--ROMARE BEARDON
Traffic nightmare: DVP, subway weekend closures
(File)
The Don Valley Parkway will be shut down in both directions from Highway 401 to the Gardiner Expressway from 2 a.m. Saturday until 5 a.m. Monday.
The closure is required in order for the city to perform routine fall maintenance, which will include the replacement of a steel beam guard rail and pavement and sign improvements.
Motorists are urged to use Don Mills Road, Bayview Avenue, Victoria Park Avenue and Kingston Road as alternative routes.
The closure won't be the only disruption to city residents either.
The TTC has also announced that there will be no weekend subway service between Bloor-Yonge and Eglinton stations on the Yonge Line as a new track is installed.
Riders will be able to take shuttle bus service between the two stations during the disruption.
The closure is expected to be lifted in time for the start of service Monday.
Fight results in manslaughter charge after man dies
A Toronto police car is pictured in this Monday, Sept. 5, 2011, file photo. (CP24/Chris Kitching)
Police say two men got into an altercation early Sunday and one of them fell to the ground and suffered a life-threatening head injury.
Brian McClenaghan, 28, died of his injuries on Tuesday and police say an autopsy Wednesday determined the cause of death to be a blunt force head injury.
Terence Grayston of Toronto was charged Sunday with aggravated assault but the charge was upgraded to manslaughter today.
Larry David show bombs in racial list
BRENT LANG,
LOS ANGELES - When it comes to hiring female and minority directors, the ABC sitcom “The Middle” gets a gold star and HBO’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm” earns a piece of coal, according to a new report from The Directors Guild of America.
The DGA analyzed more than 2,600 episodes produced in the 2010-2011 television season from more than 170 scripted television series to compile its “best of” and “worst of” lists.
The clear message from its findings is that television remains a white man’s world.
The study comes on the heels of last month’s report from the Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film at San Diego State University that found that the number of females both in front of and behind the cameras is down from just a year ago.
As evidence that a glass ceiling exists, albeit with a few cracks, the DGA study found that Caucasian males directed 77 percent of all episodes, Caucasian females directed 11 percent of all episodes and minority males directed 11 percent of all episodes. Particularly anemic was minority female representation. Women of color only slid behind the camera 1 percent of the time.
Among one-hour series, Caucasian males directed 80 percent of episodes, and in half-hour series, Caucasian males directed 74 percent of all episodes.
Those dismal numbers were essentially static in terms of Caucasian female representation, but the percentage of episodes directed by minority men dropped (from 12 percent to 11 percent) and the percentage of episodes directed by minority women dropped by half (from 2 percent to 1 percent).
“The statistics seem to demonstrate that as a whole, most production companies have demonstrated little or no interest or effort in increasing diversity in their hiring practices from year to year,” the report reads.
In the dog house in terms of female and minority representation, are HBO’s “Bored to Death,” FX’s “Justified,” and Showtime’s “Weeds” all of which were exclusively directed by white men.
In addition to “The Middle,” which turned over directing chores to women and minorities 64 percent of the time, other standouts include three HBO programs “Hung” (60 percent), “In Treatment” (54 percent), and “Treme” (45 percent), two CBS shows “90210” (45 percent) and “The Good Wife” (39 percent), and Lifetime’s “Drop Dead Diva” (38 percent).
GO Transit employees inch closer to strike
A GO Transit bus is shown in this photo.
There had been a strike deadline of Monday for 1530 GO Bus drivers, technicians, station attendants and office staff, but that has now been pushed back and there's no word yet on whether a new deadline has been set.
The Union says Metrolinx, which runs GO, wants the board to overturn a letter of agreement signed by both sides in March.
"This union has never had strike action against this company. We have always had a good working relationship where we have resolved our issues, but right now this issue with this letter they had agreed on kind of compromises our ability to say that they are negotiating in good faith," Ray Doyle, president of ATU local 1587 told CP24.
ATU local 1587 has said in the past that it would strike unless it gets a raise for its members, but Doyle said Thursday that he didn't want to compromise negotiations by speaking publically about the issues being discussed. It has been reported that GO Transit has offered the union a two year wage freeze.
"I am not going to discuss the issues because that is unfair to both sides, but I can say that I have set aside all the dates up to and including the (September) 20th if that is necessary to sit down at the table in good faith and try to get this resolved."
Gary McNeil, president of GO Transit, echoed Doyle's optimism in an earlier interview with CP24.
"Unions try to get the best they can out of management and management tries to get the best back and it's an ongoing process, but I don't think it is any more difficult this time around than any time before," he said. "We are just trying to focus on the core issues and I am looking forward to a successful conclusion."
Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1587 also represents employees operating and maintaining York Region Transit buses for Miller Transit and First Student Canada.
Child killer seeks comfort online
By Michele Mandel
“I am 60 years young,” writes the Ontario prisoner seeking a pen pal on the American website Inmate-Connection. “I have short hair, blue eyes and stands 6 feet tall. I’m slightly overweight but active. I have three passions in life 1. Gardening 2. Computers (programming not the Internet). 3. Cooking. I am a practicing Druid and I also attend Wiccan Services. This is the most important part of my life as it concerns my interaction with the Gods and the planet earth. I will write anyone back who includes a photo.”
He says he’s looking for friends. But the inmate is rather misleading when he tells prospective correspondents that he’s only behind bars for “assault.”
When, in truth, Saul Betesh is a notorious child killer serving a life sentence for the 1977 sadistic rape and murder of Toronto shoeshine boy Emanuel Jaques.
On a steamy July afternoon, a young boy with a homemade shoeshine box stood at the corner of Yonge and Dundas, beckoning for customers with his broken English.
Emanuel needed money to buy food for the new puppy he was going to get from his neighbour. He wanted money to help pay for a family trip back home to Portugal.
So the 12-year-old built his own shoeshine box and painted it light green. He then went to his parents and begged for permission to shine shoes with his older brother.
But downtown Yonge St. was a hardened artery of sleaze, a seedy stretch of body-rub parlours and strip joints. It was no place for a child. His momma told him he was too young to work.
So he turned to his father.
Valdemiro Jaques finally relented, a decision, friends say, that would haunt him for the rest of his life.
One of the boy’s few customers that day was Betesh, a 27-year-old steel rigger by day and sado-masochistic prostitute by night. Violent and remorseless, he’d been in and out of psychiatric treatment from the time he was five for pouring nail polish remover in his babysitter’s ear, throwing knives at his sister and trying to electrocute his entire family.
