G20 assault trial: Officer found guilty of using excessive force on Adam Nobody

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G20 assault trial: Officer found guilty of using excessive force on Adam Nobody G20 protester Adam Nobody called verdict a long-awaited moment of vindication.

 

Richard Lautens / Toronto Star

G20 protester Adam Nobody is seen on Queen Street after a victory of sorts earlier Thursday with the guilty verdict in the judge-alone trial of Const. Babak Andalib-Goortani. The police officer was convicted of using excessive force on the G20 protester in June of 2010.

By: Alyshah Hasham News reporter, Jacques Gallant Staff Reporter, Published on Thu Sep 12 2013

 

 

On June 26, 2010, G20 protester Adam Nobody was violently arrested — one of 1,105 jailed over that now infamous weekend of heavy-handed policing.

On Thursday, more than three years later, Const. Babak Andalib-Goortani was found guilty of using excessive force — the only G20 case in which a police officer was convicted.

It’s a long-awaited moment of vindication for the hundreds of people who joined him in jail after the largest mass arrest in Canadian history, Nobody said.

But while Thursday’s verdict in the criminal court was a surprising victory, he said, it is only one piece of what has become an agonizingly slow search for justice and accountability by people caught up in the G20 arrests.

 

Only two officers were criminally charged with assaults from that weekend. The other, Glenn Weddell, was found not guilty in May.

“A conviction against a police officer is extremely, extremely hard to get . . . it proves that, although you do need video evidence . . . you can do it,” said Nobody.

“I clapped in court, and I will keep clapping the rest of my life,” he later added.

It’s a message that resonates particularly strongly now, after the shooting of Sammy Yatim, another incident captured on video that centres on whether a police officer used excessive force.

“Unfortunately, verdicts like this are quite rare,” said civil rights lawyer Peter Rosenthal. “I hope it sends a message to police officers that, at least in some circumstances, they will not get away with assaulting people.”

The only outstanding criminal case is also Andalib-Goortani’s. He faces a charge of assault with a weapon against another G20 protester, laid by the Toronto Police’s Professional Standards Unit, rather than the SIU. That is expected to go to a jury trial next February.

Requests for comment from Andalib-Goortani through the office of his lawyer, Harry Black, were denied.

Also still to come are the disciplinary cases of 31 officers, including two senior officers, charged under the Police Services Act following public complaints, said Abby Deshman, program director at the Canadian Civil Liberties Association.

“We are concerned that (the cases) are taking so long.” Still, she said, the verdict is a good first step in the long G20 “accountability process.”

“We know that there were major hurdles getting this particular case to charges and to trial,” Deshman said. “I think it is because of media and public attention on this particular case that we have the result we have today.”

The hearings have been bogged down by procedural issues, with most of the officers charged facing May 2014 trial dates.

Many are accused of unnecessary arrest or unnecessary use of force during the protests.

“These charges are a fundamental part of the accountability process,” Deshman said. “They are oftentimes the only response to police misconduct, so disciplinary charges really are the meat of where police discipline happens.”

Charges under the Act are not criminal. If officers are found guilty, consequences range from docked pay to losing their jobs.

Toronto Police spokeswoman Meghan Gray said the disciplinary case against Andalib-Goortani will not move forward until criminal proceedings are completed.

With Andalib-Goortani’s lawyer searching for grounds for appeal, it means Adam Nobody could be going to court for a long time to come.

When Nobody changed his name from Adam Trombetta in 2008, it was for the pun value. He was in the middle of another joke two years later when he was arrested at the G20 protest at Queen’s Park.

After losing his water bottle (which he says contained Canadian Club and water) behind an approaching police line, the then 27-year-old stage builder left to pick up a 12-pack of beer and Bristol board.

He was arrested a few minutes after he returned while in the process of making a sign saying “Let Donna Graduate” — a flippant reference to Beverly Hills 90210 meant to jab at how the messages of protesters are ignored.

Nobody testified that he was tackled by police and pinned to the ground. Video evidence shows fists, boots, knees — and the baton belonging to Andalib-Goortani — pummelling him.

He spent 31 hours in jail.

Nobody’s case became one of six probed by the Special Investigations Unit five months later. The investigation determined, using a video uploaded to YouTube, that excessive force was probably used in Nobody’s case. But, as in the other cases, no charges were laid since the officers could not be identified.

Like many other officers that day, Andalib-Goortani was not wearing his badge number or name tag.

Days later, Police Chief Bill Blair said on radio that the video taken by bystander John Bridge was tampered with, and that the police were likely arresting a violent, armed offender. Blair apologized publicly to Nobody after the SIU reopened their investigation the next day.

In December, the Toronto Star obtained video from a bystander and printed a front-page photo clearly identifying the officer. A charge was laid against Andalib-Goortani by the SIU on Dec. 21, 2010.

Andalib-Goortani, who has spent the three years since on administrative duties at 31 Division, testified that Nobody was resisting arrest.

His four strikes with his baton were to assist in the arrest, he testified.

Justice Louise Botham disagreed.

“I find his explanation that he was responding to Adam Nobody’s resistance is nothing more than an after-the-fact attempt to justify his blows rather than reason for them,” she said in her verdict, delivered Thursday morning.

“I am very fortunate to be where I’m at,” Nobody said in an interview. “I do welcome the chance to go through this and see cops in court and have them charged. But I wish I had the 1,100 people behind me who went through the exact same thing as I did.”

Andalib-Goortani will be sentenced Nov. 8. The maximum sentence is 18 months in jail or a $5,000 fine. However, the decision will be appealed if possible, said Mike McCormack, president of the police union.

While they respect the justice system, the judge came to the wrong conclusion, McCormack said after the verdict was read.

In a later interview, he added that the length of time the disciplinary hearings are taking is “ridiculous.”

“Our officers are looking to move this forward. This cloud is over our officers’ heads,” he said. “What seems to be getting lost in all of this is the challenging environment and what our officers were facing that weekend.

“I think overall our officers did a great job.”

There also remain a number of G20-related civil cases before the courts.

One is the $14.2 million lawsuit launched by Nobody against officers involved in his arrest and a later alleged assault that injured his cheek and nose.

Another is lawyer Murray Klippenstein’s 1,000-person lawsuit, currently awaiting a court date to appeal a judge’s rejection of the class-action designation.

Blair would not comment on the Nobody case while it remains before the courts.

“I’m always concerned when any incident might detract from the public’s perception of their police service,” he said when asked about the impact on the police image of the guilty verdict, coupled with the Yatim shooting and child pornography charges recently laid against another officer.