pictures. I think it is one of the most basic things that police officers know in order to avoid sexual related charges is that only female officers search female prisoners. To me it sounds like these accusations have been trumped up to garner the highest level of reaction against the police. Propaganda of the most harmful sort...

And who will provide the photos? The police will volunteer photos? The detainess certainly can't. They're stripped. Where are they going to access a camera? Unless there's a camera in the detention room, neither have evidence. So the police walks away free? Basically, who are you going to believe? The police over the reporters and other female detainees? If there's no cameras, of course the police can do whatever they want.

Also, where are all the security cameras they spent so much money on? Are they only located around the security area? If not that should provide evidence if the police did beat up people or over react.

 

[kettal]

[video=youtube;1fhGneV6rQg]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fhGneV6rQg[/video]

now why would the protesters do this, unless they are desperate to get a response?