Together with his roommate and fellow pedophile, Robert “Stretcher” Kribs, Betesh liked hunting for underage boys. Pretty, young Emanuel, barely able to speak English, was easy prey.
Lured to their third-floor apartment above a Yonge St. body-rub parlour with the promise of a princely $35 to move camera equipment, Emanuel was held captive for 12 hours, stripped naked, photographed, beaten and sexually tortured by Stretcher and Betesh while fellow roommates Werner Gruener and Josef Woods stood by.
Betesh never expressed a shred of remorse. “No, I’m not sorry,” he told Toronto Life in 1979. “I don’t feel anything except sorry that it’s put me in here. They say that’s part of my illness. I’m not sorry.”
Their original plan was to give the boy sleeping pills and then dump him in a park where he would wake up long after they’d escaped to Vancouver. But the pills didn’t work. Stretcher insisted Emanuel had to be killed. Betesh tried strangling him with a plastic cord but couldn’t “finish him off.”
In the end, Stretcher and Betesh held the boy’s head down in a filthy sink of water until he was dead, wrapped his naked body in a green garbage bag and hid it under some lumber on the roof of their apartment.
The horrific murder enraged the city and sparked a cleanup of Yonge St.’s sin strip.
Kribs pleaded guilty on the opening day of their 1978 trial. While Betesh had confessed, even showed police where to find the boy’s body, he now argued he wasn’t guilty by reason of insanity. The jury found otherwise.
Inmate #704938A has been serving his life term ever since. Now a guest at the medium-security Warkworth Institution, the sexual sadist has never applied for parole knowing full well there is little chance he’ll ever be released to the outside.
So the lonely heart is confined to making unsuspecting friends through the Inmate-Connection website, which promotes its prisoners as “still human beings with feelings.”
But when it comes to Betesh, we’d have to disagree.
Ford says city employees are the ‘gravy’
Ford also mentioned councillors' office budgets, which he successfully asked council to cut at the beginning of his term in December. And he referred to the Toronto Zoo and the three-city run theatres as “nonsense we're looking after.”
Bernard Weil/TORONTO STAR FILE PHOTO Ford's response: “The gravy is the number of employees we have at City Hall.”
Ford also mentioned councillors' office budgets, which he successfully asked council to cut at the beginning of his term in December. He referred to the Toronto Zoo and the three-city run theatres as “nonsense we're looking after.” And he said again that the city should not be in the business of collecting garbage. But he did not identify anything else he believes is wasteful.
Ford usually conducts one-on-one radio interviews only with friendly hosts. In what is perhaps an indication of shifting political tides, Agar, a longtime Ford booster, grilled him about his proposed cuts to the police budget, his suggestion of a 2.5 per cent tax increase next year, his weakening grip on council, and, twice, on his apparent inability to locate true waste.
“Why are so many people saying — and you know it's all over the place, in all media, just on the street, people hangin' at Tim's [Tim Hortons] — are saying, 'Hey, he's not finding the gravy!'“ Agar said.
Ford said, “That's not what I'm hearing. I don't know what Tim's you're hanging out at.” He said he was determined to address financial problems the city’s politicians have long ignored — problems he said had been caused by the votes of the very “left-wing” councillors now opposing him.
“I'm not one to sit back and watch things. We're gonna make things happen. And that's what we've been doing our whole life,” Ford said. “I guarantee that we're gonna turn this city around, put us back on our financial feet. Because, Jerry, every year, they just kept saying, 'Well, we'll pass it on to next year, we'll deal with it next year, we'll deal with it next year.' Well you know what? Next year has come. Next year is now.”
He asked rhetorically if Toronto would prefer to follow the path of European countries currently undergoing financial crises, such as Portugal, Italy and Spain. The city's operating budget situation, however, is not comparable to the situations in those countries: their problems are related to their large debts, while Toronto is not permitted to take on debt to pay for its operations.
A poll taken this week showed Ford's approval rating at a lowly 42 per cent and overwhelming opposition to suggested cuts. Council centrists have been critical of Ford, and Jaye Robinson, a member of his executive committee, has publicly rejected his preferred plan for the waterfront Port Lands.
Asked about his hold on council, Ford said his opponents are “gonna have to answer to the taxpayers.”
Ford has refused to use the word “cuts,” habitually referring to “efficiencies.” Challenged by Agar to say whether the elimination of daycare subsidies for 2,000 people would be a cut, Ford said, “No, it's an efficiency.”
Ford again promised a 2012 property tax increase of no more than 2.5 per cent. And he again insisted: “There's a lot of gravy left at City Hall. Which we will find.”
Ford has generally distanced himself from most of the recommendations of cuts made by consultants from KPMG. He offered a general endorsement to Agar.
“These people are professionals. These people came in and they found the money. If they can find it, why can't we do what they say?”
Toronto cop board eyes 'significant staff reduction'
By Kevin Connor ,Toronto Sun
The board is examining buyouts and hiring freezes to do its part to reduce the city’s $774-million operating budget pressure in 2012.
“This has come home to us in a major way and we have to look at a significant staff reduction,” Mukherjee said.
“We know there are issues involved in that kind of reduction.”
If the funding is available, the board wants to offer a voluntary exit program for up to 400 members of the police association in 2011.
The board is asking for $20 million to fund the exit program.
There are also plans for a hiring freeze in 2012.
Attendance at training events and conferences — whether in Toronto or out of town — will be reduced by 30% and the service will only be able to host a conference every three years.
The board is waiting on a report from Chief Bill Blair on outsourcing of police background checks and criminal record checks.
There will be no new staff superintendents and staff inspectors appointed and the board will be looking for reductions through attrition in the senior ranks.
“The discussion related to the service’s operating budget for 2012 so far has focused almost entirely or largely on the likelihood of a significant downsizing of the workforce as virtually the only method of achieving the magnitude of reduction called for by the city,” said a report released by the board Wednesday.
“The downsizing of the workforce through layoffs is not a practical or viable option for the simple reason that this measure involves a complex legal and contractual process which will be lengthy and not concluded in time for establishing the 2012 budget. There is no guarantee of success either.”
Psychiatric evaluation ordered for accused in 3-year-old’s kidnapping
Randall Hopley is led out of the Cranbrook, B.C. courthouse today.
