THE TOO COZY ? RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN POLICE & THE SCHOOL BOARD (WRDSB)

That relationship is being examined via the lens of the School Resource Officers assigned to various schools in the Region. I have to assume that it also includes the separate (Catholic) school board as well. Black community activists as well as a local Black M.P.P. have made strong accusations about the program being used as form of surveillance of minorities and marginalized students. Frankly I was shocked when I first heard that as I had assumed that it was a benign, well meaning program. Of course my source of information was all one sided i.e. police & schools. Then I thought back to the reprehensible behaviour and bullying of both students and parents that I witnessed first hand from the Waterloo Region District School Board (WRDSB) twenty-four years ago. Boy talk about the "Blue Wall" protecting police officers. The WRDSB had it in spades in order to protect one of their own. And they had the full support from the very top of the Waterloo Region Police at the time. Individual officers I dealt with were both reasonable and professional but the police brass were totally and completely in bed with the jerks in charge of the WRDSB. The Education Act giving parents the RIGHT to participate in their children's education and the RIGHT to attend school functions was totally ignored based on no more than professional, educational liars whining and crying for unneeded help from the police. Those liars manufactured false claims without any evidence whatsoever and the senior police jumped at every opportunity to harass a parent protecting his child. Unknown to me and the public at the time was the two decades ongoing Ron Archer scandal in which the WRDSB were also protecting him (teacher) while throwing young children and their parents under the bus. He eventually did jail time while the same jerks and liars who were harassing me never lost their jobs, were reprimanded, or held in the least accountable for professional coverups of child molesting here in Waterloo Region by a teacher known to be inappropriately involved with minors. Parent and student complaints followed him for decades and the WRDSB did what they did best namely blame the victims.

Eventually with the aid of a lawyer, the Crown threw out ten charges for trespass against me as well as an asinine criminal charge of Obstruct Police. All those charges were motivated because of a coverup by the school board, aided and abetted by senior police administration. Cowards and liars, the lot of them. I repeat that individual officers who arrested me behaved very well. The rest not so much. Eventually even a $604,000 Libel award against me by another biased twit, the dishonourable Robert Reilly, got tossed and replaced with a Settlement filed with Superior Court (Kitchener) in 2004. I learned the hard way that individuals need lawyers to protect them from overzealous, incompetent and biased individuals in the Judicial System, including judges. Keep in mind however that there were some decent Crown Prosecutors who did drop charges when it became clear that they were improperly laid in the first place. Actions such as police giving me permission (tape recorded) to pick up my young son from school and then immediately sending a squad car to charge me again with Trespass blew up in their faces when my lawyer presented the recording to the Prosecutor. My lawyer (Wayne Rabley) advised the Prosecutor that he was quite eager to take the charge to court and expose police misbehaviour. The Prosecutor dropped the charges.

Home cooking in court decisions exists in Waterloo Region. Bringing in out-of-town prosecutors for sensitive or political prosecutions to me almost screams an admission that our courts are not truly independent. The shame of it is that the protected bad apples whether police officers, teachers, judges, school administrators etc. reflect badly on all the good ones. When self-regulation of bad apples is a joke then the entire body becomes suspect. Eventually honest and decent people will no longer apply to work in those professions. Is it any wonder?