Tamara Ward Johnson September 2 near Thunder Bay · Edited .

Crime Prevention Part II. Sept 2nd, 2014

 This is pure speculation on my part, but I have often thought that if we asked our street police officers to name the top 300 individuals – criminals, many dangerous criminals – in our city, with a little time and consideration, they could do just that. Perhaps the appropriate number is 400, or even 500, but my point is the core group of law breakers in our city, almost all repeat offenders, is relatively small. I would then ask these officers if these “identifiable problem people” were gone, not here, would our crime rate, our violent crime rate, and our murder rate be considerably closer to “normal” and would our City be a hell of a lot safer? Let me make clear that this list would include not only known criminals – dealers, addicts, break and enter “specialists,” fences, certain prostitutes, muggers, brawlers, molesters, etc. – but would also include drunken, dope-riddled sleaze, who behave and live in an atmosphere and in circumstances that have the potential to be the site of this City’s next murder. Don’t kid yourself, our police, essentially, know with whom and where our City’s crime problem lies. Veteran police officers can almost “feel” who has the potential for extreme violence. They are attuned to detecting the slightest “tell” of where that knife is concealed, is anyone behind them, what door is only partially closed, who lives upstairs, etc. This “sixth sense” keeps them alive and is what helps them return home each day to their families. They know who and what they are dealing with, but of course there is always surprises. And because they have this knowledge and “feel” – and trust me they do- they could, if required, make the list I have mentioned. Once we have our list, we target these individuals and make their lives in our City a living hell. We arrest them for every offence, no matter how minor. Open liquor, drunkenness, no seat belt, spitting on the side-walk (if that’s an offence?) littering, vagrancy etc., anything and everything. We make it so unpleasant for them to operate in Thunder Bay, that once they tire of spending weekends in jail, losing the wine bottle they only had one sip out of, being hand cuffed and carted off, having their “chums” steal their stash while they are in jail, being re-arrested for not paying fines in the time allotted, etc. etc. that they either begin to conform, somewhat, to society’s rules or, hopefully, go back to wherever they came from. Sure, this will be somewhat expensive, but most expense will be incurred at the beginning and will gradually taper off. Besides, what price do you put on murder? When is murder too expensive to combat? James Major in his recent letter to the editor referred to targeting “drunken idiots,” but I am going a few steps further. And James, if that “booze can” near where Shannon Hogan was murdered is still open, something is very, very wrong here. Correct me if I am wrong, but I believe about one-half of our murders are committed by native people. Native people are not 50 % of our population. Are we not left to conclude that certain native people in our City commit a disproportionate number of our murders? What else may we conclude? Is it fair to say – as I have said in the past- that for some reason certain native people living among us have a disproportionate propensity to commit acts of extreme violence ? That appears to be the case. Now it necessarily follows that if – lets peg the number of “identifiable problem people” at 400 – 25% of this group have the potential to commit crimes of extreme violence, then we have about 100 people living among us who have the potential or propensity to commit criminal acts involving extreme violence. 50 % of these 100 people in this category will be native. And if the statistics hold true – and they will – about 30% of the remaining 300 “identifiable problem people” will be native, so there is another 100 native people. So now we have 400 “identifiable problem people,” of which about 150 are probably native. I am quite confident not a single sole will quarrel with “targeting” the 250 non-native individuals who are breaking our laws and making our city unsafe, but I do believe considerable resistance will be encountered in targeting the native segment of this group of 400. Hell Hobbs and Hannam will undoubtedly view these words as another opportunity to garner publicity for their native glorification program and hold another press conference. Russ Aegard and his gang down at CC2 will go nuts and every bleeding heart will call for my head. The average, decent, hard-working non-native and, significantly, native family in the city will support me, but that won’t matter in the face of the overwhelming onslaught of ultra –liberal, elitist, bleeding heart attacks and vulgar criticism. Why is this? Why will they be unable to grasp that we are not targeting these people for who they are, rather we are targeting them for what they do – commit crime, and all too frequently, extremely violent crime? If, as I believe it is, a significant portion of our crime problem is attributable to natives, are we not a society of fools if we do not target and fight this problem and these people? If that is the cold, hard, truth do we not owe it to the citizens of Thunder Bay to not only recognize the problem for what it is, but to take positive steps to deal firmly and effectively with it? Are our civic leaders not in flagrant violation of their duty and responsibility to each of us if they do not do just that? I say they are. Call me naive, but I must admit that I’ve gone through life believing that a substantial percentage of mafia law breakers are Italian. And it gets worse, because, in my simplistic view, I felt a substantial percentage of the Jamaican gangs in Toronto are black. And there’s more, because I’ll confess to my belief that a substantial percentage of the Tong criminal element are Chinese. I do not want to appear too “cute,” because this is a very, very, serious matter, but my point is, in our society, it is not unprecedented that our law enforcement agencies target a group that is made up of people of a certain race, culture, colour, or ethnicity. But today somehow many will deem it wrong –socially unacceptable – to target a group of law breakers some members of which are native. This may be wrong in YOUR vision of YOUR Thunder Bay Mr. Hobbs, but not in mine! I don’t care who they are, if you break the law you get arrested and hopefully thrown in jail for a significant period of time. And where are the native Chiefs? Grand standing in Toronto, or Ottawa, or anywhere, but on the reserve, where at least part of our problem originates. Do any of these Chiefs even live on a reserve? Equally significant is the disgusting rhetoric spewed by certain native leaders. Here are some examples taken from a post I made on July 30: 1. “Native will lay down their lives” to “protect their lands from unwanted development” What exactly does this mean? What lands are they speaking of? Who determines what constitutes “unwanted development?” 