Award-winning law student denied cop ride-along — despite no criminal record

And so it came as a surprise when, as part of a criminal law class, he requested and was denied a ride-along request to head out on patrol with Toronto police officers.

The reason? He’d been stopped and documented while in the company of people with criminal records.

Singh, who recently sought the provincial Liberal nomination for the coming byelection in Scarborough Rouge-River, has filed an application with the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario alleging police discriminated against him on the grounds of race and colour, ancestry, ethnic origin and reprisal or threat of reprisal.

He has also filed a complaint with the Office of the Independent Police Review Director.

Singh, according to his human rights application, was told by a senior officer that background checks revealed he had “associated” with people with “serious criminal records.” This was most likely related to contact cards filled out by officers in non-criminal encounters where Singh was documented as being in the company of people with criminal records.

“It tainted me and denied me an opportunity to take part in a much anticipated highlight of my intensive criminal law program, but I wouldn’t know now because I didn’t get to go,” Singh said in an interview.

Toronto police spokesperson Meaghan Gray could not comment on Singh’s case but said in an email that, prior to ride-along approvals, police divisions “will do” background criminal record and “other relevant records systems” checks, including “community engagements,” the latest police term for what are more widely known as contact cards or street checks.

“Results that include one or more community engagements would not preclude someone from a ride-along,” Gray said in an email. “However, someone with past or current ‎criminal involvement with the police and/or someone who has past or current association to persons known to police would be reasons why a request would be denied.”

Singh graduated from Osgoode Hall Law School this month and is a recipient of the Dean’s Gold Key Award for making an outstanding contribution to the school.

As an aspiring criminal lawyer, Singh is regularly in the company of people with criminal records. He also spent many years working with youth and young adults, including aspiring hip hop artists, in at-risk areas of the city.

It was the latter work, he believes, that resulted in police red-flagging him.

“I was really affected by the fact that I’ve lived my life in a certain way, to help people in a positive way, and I’m viewed as a criminal,” said Singh, who is 42.

In his application to the human rights tribunal, Singh describes how the refusal made him feel that all of his volunteer work in the community aimed at making the “city safer and guiding people away from the wrong path” was a waste of time. He also sees the refusal as a form of racial discrimination, since the police stops he has experienced stemmed from being “targeted” because of his skin colour.

He is seeking $170,000 in compensation, which Singh in his application said would “serve as a deterrent to future conduct” by police. He also wants an apology from police for relying on unverified records to deny him the ride-along.

He is also seeking the creation of a program for people who do have criminal records to experience police ride-alongs to “see first-hand the type of work” officers do, which he believes would improve police relations with the community.

Singh’s classmates penned a letter last month to Chief Mark Saunders, expressing “great disappointment” that a respected and award-winning student was denied an opportunity “for a first-hand experience with front-line officers.”

The students noted in the letter that Singh had spent 18 years working as a hip hop producer with urban youth and adults, some of whom probably had criminal records.

But Singh “only worked with them in a positive way,” said the students, and provided them with a creative and “potentially professional outlet.”

“Mere ‘association’ with individuals who have a criminal record provides absolutely no insight into a person’s character,” reads the letter, signed by seven of Singh’s classmates.

The refusal comes amid the province’s moves to regulate carding, or street checks, and public debate about what to do with historical contact card databases that contain personal details about citizens who have been stopped, questioned and documented in encounters that do not involve criminal charges.

In Toronto, between 2008 and late 2013, more than a million individuals were stopped and documented on contact cards, often for reasons such as “general investigation” and “traffic stops.”

The practice of documenting citizens in these encounters and entering details into a massive database is currently suspended in Toronto. Police services wishing to perform these kinds of checks are subject to the new provincial regulations, which will go into effect in January 2017.

The regulations don’t give specific direction on what to do with old contact card data, but do ask police boards to develop retention policies.

Singh has estimated he’s been stopped by Toronto police about 30 times. He recalled being stopped in one encounter, almost a decade ago, in the company of individuals who had criminal records serious enough to have spent time in a penitentiary.

The Toronto Police Accountability Coalition is among many groups calling for police to purge historical contact card data. An internal Toronto police review contemplates a protocol, but it has not been implemented.

In the absence of clear direction, the Toronto Police Service has placed internal restrictions on who can access historical contact card data.

In addition to the human rights application and police complaint about his ride-along denial, Singh is proceeding with a court challenge of the former carding practice in Toronto, arguing that police recording of personal information stemming from arbitrary stops is a breach of Charter rights.