After street checks were determined to be illegal in October 2019, Mark Furey, the Justice minister at the time, put a stop to the practice. Case closed, you might think. Time to move on. Unfortunately no, says Vanessa Fells of the African Nova Scotian Decade for People of African Descent Coalition (ANSDPAD).
We don’t really know what’s happening with the Wortley recommendation that race data be collected on all police interactions with civilians, and that’s not good.
Press release: In mid-March, in response to the pandemic, Nova Scotia was successful in reducing provincial jail populations by nearly 50%. However, these lessons appear to have been lost as the health and human rights of persons in Nova Scotia’s provincial jails are again in jeopardy..
Prison advocates are raising the alarm about appalling conditions at the Central Nova Scotia Correctional Facility in Burnside and the East Coast Forensic Hospital in Dartmouth. Things are made even worse by the pandemic. We speak with Dr. Adeline Iftene and lawyer Claire McNeil, both members of the East Coast Prison Justice Society.
“For us feminism is not a ‘dirty’ word. For others the word seems to be scary or spells “danger.” Our call for a feminist analysis was ignored by federal and provincial governmental departments during their deliberations on how to address the mass shooting atrocities of a man whose actions or behaviours can only be described as evil.” Jeanne Sarson and Linda MacDonald on what the scary word is all about.
John McCracken takes a look at the feedback on the federal/provincial announcement that there will be a review rather than a public inquiry on April’s mass shooting. “The good people of Nova Scotia, as it turns out, can smell a cover up from a mile away,” he concludes.
Jarod Campbell and Sid Kondapuram: “What would a public inquiry conclude about Minister Furey’s former employer, the RCMP? Why did he ignore the reality of racist street checks until Dr. Wortley released his report? Why hasn’t he issued an apology to Glen Assoun for his wrongful conviction? Why is he so determined to protect the police? “
Open letter by the ANSDPAD Coalition: For decades our community has called on government to work collaboratively with us to address the ongoing issues of racial profiling, over policing, police brutality, systemic anti-Black racism in the justice system, and differential treatment while incarcerated.
Open letter: At this time the only adequate defence to the spread of COVID-19 inside our jails, and consequent preventable deaths, is strategic decarceration — i.e., ensuring that admissions and numbers of prisoners held in facilities are as low as possible, consistent with public safety.
In this terrifying time we are deeply worried about folks inside. WWW and all volunteer orgs have had our access to provincial facilities suspended completely and indefinitely. The prisoners may only have non-contact visits and 2 free phone calls per week. No action has yet been taken to reduce the burden through temporary releases, etc.
East Coast Prison Justice Society, Elizabeth Fry Societies (NS Mainland and Cape Breton), Women’s Wellness Within, and the NS Prisoners’ Health Coalition co-wrote the following letter.