Man doesn’t remember smashing windows in post-game Vancouver riot: court
By The Canadian Press - Monday, February 4, 2013 - 0 Comments
VANCOUVER – A man in his mid-20s wearing a green hockey T-shirt paces outside…
VANCOUVER – A man in his mid-20s wearing a green hockey T-shirt paces outside an electronics store in downtown Vancouver, pumping his arms in the air and smiling broadly at a thick crowd of whooping onlookers.
He shrugs at the crowd as if asking them what to do, and then picks up an orange-striped street barricade strewn on the ground before him.
Suddenly, another young man in a hooded sweatshirt runs past him and jump-kicks the window, sending a full pane of glass splintering.
The T-shirted man follows the act by tossing the wooden plank, but it’s a weak throw that drops it to the ground. He hoists it back up in two hands, proceeding to shove it repeatedly through the hole while looking backwards at the cheering crowd with a wide grin.
A white poster with a multi-coloured parrot flutters to the ground as the man is quickly swallowed up by the crowd.
The entire episode plays out on a video submitted to police in the aftermath of the 2011 Vancouver Stanley Cup riots.
Spencer Kirkwood, 26, acknowledges he was at the riot and doesn’t deny he appeared in the video smashing the window.
But he says he has no memory of the act or joining the mob scene at all, a court heard Monday at the first trial for the hundreds of people charged in the melee after the Vancouver Canucks lost the Stanley Cup.
The Vancouver man pleaded not guilty to charges that brought him before a B.C. provincial court judge, unlike 110 others so far who have admitted guilt, many of them already sentenced for their crimes on June 15, 2011.
A Crown lawyer told court that Kirkwood doesn’t dispute he was at the riot or that he appeared in the footage, but that he later gave a police statement describing a huge gap in his memory of what happened that night.
Kirkwood drank beer and other alcohol at a friend’s home and emerged after the game to see smoke rising from the downtown core, court heard.
He remembers commenting on the riot.
“The next day he woke up and didn’t recall anything else,” said Crown lawyer Patti Tomasson.
Kirkwood was sporting a green T-shirt with a white hockey stick logo and jeans when he helped break windows at a Telus store, at a cost of $10,337 to replace, said Tomasson, reading from an agreed statement of facts.
Two days later, Kirkwood phoned 911 after receiving a threatening phone call from an anonymous man who had apparently spotted him in video that had been posted online.
“He was scared,” Tomasson said.
The next day Kirkwood went to police to give a statement.
Kirkwood was charged in late November 2011 with participating in a riot and mischief.
In May 2012, he was pulled over in the wee hours of the morning by a police officer for allegedly running a red light. He told the officer he hadn’t been drinking, the Crown said, but two tests at the station found alcohol in his blood.
He was arrested and charged with breach of bail.
“That must be from the riot, my all of 45-second involvement,” Kirkwood apparently told the officer, she said.
Tomasson called the videographer of the footage to the stand, a 28-year-old comedian and municipal worker who said he went downtown that night specifically to film the riot in the hopes of helping police.
The Crown showed clips from his footage, which freeze frames and then circles certain individuals Greg Potocky believed were involved in criminal acts.
How did the man in the green T-shirt respond to the crowd, Tomasson asked the witness.
“He seemed to enjoy it quite a bit,” Potocky said. “When they were cheering him on he raised his arms in celebration.”
Potocky said that within minutes of posting his footage the day after the riot, someone had identified Kirkwood and sent him more information via Facebook. He said both the accused and an apparent mutual friend requested he remove the clips, but he refused.
Potocky handed his footage over to the police.
Kirkwood’s lawyer, Jonathan Waddington, did not cross-examine the witness. He later reminded reporters his client had already agreed he was in the video.
Earlier, the Crown called a senior Vancouver police officer to testify, and Kirkwood appeared to listen attentively as the “public order co-ordinator” spent more than an hour setting the scene.
Staff Sgt. Lee Patterson described the rising tension in the boisterous crowd of mostly young, drunk men involved in what turned into “pandemonium.”
“They had become a mob,” he told court. “There were people with hatred in their eyes.”
Patterson did not specifically describe any interaction with Kirkwood, but was asked how the crowd reacted when windows were broken.
“It gives a shot of excitement to the crowd, a trophy for achievement.”
Waddington would not say whether his client, dressed in a suit and striped tie, would appear as a witness later in the trial.
