LAW AND ORDER
Montreal's 2 solitudes
BENOIT PELOSSE/THE CANADIAN PRESS
Police block a street in north Montreal during riots on Aug. 10, 2008. Clashes began after police shot and killed 18-year-old Fredy Villanueva during a brief altercation
Many blamed race for last week's clash between police and youth in Montreal's north end. The truth is murkier and goes to a philosophical split at the heart of the force itself
Aug 16, 2008 04:30 AM
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Sean Gordon
Quebec Bureau Chief
MONTREAL–This is how rough it can get on the meanest streets of Montreal's north end: It's a Wednesday night in late July, a street gang member nicknamed "Crazy" sits in a bar when a gunman bursts in and fires a volley of shots.
Less than an hour later, a 36-year-old man – apparently chosen at random – is shot and wounded in a café known to be a Mafia hangout.
Barely two hours after that, bullets slam into a third man as he sits in his car behind yet another bar linked to the Mob.
Police would later describe the man, who survived, as "being in the wrong place at the wrong time."
Gang leaders have latterly accumulated sufficient muscle and riches to boldly launch a turf war with the Mafia figures who have traditionally controlled Montreal's drug trade.
The updated tally: five shootings; two robberies; one hostage taking. Police are bracing for more.
The epicentre of the violence, Montreal-Nord, is one of the most densely populated areas on the island of Montreal. The rectangular borough is also home to some of the city's poorest housing tracts.
Last weekend, riots broke out in the neighbourhood after police shot and killed 18-year-old Fredy Villanueva after a brief altercation in a park.
Even before that traumatic event, it was a part of town where relations between many citizens and those who police them had broken down more or less completely.
In an area largely dominated by the Bloods – teenaged gang-bangers and wannabes sport red kerchiefs to identify their allegiance – the cops are often seen as just another rival gang, who happen to wear the blue of their hated Crips rivals. And for the police, the gangs are holding the neighbourhood hostage and demonstrating ever more hubris, shooting at police vehicles and following cops home.
It's tempting to boil it all down and blame racial profiling, or the rampant gangs, or even to revive the canard that Francophone Quebecers – a hefty majority within police ranks – are somehow more bigoted than other Canadians (academic research shows otherwise).
But the reality is more nuanced.
Indeed, Montreal authorities are wrestling with similar problems as police forces in Toronto, New York and other major U.S. cities: Outbreaks of gun violence; wariness on the part of the community; a seeming inability to connect with youths drawn to the mythical gang life.
Police here have responded with a much-hyped "balanced approach" that offers prevention and rehabilitation for the fringe and petty criminals – including successful sports programs – and in-your-face repression for the heavier element.
The strategy claims a healthy component of so-called "community-based policing," but over the last 12 months, there's been a perceptible shift in emphasis.
Full story here:
http://www.thestar.com/News/Ideas/article/479599
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