Here’a weird and slightly (though only slightly) disturbing footnote to the G20 policing issue. Earlier this week, at a bail hearing for one of the anarchist ringleaders, Justice of the Peace Mark Conacher banned note-taking in the court room’s public benches, save the media. On the day, the order was enforced. The Hamilton Spectator’s Susan Clairmont, who covered the entire incident in detail, concluded her report by stating:
“I have since left a message with Conacher's office hoping to interview him about the note-taking. He has not returned my call. The whole thing is enough to leave one questioning the logic and order of things. Even those of us who aren't anarchists.”
While I’m sure that Conacher’s ruling in the matter is nothing more than an eccentric aberration, unless and until there is an independent inquiry involving all levels of government, the public will be left sharing Clairmont’s understandable confusion.
(Photo: A G20 protester is released from a temporary police detention centre in Toronto on June 27, 2010. Fernando Morales/The Globe and Mail)