“A number of matters were admitted,” he said outside court. “We admit riot, a number of matters aren’t controversial. But he’s entitled to have this matter tested and he’s presumed innocent.”
Thousands of people rocked the city’s downtown after the Canucks lost the Stanley Cup to the Boston Bruins in Game 7 in 2011.
Cars were flipped and set ablaze, stores were looted and dozens of fights broke out. Police used tear gas and riot gear to disperse the crowds about five hours after the brawl began.
Police have recommended charges against 315 suspected rioters, and the Crown has so far charged 173 people in the massive police investigation that includes thousands of hours of video evidence.
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‘What would your grandmother think?’: Vancouver riot hero asked would-be bomber
By Tamsyn Burgmann, The Canadian Press - Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 7:48 PM - 0 Comments
VANCOUVER – Ignoring a sea of taunts and threats of violence, Victoria Pearson waded…
VANCOUVER – Ignoring a sea of taunts and threats of violence, Victoria Pearson waded into the 2011 Stanley Cup riot and appealed to the conscience of one wild-eyed young man stuffing a handkerchief into the gas tank of a parked car.
“Do you think your grandmother would be proud of you right now?” she asked the stranger.
He paused, then sheepishly moved away, becoming one among a horde of nameless rioters Pearson, 29, prevented from torching a block of cars for at least half-an-hour the night Vancouver descended into lawlessness after the hometown hockey team lost the big game.
The Vancouver woman was among 17 civilians and eight medical professionals awarded Wednesday for acts of bravery on June 15, 2011 when a melee broke out among thousands of people gathered for Game 7 of the Stanley Cup.
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Commons bans masks during violent protests
By The Canadian Press - Wednesday, October 31, 2012 at 5:25 PM - 0 Comments
OTTAWA – It’s not a trick — and for would-be masked rioters, it’s no…
OTTAWA – It’s not a trick — and for would-be masked rioters, it’s no treat, either.
While tens of thousands of children are putting the final touches on Halloween costumes and masks, the House of Commons has approved a bill banning people from hiding their faces during riots.
The private member’s legislation, Bill C-309, is the brainchild of Alberta Conservative backbencher Blake Richards.
Richards says it’s a response to last year’s Stanley Cup riots in Vancouver, when often-masked vandals rampaged through the streets after their team’s Game 7 loss to the Boston Bruins.
The bill provides a penalty of up to 10 years in prison for anyone convicted of covering their face during a riot or other unlawful assembly.
The bill — which won’t apply to those attending peaceful protests or demonstrations — passed by a margin of 153-126, with the government in support and the NDP and Liberals opposed.
During the Commons debate on the bill, New Democrat MP Charmaine Borg cited civil liberties concerns in opposing the measure.
“I would also like to point out that this bill takes away an individual’s right to demonstrate anonymously,” she said.
“An individual is not necessarily going to commit a crime just because he or she is wearing a mask at a riot. It is reasonable to think that the person just wants to remain anonymous and protect his or her identity.”
Richards scorned that view.
“Anyone who is wearing a mask or a disguise to conceal his or her face in the midst of a riot is exhibiting aggravating behaviour,” he said.
He said law-abiding citizens caught up in violence will naturally tend to want to leave the area.
“It is hard to imagine that others who ignore police instructions to depart the area and who, in addition, continue to linger in the vicinity while wearing a disguise are seized by any innocent motives or good intentions in those kind of circumstances.”
The bill does not apply to protests or demonstrations and contains a “lawful excuse” clause which would protect people who cover their faces for religious or cultural reasons.
Opposition Leader Tom Mulcair called the bill redundant.
“The police already have all the tools they need,” he said.
Liberal Sean Casey said the legislation is just another part of the Conservative law-and-order fixation.
“It is as if the Conservatives lie awake at night dreaming about ways to put more and more people in prison,” Casey said during the debate. “It is an obsession rooted not in science or evidence, or even reason. It is irrational.”
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Investigators travel the country to arrest No. 1 suspect in Vancouver riot
By James Keller, The Canadian Press - Wednesday, September 26, 2012 at 8:06 PM - 0 Comments
VANCOUVER – The No. 1 suspect in last year’s Stanley Cup riot has for months existed as a nameless face on a police wanted poster, a young man in a blue Vancouver Canucks jersey placed on a photo grid of more than 100 people suspected of burning cars, looting stores and in some cases assaulting others.
