BLAST FROM THE PAST ‘the Pussies take a bite out of the cops.’ From Extra Magazine.
There will be a meeting with top city officials soon to discuss the fate of incoming Toronto Police Chief Myron Demkiw.
Mayor John Tory and Toronto Police Services Board Chair Jim Hart, have asked that Chief-designate Demkiw attend a meeting with Chanelle Gallant and JP Hornick, who are 2SLGBTQ+ advocates opposed to Demkiw being appointed as Chief.
The long-time cop was appointed last month to replace Interim Chief James Ramer. He is scheduled to assume the role on December 19.
“Given Mr. Demkiw’s record of misconduct and his willingness to silence city councillors, we must raise serious questions about how this appointment could have taken place, and what it signals for historically over-policed communities in Toronto,” Gallant and Hornick wrote in an open letter to city officials.
They claimed to be original members of the Toronto Women’s Bathhouse Committee and Demkiw was one of the officers responsible for the planning and execution of a raid on a queer event at the Pussy Palace, a women’s bathhouse, in September 2000.
They wrote that Demkiw had been involved in task forces that conducted surveillance and raids in predominantly Black neighbourhoods.
MAYOR John Tory
In 2002, his actions were found to violate the Charter rights of attendees, and resulted in a settlement at the Ontario Human Rights Commission, police reforms, and a public apology from the Toronto Police Service (TPS) in 2016.
In 2005, a class-action lawsuit and complaint to the Ontario Human Rights Commission resulted in a $350,000 settlement, part of which covered legal fees with some donated to charities of the complainants’ choice.
In the court case that followed, Justice Peter Hryn described the officers’ conduct as “bringing the administration of justice into disrepute.”
The judge dismissed the charges, arguing male officers should never have gone into the Pussy Palace, because it amounted to a strip search of the women and that violated their Charter rights.
The settlement included a formal apology in writing from the male officers involved in the raid to the Toronto Women’s Bathhouse Committee, and also required the force to establish sensitivity training for all members regarding the LGBT community.
COMPLAINANT Chanelle Gallant (above) and JP Hornick.
Demkiw was among the officers who then sued a sitting city councillor for speaking for the defence, and was involved in a series of additional raids on queer spaces that same year.
“In your two year hiring process, the communities you consulted told you that they have significant concerns about police accountability,” according to the letter. “ What message does the appointment of an officer who has been directly involved in a breach of civil liberties send to those communities?”
JP Hornick was charged during the 2000 raid. Courtesy photos.
JP Hornick was arrested and charged with liquor violations at the time of the raid.
“The police really tore through the place top to bottom asking questions, pulling signs off walls…interrogating us for a fair bit of the night,” she said.