Bill Graveland/THE CANADIAN PRESS “Mr. Hopley is tired and exhausted,” Cranbrook lawyer William Thorne said shortly after his client was whisked in and out of court here in a whirlwind early-morning hearing. “I understand he was taken down by a dog.”
Hopley, 46, arrived at the Cranbrook courthouse in an RCMP minivan and tried to cover his head with a shirt to avoid TV cameras. He was handcuffed and wore black pants.
He had spent the previous night at the RCMP detachment in Cranbrook after being captured early Tuesday by police with search dogs who were combing the mountainous B.C.-Alberta border near Crowsnest Pass.
Hopley, who has a history of offences involving minors, is charged with breaking and entering, kidnapping, and abduction of a child under 14 years of age. The charges are all in connection with the five-day disappearance of three-year-old Kienan Hebert of Sparwood, B.C., a coal-mining and resort town about 150 kilometres east of here.
In what many are calling a miracle, the boy’s abductor returned him safely to his family home early Sunday before slipping away without being detected by police.
“Mr. Hopley has a story to tell, and eventually his story will come out,” Thorne told reporters. “It’s a very unusual circumstance.”
Thorne said he did not know if his client had been placed on a suicide watch but said he wouldn’t be surprised if that were the case.
“I’m more concerned about his safety in custody,” he said, referring to the danger of attack by other prisoners.
Hopley was likely to be held in a prison in Kelowna, the lawyer said.
“Mr. Hopley is very sorry for being in the situation he is in.”
Meanwhile, Brandon Johnson, 25, who described himself as a longtime friend of Hopley, told reporters outside the courthouse that he feared for the man’s life.
“They should get him into a facility where they can help him,” Johnson said. “If he goes to prison, he’ll die.”
Describing Hopley as “a great guy” who would “give the shirt off his back to anybody,” Johnson attributed his friend’s alleged behaviour to his failure to take prescribed medication.
“If he doesn’t take his meds, he’s a different person,” Johnson said.
Johnson also said he received a phone call from Hopley prior to his arrest Tuesday in which the wanted man expressed remorse for his actions.
He quoted the man as saying, “My life is over. I gotta go.”
A smattering of Cranbrook residents demanded that no mercy be shown for the accused man.
“I believe he deserves the death penalty without trial,” said Sarah Murray, who wore placards over her shoulders calling for the execution of sex offenders.
Several passersby echoed those sentiments, but they seemed to be a small minority of local residents, most of whom seemed unaware that Hopley’s court hearing was taking place.
Three-year-old Kienan Hebert was in good health following his mysterious return to his family home Sunday. It remains something of a mystery how his abductor was able to bring the boy back while eluding police.
RCMP Inspector Brendan Fitzpatrick said Tuesday the police had hoped the boy would be returned to some safe location but did not dream it would be to his home, which was unlocked and unoccupied at the time.
13-year-old charged with arson after Brampton fire
Police said they received a call at 7:15 p.m. Sunday when the home near Bovaird Dr. and Hwy. 410 was set ablaze.
Police arrested the teen on Monday and charged him with arson and disregard for human life.
No one was injured in the fire and police have not released the cost of damage.
Doors unlocked before boy returned home
SPARWOOD, B.C. - Just how three-year-old Kienan Hebert was brought back to his British Columbia home undetected in the dark of night may have a deceptively simple answer: the doors were unlocked.
Kienan was returned to his family home in Sparwood, B.C., early Sunday morning nearly a week after he disappeared from the very same two-storey house.
The house was unoccupied at the time, with Kienan's large family staying a few doors down, and just hours earlier, the boy's father made an emotional plea for whoever had his son to leave him in a safe location.
The sudden turn of events raised immediate questions about how a kidnapper could enter the home undetected for a second time, but on Monday, Kienan's father Paul offered the explanation.
"We left the doors unlocked on purpose," Paul Hebert, sounding exhausted but relieved, said in an interview.
"We asked him to bring him back to a safe place, and he brought him back to our house."
Hebert declined to say whether he left the doors unlocked on the advice of police.
The sole suspect in Kienan's disappearance remains convicted sex offender Randall Hopley, 46, who was still at large. Police and the Heberts have publicly urged Hopley to turn himself in.
Kienan hadn't been seen since last Tuesday, when his parents put him to bed for the night. By Wednesday morning, he was gone, prompting a massive search of the surrounding area.
By the end of the day, the RCMP had determined Kienan may have been abducted and issued an Amber Alert, asking the public to be on the watch for Hopley's car and a little boy wearing Scooby Doo shorts. The alert spanned several days and was eventually expanded into Alberta.
On Monday, Hebert said his son — one of eight children — was coping with the ordeal and appeared to be OK.
"Other than the personal invasion, being taken away in the middle of the night, nothing," Hebert said when asked whether his son was harmed.
"Kienan's still a little bit offset. If you're a stranger, he won't come and talk to you. But he's doing really good; he's happy to be home."
The case has prompted public debate about two aspects of the police investigation: whether the Amber Alert was issued soon enough and how the abductor could have evaded police to return Kienan home.
Hebert said he was confident the RCMP did all they could and credited the force for Kienan's safe return.
He saved his criticism for the courts, which he said failed to intervene as Hopley's criminal record grew, including at least one case involving a child.
"The judicial system that didn't correct Hopley to begin with, they invaded our rights," said Hebert.
"The judge let him walk with no help. That's what failed: The system. Mr. Hopley needs help and the judicial system failed him, and in doing so failed us, as well."
Hebert didn't specify which case he was referring to, but Hopley has numerous convictions spanning two decades.
In 2008, Hopley pleaded guilty to break-and-enter and was sentenced to 18 months in jail. A Crown spokesman has confirmed Hopley admitted in court that he attempted to take a 10-year-old boy from a home in Sparwood, although charges of unlawful confinement and attempted abduction were stayed.
In the 1980s, Hopley was convicted of sexual assault and sentenced to two years in federal prison.
Hopley hasn't been charged in Kienan's disappearance. Two of his recent defence lawyers have declined comment.
Shirley Bond, who is both the attorney general and solicitor general in B.C., wasn't available for an interview. In a written statement, Bond said she couldn't comment on an ongoing criminal case.
"I understand the RCMP is planning to review some of the questions at hand, such as the process around the issuing of the Amber Alert, which I fully support," said the statement.
"At this time, we need to take care not to say anything that might compromise the ongoing police investigation or any future prosecution."