VANCOUVER – The No. 1 suspect in last year’s Stanley Cup riot has for months existed as a nameless face on a police wanted poster, a young man in a blue Vancouver Canucks jersey placed on a photo grid of more than 100 people suspected of burning cars, looting stores and in some cases assaulting others.
Suspect IRIT-00001, as he’s known to investigators, is one of 15 people suspected of beating a Good Samaritan who was attempting to stop rioters from smashing the windows of the Bay department store and stealing merchandise from inside.
IRIT-00001 was the only one of those suspects police had yet to track down — until this week, when investigators who spent months following his movements out of B.C. and across three provinces made an arrest in Saskatchewan.
Police announced Wednesday they had arrested Jonathan Stephen Mahoney, 24, a day earlier in Lanigan, Sask., a small community of about 1,200 people east of Saskatoon.
Mahoney, originally from Conception Bay, N.L., has been charged with participating in a riot, assault, assault with a weapon and mischief, said Insp. Laurence Rankin. Two officers travelled to Saskatchewan to make the arrest and were expected to return with Mahoney on Wednesday afternoon, said Rankin.
“He was certainly aware of what’s going on and we extended the opportunity to meet with him, and he chose not to,” said Rankin.
“I don’t want to speculate any more other than to say that he did move a lot, and it leaves one to wonder if it was because he didn’t want to be tracked down.”
Mahoney is charged in the assault of Robert MacKay, who was swarmed, beaten and pepper sprayed on June 15, 2011, as violence and lawlessness swept across several blocks of downtown Vancouver in the hours after the Canucks lost Game 7 of the Stanley Cup final.
Police have recommended charges against all 15 suspects in the MacKay beating; of those, charges have so far been approved against 11 adults and two youth.
Mahoney was working in Vancouver at the time of the riot, but later moved to Manitoba, his hometown of Conception Bay, N.L., and finally to Lanigan, Sask., where he was working at a potash mine, said Rankin.
Rankin said he had a chance to speak with MacKay and tell him the news.
“He’s very happy to see that we’ve continued to see it through,” said Rankin.
“Like a lot of the victims, not only the ones that were assaulted but victims of property crime, they were very relieved that we’re continuing the investigation. It’s been a year and a half, it’s been a long haul, but we’re continuing to do so because we haven’t forgotten or lost sight of the victims in this.”
Rankin also announced police were recommending charges against an additional 50 people. That brings the total number of accused rioters to 275, though Crown counsel has so far only approved charges against 156 of them, according to statistics provided by the Vancouver police.
Earlier this year, police indicated the investigation was scaling back due to a decrease in tips from the public. Currently, there are 22 investigators working on the file, said Rankin.
But Rankin said additional charges could still come. He said there were still a number of strong suspects, including some who may have been involved in serious assaults, and he urged the public once again to look at photos collected on the police department’s website to see whether they recognize anyone.
“We’re still receiving information and we still have viable suspects that we’re working on, so in that sense we’re still moving ahead,” he said.
As of this week, 73 rioters have pleaded guilty and 14 of them have been sentenced, according to the province’s criminal justice branch. Those sentences range from conditional sentences that don’t include jail time to jail terms of more than a year.
The riot caused nearly $4 million in damage over several blocks of downtown Vancouver. Rioters smashed windows, set cars on fire and looted stores for hours until police in riot gear and on horseback were able to bring the crowd under control.
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Canada by the numbers: tattooed patriots and brown baggers
By Mika Rekai - Wednesday, September 5, 2012 at 12:50 PM - 0 Comments
British Columbia…: Vancouverites still haven’t forgiven the Stanley Cup rioters. A recent Angus
British Columbia: Vancouverites still haven’t forgiven the Stanley Cup rioters. A recent Angus Reid poll found 85 per cent of residents believe the police probe into riot-related offences should continue. Not only that, but 56 per cent of people there think the city’s reputation is still tarnished.
Alberta: Albertans love their cars, but an Angus Reid survey suggests they have some poor driving habits. When asked, 76 per cent of respondents have seen drivers multi-tasking (putting on makeup, texting) while driving, and 73 per cent have seen drivers run red lights—the highest rate in the country.
Manitoba: People in Manitoba are the most in love with Canada’s flag. An Ipsos Reid survey found 36 per cent of people there would consider getting a tattoo of the Maple Leaf somewhere on their body, tying only Saskatchewan in their devotion.
