Ipperwash Summer series: Policing ‘critical incidents’ after Ipperwash: 15 years of the ‘Framework’, no evaluation – Anishinabek News
In February 2020, the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) arrested 10 people and dismantled the camp near CN rail tracks on Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory that was established in solidarity with Wet’suwet’en land defenders. CN quickly obtained an injunction in six days, and the OPP enforced it 12 days later. Over this time, OPP spokespeople referred to the “Framework for Police Preparedness for Indigenous Critical Incidents” to explain both the perceived delay and their eventual enforcement of the injunction. Police representatives and politicians made references to Ipperwash as a reminder of the potential consequences of taking aggressive, escalated police action. These comparisons to Ipperwash imply that the current approach is inherently better than past practices, supported by the fact that Ipperwash Inquiry Commissioner Sidney Linden had described the Framework as a “best practice.” However, Commissioner Linden also recommended that it be subject to “independent, third-party evaluations” with “meaningful” involvement of First Nations representatives. This recommendation remains unfulfilled.
