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G20 police ‘yanked’ off prosthetic leg: amputee
Kenyon Wallace, National Post · Tuesday, Jul. 6, 2010
Toronto — A 57-year-old amputee says he was “brutalized” and “humiliated” by police patrolling the G20 summit when they confiscated his prosthetic leg, labelled it a “weapon” and ordered him to “hop” into a paddy wagon.
John Pruyn, a Revenue Canada employee from Thorold, Ont., was in Toronto on June 26 with his wife and daughter to participate in the peaceful Canadian Labour Congress march and rally.
In the early evening, Mr. Pruyn and his 24-year-old daughter, Sarah, were sitting on the lawn of the provincial legislature — the so-called “designated speech area” — waiting to meet Mr. Pruyn’s wife, Susan, from whom the pair had become separated during the afternoon march.
At the same time, a line of police began advancing on the crowd of protesters, most of whom Mr. Pruyn says were simply relaxing on the grass.
“The police came up to us and said, ‘Move!’ so I tried to get up,” said Mr. Pruyn, who lost his left leg above the knee 17 years ago in a farming accident.
“I fell back down and my daughter yelled out, ‘Give him time. He’s an amputee.’ I guess the police thought I was taking too long ... then all of a sudden the police were on top of me.”
Mr. Pruyn claims his head was kept on the ground by an officer digging a knee into his left temple while other officers yanked at his arms.
“One of them was yelling, ‘You’re resisting arrest’, but I wasn’t resisting anything. I couldn’t move.”
He says police then ordered him to start walking, but when he informed them that he couldn’t get up because his hands were cuffed behind his back, an officer grabbed his prosthetic leg and “yanked it right off.”
“Then he said, ‘Hop!’ but I told them I couldn’t because it hurts for me to hop on my right leg,” Mr. Pruyn recalled. “Then the cop said, ‘OK, you asked for it’ and two officers grabbed me under my armpits and dragged me away from Queen’s Park towards the police vans.”
Mr. Pruyn says five Toronto police officers then arrived and carried him the rest of the way, threw him on the ground and allegedly “gave me kicks and little punches and saying I was resisting arrest and that I had a weapon.”
“None of that was true. I had no weapons or anything like that.”
Toronto Police spokeswoman Meaghan Gray said the force would not respond to any allegations made by individuals.
“Certainly if anyone feels they’ve been mistreated by police officers, they can file a complaint either with the Toronto Police Service or the Office of the Independent Police Review Director,” she said.
After waiting for close to three hours in the back of a paddy wagon, Mr. Pruyn says he was transferred to a bus and taken to the temporary detention centre, where he was given a wheelchair and remained handcuffed in a cell for the next 27 hours. His daughter was also arrested.
He says he shared the space with another man in a wheelchair who was paralyzed on one side of his body and who had trouble using the portable toilet in the cell. The man begged for access to a regular washroom but his pleadings were ignored.
“Eventually he ended up soiling his pants and they let him sit there with his pants wet all that time,” Mr. Pruyn said, adding that he was given one styrofoam cup of water, a processed cheese sandwich and no phone call. No one interviewed him or told him why he was being held, he said.
“I had no idea where they were,” said Susan Pruyn, who made frantic calls to police during the weekend. “John had been asking to make a phone call so at least I would know where he was.”
Mr. Pruyn and his daughter were released late the following day without charge. While he was given back his prosthetic leg, he says police kept $33 he had in his pocket, his walking sticks and his glasses, which will cost $500 to replace.
“It was surreal. I couldn’t believe it,” Mr. Pruyn said, adding that he hasn’t yet decided whether to file a formal complaint. “I feel like I’ve been brutalized.”
Mr. Pruyn’s claims came the same day the Toronto Police Services Board announced the launch of an independent civilian review of police tactics during the G20 summit.
Board chairman Alok Mukherjee made the recommendation yesterday during a hastily called meeting at Toronto Police headquarters that quickly devolved into a shouting match between board members and dozens of citizens angry over a perceived lack of public involvement.
“We don’t trust the Police Services Board, who has very close ties to the police, to make the decisions for us,” downtown resident Vanessa Brustolin yelled at board members amid cries of “Shame! Shame!”
Toronto Mayor David Miller says the review is the “appropriate” way to look at systemic issues that may have arisen during policing of the G20. “Based on what I saw personally, I think the police did a tremendous job like I’ve said repeatedly,” he said. “My understanding is that police used lawful powers they had, I think since Confederation.”
More than 1,000 people were arrested during the G20, most of them charged with breach of peace and later released. Several people remain behind bars and are awaiting trial.
National Post
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發表於 2010-7-6 20:08
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