An RCMP spokesman did not return a request for comment Monday.
Brad Bostock, executive director of Child Find Canada, said the criticism directed at the RCMP — for the Amber Alert and the circumstances surrounding Kienan's return — may be misplaced.
Bostock noted there are specific criteria in place to determine when an Amber Alert should be issued.
Police must believe a child has been abducted and is in danger, and they must have information such as a vehicle description or license plate number to distribute.
"People question the Amber Alert system because, in a lot of the situations, they don't have a full understanding of the criteria that needs to be met before it can be activated," said Bostock.
"I think what would end up happening is that if we relaxed the criteria and we saw a greater number of Amber Alerts put out into the general public, we would see them lose their importance. People would become desensitized."
Bostock said he's never heard of another case in which an abductor returned a child home unnoticed, and there would have been little reason for police to be watching the family home.
"To have the child returned to the home at three o'clock in the morning, that's really unprecedented," said Bostock.
"A lot of people are being critical of law enforcement, but I don't think anybody realistically thought, 'He's probably going to bring the kid right back home and put him on the couch,' so we should have a law-enforcement officer sitting on that couch waiting.'"
— By James Keller in Vancouver
Kienan was returned to his family home in Sparwood, B.C., early Sunday morning nearly a week after he disappeared from the very same two-storey house.
The house was unoccupied at the time, with Kienan's large family staying a few doors down, and just hours earlier, the boy's father made an emotional plea for whoever had his son to leave him in a safe location.
The sudden turn of events raised immediate questions about how a kidnapper could enter the home undetected for a second time, but on Monday, Kienan's father Paul offered the explanation.
"We left the doors unlocked on purpose," Paul Hebert, sounding exhausted but relieved, said in an interview.
"We asked him to bring him back to a safe place, and he brought him back to our house."
Hebert declined to say whether he left the doors unlocked on the advice of police.
The sole suspect in Kienan's disappearance remains convicted sex offender Randall Hopley, 46, who was still at large. Police and the Heberts have publicly urged Hopley to turn himself in.
Kienan hadn't been seen since last Tuesday, when his parents put him to bed for the night. By Wednesday morning, he was gone, prompting a massive search of the surrounding area.
By the end of the day, the RCMP had determined Kienan may have been abducted and issued an Amber Alert, asking the public to be on the watch for Hopley's car and a little boy wearing Scooby Doo shorts. The alert spanned several days and was eventually expanded into Alberta.
On Monday, Hebert said his son — one of eight children — was coping with the ordeal and appeared to be OK.
"Other than the personal invasion, being taken away in the middle of the night, nothing," Hebert said when asked whether his son was harmed.
"Kienan's still a little bit offset. If you're a stranger, he won't come and talk to you. But he's doing really good; he's happy to be home."
The case has prompted public debate about two aspects of the police investigation: whether the Amber Alert was issued soon enough and how the abductor could have evaded police to return Kienan home.
Hebert said he was confident the RCMP did all they could and credited the force for Kienan's safe return.
He saved his criticism for the courts, which he said failed to intervene as Hopley's criminal record grew, including at least one case involving a child.
"The judicial system that didn't correct Hopley to begin with, they invaded our rights," said Hebert.
"The judge let him walk with no help. That's what failed: The system. Mr. Hopley needs help and the judicial system failed him, and in doing so failed us, as well."
Hebert didn't specify which case he was referring to, but Hopley has numerous convictions spanning two decades.
In 2008, Hopley pleaded guilty to break-and-enter and was sentenced to 18 months in jail. A Crown spokesman has confirmed Hopley admitted in court that he attempted to take a 10-year-old boy from a home in Sparwood, although charges of unlawful confinement and attempted abduction were stayed.
In the 1980s, Hopley was convicted of sexual assault and sentenced to two years in federal prison.
Hopley hasn't been charged in Kienan's disappearance. Two of his recent defence lawyers have declined comment.
Shirley Bond, who is both the attorney general and solicitor general in B.C., wasn't available for an interview. In a written statement, Bond said she couldn't comment on an ongoing criminal case.
"I understand the RCMP is planning to review some of the questions at hand, such as the process around the issuing of the Amber Alert, which I fully support," said the statement.
"At this time, we need to take care not to say anything that might compromise the ongoing police investigation or any future prosecution."
An RCMP spokesman did not return a request for comment Monday.
Brad Bostock, executive director of Child Find Canada, said the criticism directed at the RCMP — for the Amber Alert and the circumstances surrounding Kienan's return — may be misplaced.
Bostock noted there are specific criteria in place to determine when an Amber Alert should be issued.
Police must believe a child has been abducted and is in danger, and they must have information such as a vehicle description or license plate number to distribute.
"People question the Amber Alert system because, in a lot of the situations, they don't have a full understanding of the criteria that needs to be met before it can be activated," said Bostock.
"I think what would end up happening is that if we relaxed the criteria and we saw a greater number of Amber Alerts put out into the general public, we would see them lose their importance. People would become desensitized."
Bostock said he's never heard of another case in which an abductor returned a child home unnoticed, and there would have been little reason for police to be watching the family home.
"To have the child returned to the home at three o'clock in the morning, that's really unprecedented," said Bostock.
"A lot of people are being critical of law enforcement, but I don't think anybody realistically thought, 'He's probably going to bring the kid right back home and put him on the couch,' so we should have a law-enforcement officer sitting on that couch waiting.'"
— By James Keller in Vancouver
Warrant issued for suspect in domestic dispute
A Toronto police car is pictured in this Monday, Sept. 5, 2011, file photo. (CP24/Chris Kitching)
Toronto police released limited information about the incident, which occurred near Keele Street and Falstaff Avenue, just south of Highway 401, at about 12:50 a.m.
No one was injured in the domestic incident, police said.
The suspect fled on foot, so police set up a perimeter and conducted a search with a canine unit. Officers failed to locate the man, but they did recover a 9-millimetre handgun.
Investigators are now seeking the public's help to locate the suspect.
Police said Flynt Anthony Ricketts is wanted for several firearm-related offences. He is black, five-foot-eight, 145 pounds and has black hair.
Western, Muslim societies ‘irreconcilable’: poll
Geoff Robins/AFP/Getty Images
56% of respondents in a new Leger Marketing poll see Western and Muslim societies locked in an unending ideological struggle.
