And that's a wrap!
Thanks to our gracious hostess for putting us up overnight so we could be up at ass o'clock to get to CANSEC.
And airport duty again.
Been a while since I've been on this duty, and fortunately, it's relatively rare.
Last night cops hassled the flotilla returnee. Tonight, who knows.
#LOLife #Toronto #TorontoActions #FreePalestine #GenocideIsNotDefence #PoliceDontKeepUsSafe
Leaving peaceful gardenworld to go watch police at a protest sometimes is less than motivating.
I wonder how many altercations Adam Lee Wasserman will get into today. Is it even possible for that intellectually inert shitbag to go a whole day without starting anything?
Also, I love Miss Fuzzybum pollinating my currants and gooseberries.
I have only relatively recently learned to watch for the bums in determining whether it's a carpenter bee (leathery bum) or the wonderful bumblebee.
I get the most random arrest phone calls.
It's like wildly divergent parts of my life keep intersecting.
We're marching and somehow, I'm on flank.
I'm officially too old for flank.
I need to train some youth to do this.
I feel like we should celebrate wins more.
Screenshot from:
https://www.noarmsinthearts.com/
Backing people up in their quest to make the world a better place isn't always as easy as it should be.
People who think the world is perfect as it is (or, tbh, are on a quest to make it just that little bit uglier) really like to make shit just a little bit more difficult, with the doxxing, and the obsessive (disordered) following, and the stalking.
But we stick it out.
We were there until 3 am after the Giller arrests; sitting in locked banks; sitting outside locked banks; and myriad other places: IN CASE OF COPS.
So this win, this massive corporation divesting from a genocidal investment because the cost was just too high in the end, belongs to all of us.
On to the next win.
Since we went off on our own, Orange Hats has expanded our legal support functions well beyond legal observing.
We are currently compiling a comprehensive list of what we do, both for the granting process and our site. Inl would say 75% of what we do is effectively invisible.
At Protests
• Quick KYR Training;
• Watch and document cops' behaviour;
• Arrange for legal support if there are arrests.
At Police Stations
• Arrest/Jail support (function as the point of contact between legal team and those awaiting for arrestees to be released);
• Accompany people when they need to get fingerprints and photos taken, or to do turn-ins.
• Accompany people when they have to file a report.
In Court
We attend court or just accompany people to the courthouse, typically during the self-rep stages, to help manage expectations and provide moral support, as well as to help navigate the system where appropriate.
Other
• Facilitate workshops around police and the broader carceral system, particularly with youth and marginalized communities;
• Provide one-on-one information about what to expect in various encounters with the carceral system;
• Connect people to supports;
• Track trends in police behaviour vis-à-vis activists and protests;
• Track police brutality and police-caused injuries.
2/ If you are an activist in Toronto and you need help navigating the legal system (cops/court) that's what Orange Hats is for. We're also actively seeking politically-aligned* people who are interested in helping others navigate the legal system so we can build more capacity. It can be something as simple but meaningful as attending a police division with a marginalized person. You'd be surprised what a difference it makes. Our presence at protests is way less than half of what we do. Ping me and I'll give you the org Signal contact. ____ * we don't want to have to start from "police are NOT, in fact, your friends." #TorontoActivists #LOLife #LegalObservers #PoliceDontKeepUsSafe
2/
If you are an activist in Toronto and you need help navigating the legal system (cops/court) that's what Orange Hats is for.
We're also actively seeking politically-aligned* people who are interested in helping others navigate the legal system so we can build more capacity.
It can be something as simple but meaningful as attending a police division with a marginalized person. You'd be surprised what a difference it makes.
Our presence at protests is way less than half of what we do.
Ping me and I'll give you the org Signal contact.
____
* we don't want to have to start from "police are NOT, in fact, your friends."
#TorontoActivists
#LOLife #LegalObservers #PoliceDontKeepUsSafe
Today in #FuckThePolice
(Actually "Last week in #FTP" but I just found it)
This asshole is BUSTED.
One of the things we do at Orange Hats arrest support, including accompany people for turn-ins and fingerprinting (and honestly, we need more capacity, because I'd love us to have a team to help people with FOI requests and getting prints/photos expunged).
This asshole is Desk Sergeant McCormick.
https://www.tps.ca/media-centre/news-releases/65035/
We have literally taken up warning marginalized people not to go into 52 during his shifts, because he is such an abusive dick. I just did this again 3 days ago.
The worst incident involved him assaulting the person I had accompanied for prints because she knew her rights and refused to answer questions the cops are not even supposed to ask.
Dude was apoplectic.
His face was so red I thought he might actually die on the spot because a Black woman and a Palestinian woman were telling him "no."
That's when he decided to grab her arm and physically throw her from the building. He opted not to touch me.
🐖🐖🐖Dudes🐖🐖🐖
I AM LITERALLY THERE TO MAKE SURE YOU DON'T VIOLATE PEOPLE'S RIGHTS, AND I HAVE MULTIPLE LAWYERS ON SPEED DIAL TO VERIFY WHAT I SAY AND IN CASE YOU MANAGE TO THROW ME A LOOP.
(BTW, there used to be cards in the prints room that specified what the cops will ask — name, dob, address — but those all vanished a little over a year ago when they decided that they were going to try to violate people's rights much more intensely and see what they could get away with.)
FROM THE TPS MEDIA RELEASE:
A Toronto Police officer has been arrested and charged by the Toronto Police Service.
It is alleged that:
• in multiple instances in October 2025, the accused took property that was delivered to 52 Division instead of logging it
• following an investigation, multiple items were recovered, including government-issued identification, bank cards, and passports; some of these items had previously been reported stolen to the Toronto Police Service.
Constable Derek McCormick, 56, has been arrested and charged with:
• four counts of Theft Under $5,000
• Breach of Trust
• Obstruct Justice
#LOLife #LegalObservers #PoliceDontKeepUsSafe #PoliceDontPreventCrime #DefundDisarmDismantle #Abolish #FuckThePolice
Gigi 🍄🟫