'People are pissed:' Ottawa police logs describe confrontational, abusive crowds during protest
CBC
Ottawa police officers assigned to work with the convoy protesters described abusive and confrontational — but also sometimes cooperative — crowds during last winter's blockades, according to their logs presented at the Emergencies Act inquiry.
Hundreds of pages of logs from the police liaison team were entered into evidence on Friday at the Public Order Emergency Commission, which is investigating the federal government's decision to invoke the Emergencies Act on Feb. 14 to clear the crowds.
The document includes the date and time of the record, the officer's last name and badge number and a brief summary of what each officer observed on a given day.
During the first weekend of the protest an officer advised that a police cruiser had been rammed by a protester near Elgin Street, according to the document. Their note said the driver refused to leave their car and police backup was needed.
The logs show a rift between protesters and police formed after the service announced plans to seize gas cans, propane tanks or fuel of any kind that the protesters were bringing into the downtown core.
"Word is spreading of the fuel cut off," reported an officer on Feb. 6. "People are pissed."
The officers took notes when their talks with those in the crowd turned aggressive.
"When we left we got challenged and told police have no rights to walk between vehicles by a young white male who was very confrontational," said an officer on Slater Street on Feb. 8
"Crowd had quickly formed and was agitated," said another log from the following day.
On Feb. 11 police reported that the crowd at the Wellington and O'Connor street intersection had "grown verbally abusive and was getting abusive."
One officer reported that it became hard to do their jobs.
"This time the crowd was bigger and would not allow anyone in and was no longer safe for any officer," said an entry from later that day.
The tone appeared to escalate after the Emergencies Act was invoked on Feb. 14.
Invoking the act gave authorities new powers, allowing them to freeze the finances of those connected to blockades and protests, ban travel to protest zones, prohibit people from bringing minors to unlawful assemblies and commandeer tow trucks.
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