By Randy Boswell
A majority of Canadians believes conflict between Western nations and the Muslim world is “irreconcilable,” according to a new national survey that revealed a strong strain of pessimism in the country leading up to Sunday’s 10th anniversary commemorations of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the U.S.
The survey of 1,500 Canadians, conducted over three days last week for the Montreal-based Association for Canadian Studies, showed 56% of respondents see Western and Muslim societies locked in an unending ideological struggle, while about 33% — just one-third of the population — held out hope that the conflict will eventually be overcome.
Another 11% of those polled didn’t answer the question.
ACS executive director Jack Jedwab said the finding has “serious ramifications” for Canadian policies aimed at bridging divides between cultures, which are based on the premise that citizens believe significant progress in mending such religious and cultural conflicts is achievable.
The dark view expressed in the survey “contradicts a fundamental idea in multicultural democracies like ours, that conflicts between societies can be resolved through dialogue and negotiation,” said Jedwab. “This is also a key element in multiculturalism, where Canada is often seen elsewhere in the world as a model in conflict resolution.”
He adds: “If a majority of Canadians feel it is irreconcilable, what does this imply for the various projects and programs in place that aim to bridge gaps?”
The online survey, carried out Sept. 6 to 8 by the firm Leger Marketing, is considered accurate to within 2.9 percentage points 19 times out of 20.
The results also confirm the findings of other recent surveys highlighting Canadians’ ongoing anxiety about the state of security in the post-9/11 world and their deep doubts about whether the long and bloody war in Afghanistan has done much to thwart the threat of terrorism.
In fact, 65% of respondents in the ACS survey said they don’t believe the world is safer from terrorists today than it was 10 years ago. And 70% of those surveyed said they don’t believe the war in Afghanistan has reduced the chances of terrorist attacks.
Jedwab said the “pessimistic feeling” about what the war has accomplished is likely linked to the “widespread hopelessness” about the prospects for ever resolving the deep-rooted, “ideological” conflict between Muslim and Western societies.
Many Canadians have come to believe “nothing will work” to end that conflict, said Jedwab, adding that this grim state of mind will require more scrutiny to fully understand and more carefully crafted public policies to rebuild a sense of optimism about the future of global relations.
The survey did offer one notable “ray of hope,” Jedwab suggested, pointing to a result showing that a slight majority of Canadians (52%) believe it would be wrong for airport security officials to do “extra checks” of “passengers who appear to be of Muslim background.”
While 39% of respondents were open to that kind of profiling, Jedwab interpreted the majority’s rejection of the practice as a sign that most Canadians realize such infringements “would make the purportedly irreconcilable conflict even deeper if the enshrined principles of our rights charters are to be disregarded.”
As the days of Kienan Hebert’s abduction wore on, Canadians braced themselves for the worst — that the three-year-old’s ordeal at the hands of his kidnapper had ended tragically.
The happy news early Sunday that the abductor, believed to be a sex offender, had apparently returned the boy unharmed to his home in Sparwood, B.C., surprised even the experts, with one prominent U.S. advocate for missing children saying he cannot remember a similar outcome in the past.
While the majority of child sex offenders do actually release their victims alive, it is unheard of for a culprit with clearly serious criminal intentions to go to such lengths to ensure a child’s safe return, said Ernie Allen, president of the Virginia-based National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
“For an abductor to take a child in this manner — to penetrate the home, to come into the home, to take the child — and then return the child back to the home is in many ways unprecedented,” he said. “We’ve worked thousands of these cases and I don’t remember one like it.”
The credit can go at least partly to a more aggressive police response in recent years to missing children reports, coupled with law enforcement’s use of conventional media, the Internet and even mobile phones to alert the public, said Mr. Allen. In that sense, the development would fit a hopeful pattern. The rate at which children are recovered alive in serious U.S. abduction cases has soared in the last two decades — from 62% in 1990 to 97% today — as such methods were widely adopted, he said.
Kienan had been taken on Wednesday, with police quickly identifying Randall Hopley, 46, a local man with a record of breakins, theft and at least one sexual offence against a child, as a suspect.
Amber alerts and a wide dragnet had turned up no sign of either the boy or the abductor by Saturday, when his parents’ issued an emotional appeal to the kidnapper to leave their son in a safe, visible place.
Then, at 3. a.m. Sunday morning, the kidnapper returned to the site of the abduction and left Kienan at his home, police said. The Hebert house was empty at the time as the family was staying with friends nearby, but the suspect called 911 to inform police of the child’s whereabouts, while evading capture himself, officers said.
As the community has only one road in or out, driving to the Hebert house would have required passing the search and rescue command post located at the entrance to the suburb, whose flat, largely treeless landscape offers little visual cover.
By Sunday afternoon, Kienan was seen throwing around a frisbee and playing with a Silly String toy in his front yard, appearing healthy and happy. “It’s like nothing ever happened,” Paul Hebert, the boy’s father, told CTV News, while Kienan’s grandparents reacted emotionally to the surprise development.
“We still can’t imagine what we went through these past four days. It’s just like it’s a dream,” Bernadette Hebert, the grandmother said. “Everyone’s so happy he’s back .”
Sharon Fraser, Sparwood’s acting mayor, said the boy seems unaffected by his four-day ordeal, with an examination at the local hospital indicating that he had not been physically or sexually abused.
“It’s just like having a miracle happen,” said Ms. Fraser. “Little Kienan is so unbelievably content and happy. It’s like [he knows], ‘So now I’m home and I can go back to playing’.”
Ms. Fraser said the father revealed that he hadn’t slept since the ordeal began Wednesday morning when Kienan was discovered missing.
At the Missing Children Society of Canada, the chief investigator indicated that in 25 years as a police officer and 15 with the society, he had only once seen a similar abduction end with the victim getting home alive, said Amanda Pick, the group’s executive director.
“It’s absolutely shocking,” she said. “The more time passes — in this case getting into the four-day time period — people’s expectation of human beings being returned safely diminishes.”
She said the ability of new technology — like a smart-phone application the society helped launch earlier this month — to circulate information in real time has made it more difficult for child abductors to hide and remain anonymous.
With the boy home safe, police stepped up their manhunt for Mr. Hopley on Sunday, setting up roadblocks searching vehicles in the area.
Despite the intense publicity that surrounds abductions that end in murder, the vast majority of sex offenders release their victims after harming them, said Mr. Allen. Anecdotal evidence suggest that may increasingly be due to Amber alerts and other police methods that employ the media to widely broadcast news of a missing child as soon as possible, he said.
