[asia-apec 769] Van Sun: Mounties' defence

[David Webster]

Last Updated: Thursday 8 October 1998         TOP STORIES
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Mountie tried to keep tension down
The Vancouver Sun

 Jeff Lee Vancouver Sun

The head of the RCMP's        Ian Lindsay, Vancouver Sun
quick-response team at
the APEC summit           / PICTURES TELL A STORY OF APEC
angrily demanded that     PROTEST AND ARREST: How It
a Vancouver police        Happened: Law student Craig
riot squad be removed     Jones describes photographs of
from a area because it    his arrest during a protest at
was escalating            the University of B.C. as APEC
tensions, documents       leaders held their summit last
filed at the RCMP         year. He was testifying
Public Complaints         Wednesday at the RCMP Public
Commission indicate.      Complaints Commission inquiry.

                  In the moments before
                  police pepper-sprayed protesters who had torn down a
                  security fence near where 18 world leaders were meeting,
                  Staff-Sergeant Hugh Stewart shouted that the squad was
                  not needed.

                  And when officers were later being pressed by
                  protesters, he urged them to remain cool, and to "not
                  get caught up in this."

                  Stewart later criticized APEC command, which was run by
                  the RCMP, for sending in the Vancouver police riot
                  squad. Stewart told the officer in charge he could hold
                  the line of officers on his own.

                  The information, contained in radio transcripts, paints
                  a different picture of Stewart, the officer most
                  identified with the pepper-sprayings, and the man
                  Solicitor-General Andy Scott is alleged to have said
                  would take the fall for police conduct at APEC.

                  Scott has denied making the comments, which an NDP MP
                  says he overheard while on an airplane.

                  While Stewart tried to keep tensions down in an earlier
                  confrontation, he led a team of officers who
                  pepper-sprayed protesters after demonstrators had
                  blocked all three motorcade routes out of UBC shortly
                  before the leaders were to leave.

                  Stewart waded in with a bottle of pepper spray, and one
                  of those he hit was a CBC cameraman. The image of the
                  camera being covered in milky white spray became one of
                  the most-replayed scenes of the protests.

                  It also overshadowed the role Stewart played in trying
                  to keep tensions down during the protests. Stewart has
                  refused to comment on what happened, except to say he
                  will testify before the commission, which is
                  investigating allegations that police used excessive
                  force.

                  Radio logs paint a picture of a man who tried first to
                  avoid a confrontation with protesters before stepping in
                  with the pepper spray.

                  On the day of the leaders' visit, Stewart, a crowd
                  control expert who had been noted in media stories
                  before for his patience in dispersing angry protesters,
                  was in charge of a squad whose job was to keep
                  protesters from entering a tightly controlled security
                  zone.

                  When the demonstrators moved against the security fence
                  across the road from where the APEC leaders were
                  meeting, Stewart's officers formed a line nearby. But
                  unknown to him, the Vancouver police riot squad had also
                  been assembled. When Stewart noticed them, he blew his
                  stack.

                  "You get at the duty office and you get those f------
                  guys off the back of that square now. I don't want
                  [them] there . . . . They're already raising the level
                  of this crowd," Stewart shouted over his radio to the
                  police command centre.

                  When the APEC command centre officer, Brian Pap, said
                  site commander Inspector Bill Dingwall wanted them
                  there, Stewart said:

                  "Okay, you, he wants me to do this job, he better do it.
                  All this is bullsh--."

                  When the protesters began to rally at the fence, another
                  officer told Pap: "They got another protest going and
                  the crowd sees all these other guys coming on, they're
                  going nuts and Hagie's [Stewart's nickname] just
                  steaming and we got a call into [the riot squad
                  commander] to back them off . . ."

                  Later, Stewart apologized to Pap for blowing up, but
                  said "I can hold this and do it well."

                  A half hour later, when students were again rushing the
                  fence, Stewart was overheard telling his officers:
                  "Standby . . . don't lose your cool; back, back

                  . . . don't get caught up in this

                  . . . do not deploy, do not deploy, hold the line, hold
                  the line, you're doing fine here."

                  But his demeanour changed three hours later, after the
                  command office discovered all routes out of UBC were
                  blocked by protesters a half hour before the leaders'
                  motorcades were to depart the university.

                  With 15 minutes before the first motorcade moved, police
                  decided to crack open the route at Gate 6 on Southwest
                  Marine Drive.

                  Stewart told officers they would have to move in
                  quickly.

                  "Well, we're gonna push, yeah, but, see, they won't be
                  organized. If you want them out of the way, we're gonna,
                  we're just gonna go down there, we're gonna hit 'em,
                  wham, nail 'em."

                  In the meantime, police command sent the riot squad,
                  this time in full battle dress, to Gate 6. But before
                  they could get there, Stewart stepped in with a handful
                  of officers and told the protesters they must disperse.
                  Almost immediately, he began spraying the crowd,
                  including the cameraman.

                  Within one minute he had the road cleared, and 13
                  minutes later the first of the motorcades passed through
                  the area.

                  APEC SECURITY

                  The RCMP was responsible for over-all site security and
                  the safety of the 18 world leaders who attended the
                  November conference.

                  Using a special command centre, the RCMP controlled
                  security at the University of B.C. and in a special zone
                  downtown around nine hotels where the delegations
                  stayed.

                  In the case of the protests at UBC, the RCMP had several
                  layers of protection between people and the leaders:

                  - Miles of security fencing around an area encompassing
                  the Museum of Anthropology, Faculty Club, Graduate
                  Student Society building and UBC president Martha
                  Piper's home, where delegates would meet for lunch.

                  - Uniformed police officers who controlled entrance and
                  exit points.

                  - A quick-response team, which was given the task of
                  dispersing protesters if they attempted to breach the
                  fence or blocked any of the routes.

                  - The Vancouver police riot squad, which was never used.

                  Had protesters managed to reach the area where the
                  leaders were meeting, they would have faced armed
                  security officers from eight countries, as well as
                  snipers positioned on nearby roofs.

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