2. Stan Beardy stated that anyone deriving benefit from Ontario’s resources will have to do so subject to certain conditions that must be consistent with traditional native laws and that prior native consent would have to be obtained. Beardy warns “appropriate steps to enforce” these demands will be taken. Beardy fails to explain what is “appropriate.” Apparently, he is fine with enforcement of HIS LAWS on others, but what about enforcement of OUR LAWS Mr. Beardy? 3. Grand Chief Yesno added his people are not simply going to practice civil disobedience in the future, they will “defend” their lands, which he stated was a “big difference.” When coupled with previous statements to the effect that natives will “do whatever it takes” does anyone truly believe these words are not in fact threats that if natives do not get what they demand they will resort to violence. Rhetoric like this is simply not responsible, nor is it acceptable. Here is a newsflash native “leaders,” we don’t attain our objectives in today’s society by threatening to take violent action. This quick resort to violence as a means of achieving ones goals seems to have permeated much of native society. Are the people following their “leaders,” or are the “leaders” following the people? Then, of course, we have “Gladue” to deal with. Ezra Levant’s op-ed, published in the August 27th edition of the CJ, discusses Gladue better than I could do. I’ll pick up Ezra’s words in mid stream “ Because so many of these murderers are graduates of our two-tier justice system that gives aboriginals offenders lighter sentences, or no sentences at all. Out of white, liberal guilt, or simply the soft bigotry of low expectations, Canada’s judge’s give a “discount” to aboriginal criminals when it comes to sentencing. It’s called the Gladue discount. It was devised by white judges who were very pleased with how tolerant and understanding they were. As they dumped violent aboriginal criminals right back into their communities ….” Regrettably, this “dumping” includes communities other than just native communities. In fact, it includes our community and is reflected in our crime rates. Voters if elected I intend to spearhead an approach to our Country’s judiciary to retract this “Gladue Discount” and have native offenders sentenced just as harshly as non native offenders. Is that not common sense? As I reflect on these various issues – and they are very real, very physically dangerous and controversial issues – the one thing that keeps coming to mind is support for our police officers. No aspect of crime prevention will be effective until we provide those on the front lines in this war on crime with absolutely all of the encouragement and support we can muster. Until we can provide our police officers with our totally committed support and backing, we cannot expect these problems, these very dangerous problems, to go away. Put yourself for a moment in the shoes of a police officer, particularly a young officer, a relatively “unproven” officer. Would it not be on your mind that in arresting that native person that unfounded allegations of racism might very well be leveled against you? What kind of support do you receive from your immediate supervisor? I would expect nothing less than full and complete support and trust. I am confident that is the case, but somewhere there exists a police officer who was improperly sacrificed to political pressure, political expediency, or prevailing political influence. How can you possibly know that this fate does not await you? Can you trust your fate to, for example, a Hobbs, or the entire current council, or the anti-racism committee? My situation is a very good example of this. I don’t hate anyone and I’m not a racist. My only ”crime” if you will, is to have the courage to face tough issues head on and speak the truth. But look what Hobbs’ and his sycophantic chum Hannam, did to me. Somewhere out there, there is someone who believes I am indeed “motivated by hate and racism” all because Hobbs said so at his press conference. Clearly, this “man” will stop at nothing if it serves his purpose. Can our police officers truly believe they won’t be crucified next? I wonder. Hobbs will be gone soon, but the point is our police officers simply must be convinced that their careers will not only never be destroyed by such allegations, but because of the ease with which such allegations are made, that their careers will not in any way whatsoever be even remotely influenced by the ceaseless resort to baseless, unfounded, accusations of racism. In addition, I would establish a fund to ensure the hiring of the very best lawyers to defend all of our city employees against any and all allegations of racism. I believe the various unions do provide a similar service, but my point is not a single City employee should be even $ 1.00 out of pocket for allegations of racism lodged against them in the course of the performance of their various duties. Further, I would enquire into full prosecution, to the full extent of the law, of every single false allegation made against our City employees. The bottom line is our City employees – all of our City employees – cannot be subjected, nor affected in the least, by bullshit accusations. I think it’s time that everyone in our City recognize and understand that the proportion of the criminal element in the City-wide native population is very, very small. The vast majority are not involved in lawlessness. But there does exist a very dangerous minority of natives living among us to whom a significant portion of our crime is attributable to and who possess and inclination and propensity to resort to extreme violence. Readers, I am told that some native communities deal with lawbreakers (drug dealers, those who commit acts of personal violence) not by utilising our court system, but by banishing these individuals from the community. That would certainly solve the immediate problem in that community, but if these people - now homeless - journey to our City to take up “residence,” the only thing that has truly been accomplished is their former problem has now become our current problem. Please assist me here readers, is this practice actually being carried out? If true, this is simply unacceptable. Let’s find out if this is true, so we can begin to deal with it.