Those messages — especially when they feature pleas from loved ones — may provoke a belated feeling of sympathy for the victim on the part of the offender, or simply a fear of being caught, said Mr. Allen. And, perhaps most importantly, the alerts draw the “eyes and ears of the public” into the investigation, he said.
“We have lots of cases in which offenders will take a child and see or hear the media response … and make a decision that the heat is too great, the risk is too high, and let the child go,” said Mr. Allen. “In so many of these cases, what we see is children recovered, abductors identified, not through CSI-type wizadry, but recovered because of average people doing average things and paying attention.”
A majority of Canadians believes conflict between Western nations and the Muslim world is “irreconcilable,” according to a new national survey that revealed a strong strain of pessimism in the country leading up to Sunday’s 10th anniversary commemorations of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the U.S.
The survey of 1,500 Canadians, conducted over three days last week for the Montreal-based Association for Canadian Studies, showed 56% of respondents see Western and Muslim societies locked in an unending ideological struggle, while about 33% — just one-third of the population — held out hope that the conflict will eventually be overcome.
Another 11% of those polled didn’t answer the question.
ACS executive director Jack Jedwab said the finding has “serious ramifications” for Canadian policies aimed at bridging divides between cultures, which are based on the premise that citizens believe significant progress in mending such religious and cultural conflicts is achievable.
The dark view expressed in the survey “contradicts a fundamental idea in multicultural democracies like ours, that conflicts between societies can be resolved through dialogue and negotiation,” said Jedwab. “This is also a key element in multiculturalism, where Canada is often seen elsewhere in the world as a model in conflict resolution.”
He adds: “If a majority of Canadians feel it is irreconcilable, what does this imply for the various projects and programs in place that aim to bridge gaps?”
The online survey, carried out Sept. 6 to 8 by the firm Leger Marketing, is considered accurate to within 2.9 percentage points 19 times out of 20.
The results also confirm the findings of other recent surveys highlighting Canadians’ ongoing anxiety about the state of security in the post-9/11 world and their deep doubts about whether the long and bloody war in Afghanistan has done much to thwart the threat of terrorism.
In fact, 65% of respondents in the ACS survey said they don’t believe the world is safer from terrorists today than it was 10 years ago. And 70% of those surveyed said they don’t believe the war in Afghanistan has reduced the chances of terrorist attacks.
Jedwab said the “pessimistic feeling” about what the war has accomplished is likely linked to the “widespread hopelessness” about the prospects for ever resolving the deep-rooted, “ideological” conflict between Muslim and Western societies.
Many Canadians have come to believe “nothing will work” to end that conflict, said Jedwab, adding that this grim state of mind will require more scrutiny to fully understand and more carefully crafted public policies to rebuild a sense of optimism about the future of global relations.
The survey did offer one notable “ray of hope,” Jedwab suggested, pointing to a result showing that a slight majority of Canadians (52%) believe it would be wrong for airport security officials to do “extra checks” of “passengers who appear to be of Muslim background.”
While 39% of respondents were open to that kind of profiling, Jedwab interpreted the majority’s rejection of the practice as a sign that most Canadians realize such infringements “would make the purportedly irreconcilable conflict even deeper if the enshrined principles of our rights charters are to be disregarded.”
‘Unprecedented’ for kidnapper to return boy, expert says
The happy news early Sunday that the abductor, believed to be a sex offender, had apparently returned the boy unharmed to his home in Sparwood, B.C., surprised even the experts, with one prominent U.S. advocate for missing children saying he cannot remember a similar outcome in the past.
While the majority of child sex offenders do actually release their victims alive, it is unheard of for a culprit with clearly serious criminal intentions to go to such lengths to ensure a child’s safe return, said Ernie Allen, president of the Virginia-based National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
“For an abductor to take a child in this manner — to penetrate the home, to come into the home, to take the child — and then return the child back to the home is in many ways unprecedented,” he said. “We’ve worked thousands of these cases and I don’t remember one like it.”
The credit can go at least partly to a more aggressive police response in recent years to missing children reports, coupled with law enforcement’s use of conventional media, the Internet and even mobile phones to alert the public, said Mr. Allen. In that sense, the development would fit a hopeful pattern. The rate at which children are recovered alive in serious U.S. abduction cases has soared in the last two decades — from 62% in 1990 to 97% today — as such methods were widely adopted, he said.
Kienan had been taken on Wednesday, with police quickly identifying Randall Hopley, 46, a local man with a record of breakins, theft and at least one sexual offence against a child, as a suspect.
Amber alerts and a wide dragnet had turned up no sign of either the boy or the abductor by Saturday, when his parents’ issued an emotional appeal to the kidnapper to leave their son in a safe, visible place.
Then, at 3. a.m. Sunday morning, the kidnapper returned to the site of the abduction and left Kienan at his home, police said. The Hebert house was empty at the time as the family was staying with friends nearby, but the suspect called 911 to inform police of the child’s whereabouts, while evading capture himself, officers said.
As the community has only one road in or out, driving to the Hebert house would have required passing the search and rescue command post located at the entrance to the suburb, whose flat, largely treeless landscape offers little visual cover.
By Sunday afternoon, Kienan was seen throwing around a frisbee and playing with a Silly String toy in his front yard, appearing healthy and happy. “It’s like nothing ever happened,” Paul Hebert, the boy’s father, told CTV News, while Kienan’s grandparents reacted emotionally to the surprise development.
“We still can’t imagine what we went through these past four days. It’s just like it’s a dream,” Bernadette Hebert, the grandmother said. “Everyone’s so happy he’s back .”
Sharon Fraser, Sparwood’s acting mayor, said the boy seems unaffected by his four-day ordeal, with an examination at the local hospital indicating that he had not been physically or sexually abused.
“It’s just like having a miracle happen,” said Ms. Fraser. “Little Kienan is so unbelievably content and happy. It’s like [he knows], ‘So now I’m home and I can go back to playing’.”
Ms. Fraser said the father revealed that he hadn’t slept since the ordeal began Wednesday morning when Kienan was discovered missing.
At the Missing Children Society of Canada, the chief investigator indicated that in 25 years as a police officer and 15 with the society, he had only once seen a similar abduction end with the victim getting home alive, said Amanda Pick, the group’s executive director.
“It’s absolutely shocking,” she said. “The more time passes — in this case getting into the four-day time period — people’s expectation of human beings being returned safely diminishes.”
