RCMP enforcement at B.C. logging protests 'unreasonable,' federal police watchdog says
CTV
A federal police oversight agency has found the RCMP's enforcement of a civil injunction against old-growth logging protesters on Vancouver Island was unreasonable and violated the rights of activists.
A federal police oversight agency has found the RCMP's enforcement of a civil injunction against old-growth logging protesters on Vancouver Island was unreasonable and violated the rights of activists.
The Ottawa-based Civilian Review and Complaints Commission on Wednesday published a summary of its final report into the RCMP's handling of the protests in the Fairy Creek watershed, which began in 2020.
The CRCC investigation found the protest exclusion zones and checkpoints used by members of the RCMP’s Community-Industry Response Group (C-IRG) were unreasonable, and the decisions by officers to remove their name tags and, in some cases, don "Thin Blue Line" patches broke RCMP policy.
Timber company Teal Cedar Products Ltd. won an injunction in April 2021 prohibiting protesters from obstructing its forestry operations in the watershed, approximately 120 kilometres west of Victoria.
Over the ensuing months, more than 1,100 people would be arrested in the protest exclusion zone, including many who were arrested more than once.
The C-IRG, a specialized unit that is tasked with policing protests against industry and resource-extraction infrastructure in B.C., detained at least person without cause on a public road after he refused to submit to a search, which itself was baseless, the police watchdog found.
"The review determined that the RCMP’s demand to search the complainant at a checkpoint on a public road was unfounded, and his arrest, after refusing to agree to the search, was groundless," the summary said.
