The Ontario Human Rights Commission (OHRC) is conducting a public interest inquiry into the practices of the Toronto Police Service (TPS), in relation to their interactions with Black persons specifically, to determine whether racial profiling and discrimination has occurred. The OHRC will be examining a range of activities between the years 2010 and 2017, including arrests and charges of specific categories of offences and the disproportionate impact on Black persons and communities. This will also include an inquiry into the TPS’s and the Toronto Police Services Board’s (TPSB) culture, policies, and accountability mechanisms relating to racial profiling and discrimination. This process will involve data collection from the TPS, the TPSB, as well as the Special Investigations Unit (SIU), as well as conducting other research and consultations with experts, stakeholders and affected individuals and organizations.
The OHRC will allow the TPS and TPSB to respond to the inquiry’s findings and recommendations prior to providing a public report. In identifying issues relating to the Ontario Human Rights Code, the OHRC will determine what, if any, steps can be taken to address those issues.
This initiative is in keeping with the OHRC’s report Under suspicion: Research and consultation report on racial profiling in Ontario, which was released in May, 2017. CMHA Ontario contributed a policy paper on the intersection of racial and mental health profiling that was published in a journal sponsored by the OHRC called the Canadian Diversity Journal and is available on the OHRC’s website.