She said the ability of new technology — like a smart-phone application the society helped launch earlier this month — to circulate information in real time has made it more difficult for child abductors to hide and remain anonymous.
With the boy home safe, police stepped up their manhunt for Mr. Hopley on Sunday, setting up roadblocks searching vehicles in the area.
Despite the intense publicity that surrounds abductions that end in murder, the vast majority of sex offenders release their victims after harming them, said Mr. Allen. Anecdotal evidence suggest that may increasingly be due to Amber alerts and other police methods that employ the media to widely broadcast news of a missing child as soon as possible, he said.
Those messages — especially when they feature pleas from loved ones — may provoke a belated feeling of sympathy for the victim on the part of the offender, or simply a fear of being caught, said Mr. Allen. And, perhaps most importantly, the alerts draw the “eyes and ears of the public” into the investigation, he said.
“We have lots of cases in which offenders will take a child and see or hear the media response … and make a decision that the heat is too great, the risk is too high, and let the child go,” said Mr. Allen. “In so many of these cases, what we see is children recovered, abductors identified, not through CSI-type wizadry, but recovered because of average people doing average things and paying attention.”
Missing B.C. boy Kienan Hebert, 3, found safe: ‘It’s him, it’s him’
Kienan Hebert, 3, of Sparwood BC, pictured, was reported missing from the family home Wednesday morning. Police confirmed Sunday he had been found safe.
The RCMP found Kienan at his family home in the small town of Sparwood, B.C., around 3 a.m. Sunday morning after receiving a 911 call. The house was declared a crime scene last week after the boy’s disappearance; his parents and seven brothers and sisters were staying with friends a few doors down.
“Police retuned to the Hebert home and found Kienan inside,” RCMP Cpl. Dan Moskaluk in an interview with the Toronto Star.
“The house was vacant but when we got there the child was found in the house.”
TIMELINE: Kienan Hebert’s case
Hebert’s family saw all the police activity at the house and approached and found their son.
Moskaluk said the Hebert house was vacant at the time the boy was returned because RCMP had finished their investigation and left allowing the family to return to their home. But the family had decided to continue staying nearby at a friend’s home.
“All they kept saying was, ‘This is just wonderful. It’s him, it’s him,’” Moskaluk said.
The young boy is spending the morning playing with his seven brothers and sisters. He is the second youngest.
“Children are so resilient. I’ve seen it before,” Moskaluk said. “There are serious violent incidents with young children. They feel the emotion, but speaking as a father and looking at Kienan today playing with his brothers and sisters, he’s not skipping a beat.”
An emotional Moskaluk said there were tears of joy among officers and search and rescue volunteers who have spent days looking for the little boy.
“We're all ecstatic and there's just a great sense of relief. It's just great to see him with his family, just great,” said a choked-up Moskaluk.
Sparwood Councillor Jim Banks said he can’t think of a better word than “elation” to describe how he felt when he heard the news of the boy’s safe return.
Referring to an avalanche that took the lives of eight Sparwood residents in a snowmobile accident three years ago, Banks said: “We are not strangers to having a very massive tragedy here. People in our community live and work together.”
Kienan’s parents, Tammy and Paul, made an emotional plea for the boy to be returned Saturday as the whole community of Sparwood, a small town in B.C.'s interior near the Alberta border, rallied their support. Hundreds of volunteers have been scouring the nearby woods and waterways of the picturesque town looking for Hebert after his parents reported he went missing sometime between Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning.
“Kienan is only 3 years old right now, and as you know and we know, Kienan can't speak. So he can't tell us who you are,” Paul Hebert said, as Tammy clutched his hand in support.
Moskaluk said Kienan can speak but is a very shy boy.
“He can say a couple of words and as a three year old he's just developing his vocabulary. What Paul meant and I clarify is he's just by character a quiet child, very reserved.”
Moskaluk said the family of Randall Hopley is aware the child has been brought back.
“Everyone is just so overjoyed by this news including them. We suspect their son and brother is involved in this and now they're just sitting and waiting and are hopeful they can reach out to him.”
Moskaluk said Hopley's family is going to make a public plea later today for him to contact police.
“Kienan is with his family and the investigation continues to locate the person who's responsible for the abduction,” said Moskaluk. “I'm making a direct plea to Randy Hopley to please get a hold of us to speak to us so we can assist him now. We're concerned for his well being and so is his family.”
The Hebert family may also speak later to thank the hundreds of volunteers who helped search for their son, Moskaluk said.
“Right now there's just a great sense of relief. Tammy and Paul right now know they have their child back and they recognize and feel his true spirit is intact,” said Moskaluk. “They know this is really him, it's their child and they know him.”
Police believe the suspected kidnapper brought Kienan back to his home. More than 60 investigators are still searching for the suspect. Moskaluk urged him to contact police.
The Hebert family has gone through a range of emotions since the boy's disappearance. Initially because the little boy has a history of sleepwalking, there were thoughts that he may have left his house on his own. But within hours of his disappearance, police issued information saying that Hebert may be with a stranger Randall Hopley, 46, a man not known to the family.
Hopley, a convicted sex offender, was known to some people in town and his mother confirmed that she had seen him earlier on Tuesday before the boy's disappearance.
He was convicted of sexual assault in the mid-1980s and was given a two-year federal prison sentence.
An incident in November 2007 led to charges of break and enter, unlawful confinement and attempted abduction, and the indictment for the case indicated the victim was under the age of 16.
B.C.'s Criminal Justice Branch has confirmed Hopley pleaded guilty to break and enter and was sentenced to 18 months in jail, while the other charges were stayed.
Crown spokesman Neil MacKenzie confirmed Hopley admitted at trial that he attempted to remove a 10-year-old boy, who was in foster care at the time. Hopley claimed he was acting on behalf of the child's parents.
A preliminary hearing has been set for Sept. 19 in Pincher Creek, Alta. According to a court official in Lethbridge, Hopley faces 12 charges dating back to May 2010 in Crowsnest Pass. They include break and enter and possession of stolen property.
Two of Hopley's recent defence lawyers declined to comment.
With files from Vidya Kauri and The Canadian Press
Police look for help in solving Spence murder
By Tom Godfrey
Father-of-two Jahmeel Spence was slain and the gunman is believed to have fled the scene in great haste in a light-blue Honda Accord, Toronto Police said.
Spence, 27, who had no criminal record, was slain on Sept. 10 last year in a
laneway behind 30 Greenbrae Ct., in Scarborough. He died of multiple gunshot wounds and was pronounced dead at the scene.
A bouquet of flowers and a few candles marked now mark the spot where he was killed.
Police are appealing to residents to help locate the car that was in the area around the 9:30 p.m. murder.
“We are hoping someone would remember the Honda that was driving erratically in the area,” said homicide unit Staff-Insp. Mark Saunders. “That person may have made changes or altered the vehicle since the incident.”
The gunman had been hunting someone who looked like Spence when he opened fire, Saunders said.
The area is active with gang violence, officers have said in the past.
“Our investigation shows that Jahmeel was the wrong person murdered,”
Saunders said. “We know members of the community have information that can assist us.”
Jahmeel is the second member of his family to be slain in five years. His brother Ishmael, 15, was killed in 1996 outside the Kennedy subway station.
Jahmeel’s wife, Shivonne Clarke, said it has been difficult raising two young children without a father.
“It has been very frustrating waiting for an arrest and to find out who killed my husband,” Clarke said. “My husband was a quiet person who was loving and had a positive attitude.”
Jahmeel’s mom, who did not want to give her name, said her life has been changed by the loss of two sons.
“It has been hard for the entire family,” she said. “We have a very hard time coping.”
Family member Crystal Douglas said she’s waiting for an arrest and closure.
“My family is still in shock that this can happen,” Douglas said. “Jahmeel loved life and he loved his family.”
Focus on historic sites of Canada’s African Diaspora
Michaëlle Jean
Modern day exploitation in the form of child slaves, enslaved domestic workers and indentured sex workers serve as stark reminders that slavery is still present in many guises, says former Canadian Governor-General Michaëlle Jean.
Jean issued the warning last week in her endorsement of The Harriet Tubman Institute proposal to the United Nations Educational, Scientific & Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Slave Route Project that historic sites associated with people of African descent in Canada constitute an Itinerary of Memory.
In her keynote address at York University to launch the proposal, Jean said the project - accepted by UNESCO's Intercultural Dialogue Section head Dr. Ali Moussa Iye who was in Toronto for last week's Tubman Centre Summer Institute - is one of the most innovative academic initiatives of its kind in Canada.
"Today, we are inviting all Canadians to join us in ushering in a deeper and more extensive understanding of the African Diaspora's presence in our country by confronting our past together because we must acknowledge the Itinerary of Memory initiative is a culmination of decades of meticulous research, of genealogical exploration and political advocacy by historians, anthropologists, teachers, public officials and human rights activists of all hues, many of whom are here with us today," said Haitian-born Jean.
"I would say that through your unique contributions, you have conferred greater visibility upon the historic sites dotting the Canadian landscape which bears witness to the enslavement of African and indigenous people. Today, you bring new impetus to the struggle and with the blessings of UNESCO, you are establishing a procedure according to which undiscovered sites can and will be designated Sites of Memory within Canada.
"In so doing, you join the efforts in a transnational circle of solidarity which finds unity in the belief that knowing the history of slavery is essential to seeing a global culture of peace flourish around the world. And to that belief, I say yes, I concur for our story is fundamentally about lifting humanity out of the sinking sand of barbarism and injustice. Our story is about finding the strength and fortitude to shatter the walls of indifference and tyranny that has held us back for so long.
"Our story is about instilling a global ethical fellowship that emboldens humanity to prevent the crimes of the past from dictating the trajectory of the present and the future."
Jean, UNESCO's special envoy for Haiti, thanked those individuals who spent years doing the groundwork to formulate the proposal for staying the course in spite of rejection by their peers, ostracism by colleagues and ridicule by friends.
"You resisted the temptation to give in and thanks to your tenacity, the country will reap the fruits of your labour," she said. "For this initiative will ensure the story of Canada's African Diaspora ignites hope in the hearts of many, reminding everyone of our great responsibility to safeguard the sacred principles of justice, equality and liberty. I am persuaded that memory is not simply there for us to meditate upon. It can help elucidate certain issues concealed deep within our relations with ourselves.
"In launching this site, we not only pay tribute to women and men who survived one of the worst barbaric ordeals in the history of human kind. We honour our responsibility to seek out truth and wisdom from the past so that the errors of yesterday are never repeated. The persistence of slavery and slave-like practices and human trafficking today should serve as a clear warning that we must continue to be vigilant."
The Harriet Tubman Institute's director, Paul Lovejoy, said 11 sites have been identified initially with the intention of undertaking a program of research and there are plans for further designations across Canada.
He said the project is part of a broader initiative to insert the African past into Canada's national narrative.
"This initiative builds on earlier efforts to reveal the importance of African-Canadian heritage such as promoted by the Ontario Black History Society and Ontario Heritage Trust," said Lovejoy.
The proposal was made on August 23 which is the UNESCO-proclaimed International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade & its Abolition. The UN also designated this year to People of African Descent.
Iye said The Tubman Institute's proposal comes at a time when countries that have participated in the slave trade and slavery continue to ignore the tragic history in their heritage policies.
"However, more and more countries are recognizing the cultural diversity of society and the necessity of taking into account the corresponding diversity of memory," he said. "They are more and more convinced that their democratic citizenship implies the equal recognition of painful memories of the different communities that constitute nations.
"The recognition of Sites of Memory related to the slave trade should be part of any serious policy for a democratic management of national narratives and memory."
Ontario Heritage Trust chair Dr. Thomas Symons also pledged support for the proposal.
"Ontario's Black community has made and continue to make an enormously important social, cultural and economic contribution to the life and development of the province," he said. "The rich and diverse history of this community forms a fundamental and very important part of Ontario's heritage."
A descendant of slaves who came to Canada prior to the American Civil War, Bryan Prince has a profound interest in the Underground Railroad and is actively involved with the Buxton National Historic Site & Museum.
"The public knows the story (of slavery) in a general way, but with very few exceptions, much has been lost and forgotten," said Prince who is a member of The Harriet Tubman executive committee. "But we believe that everyone's narrative is compelling and worthy of being remembered. The challenges associated with uncovering the tiny details that are sprinkled around the continent and beyond - in museums, archives, attics and in memory - and presenting these stories have been daunting at times."
York University president Mamdouh Shoukri said The Tubman Institute is doing a great job in reflecting what the university stands for which is academic excellence, equity and social justice.
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