Shocking allegations of police racism and racial profiling in Montreal’s Montreal-North borough recently made national headlines, reverberating across the city and beyond.
On June 12, Montreal Police Chief Fady Dagher called an unprecedented 10:30 p.m. press conference to announce the entire night patrol (16 police officers in total) from Montreal-North’s Station 39 had been disbanded and were under investigation for racist and hateful acts allegedly committed against Black and Arab citizens. The investigation began in March after police officers reported their colleagues’ behaviour. Two officers are currently suspended and may soon be facing criminal charges. Fourteen others have been temporarily reassigned. Among the allegations: issuing tickets solely on the basis of ethnicity, and officers cutting or ripping out the locs from Black men’s scalps and keeping them as “trophies.”
Chief Dagher expressed being “extremely surprised” and “deeply hurt” by the revelations. Montreal mayor Soraya Martinez Ferrada called them “extremely disturbing.” Montreal-North borough mayor Christine Black referred to the allegations as “unacceptable” and urged citizens to report incidents of racism involving the police.
But, while the city is reeling from the news, Montreal-North residents and anti-racism activists — who have long denounced unfair and unwarranted police checks — have barely raised an eyebrow. They say they’re shocked that people are shocked.
‘Finally, it’s coming out’
Documentary filmmaker and activist Will Prosper grew up in Montreal North and feels a mixture of relief and fatigue at the news. “Finally, it’s coming out,” he says. “We’ve denounced these incidents for years, but police officers finally had the courage to say something about it.”
Prosper says racial profiling has been a part of his life ever since he can remember. “The first thing that came with my driver’s licence,” he says, “was a police escort, but not for the right reasons. I’ve been pulled over by the police over 50 times, and I don’t have a criminal record.”
While he no longer lives in the borough, Prosper says it’s frustrating to know that what he experienced growing up is still being experienced by Black youth today. “It hasn’t changed,” he says. “ I always knew this was wrong, but I thought it was normal. It’s only when you get out of the neighbourhood that you realize it’s not the same reality for other folks.”
After the 2008 shooting death of 18-year-old Fredy Villanueva (a Honduran immigrant with no criminal record playing dice in a Montreal-North park with friends) by a police officer from Station 39, Prosper co-founded Hoodstock, a social-justice organization that provides free legal aid and other services to local residents. Hoodstock is one of many community organizations now pushing for an independent investigation, adamantly rejecting the internal investigation that Quebec’s Minister of Domestic Security, Ian Lafrenière, has decided upon.
“If it’s the police investigating the police I’m not remotely hopeful that anything will come of it.”
“I hope they have the courage to truly investigate this,” Prosper says. “But if it’s the police investigating the police I’m not remotely hopeful that anything will come of it.”
It’s unsurprising many don’t trust an internal inquiry. The officer who shot and killed Villanueva faced no criminal charges. Quebec’s police watchdog, the Bureau des enquetes independantes (BEI), created after public outrage at Villanueva’s death, has rarely resulted in criminal charges for police officers.
‘I’m used to it. This happens often’
Samuel Bunche was just 12 years old when Villanueva was killed — the exact same age he was when he was handcuffed by the police for the very first time. “I was on the way to the park,” he says, “riding on my friend’s handlebars, when they stopped us, handcuffed and humiliated me.”
Since then, he’s been stopped more than 100 times. “I’m used to it,” he says. “This happens often. It’s exhausting, and they never find anything.”
The martial artist made headlines in 2020 after he sued the City of Laval (a Montreal suburb) for damages after an encounter with Laval police left him feeling “humiliated’ and “traumatized.”
Bunche says he was in a car (as a passenger) with his brother and a friend when police pulled them over for no reason and told them they were violating Covid-19 physical-distancing rules. (No such rules were in effect yet.) When Bunche questioned the police’s actions, he was handcuffed and assaulted.
“He dragged me out of the car by my locs and kneed me in the face for no reason” says Bunche. “They assumed we had drugs in the car and brought the K-9 unit.” Bunche would later sue the City of Laval for $275,000 in damages, forcing them to cancel the social-distancing ticket and eventually settle out of court. “For three years, they insisted they had a valid reason for stopping us,” he says. “They finally admitted it was racial profiling.”
Born and raised in Montreal-North, Bunche says he vividly remembers when Villanueva was killed. “I was too young to fully understand what it meant,” he says, “but I remember thinking, ‘This is someone from my neighbourhood, who lived in and hung out at the same places I did, and he was killed.”
The recent news surrounding Station 39 hasn’t surprised him but has left Bunche feeling frustrated. “We’ve been filing lawsuits for years,” he says. “Yet nothing was ever taken seriously. To see authorities now acting surprised and claiming they didn’t know… But they did know because we’ve been telling them for years. We’re talking 16 cops and two supervisors. It wasn’t an isolated problem.”
Prosper shares similar sentiments. “For a while, I stopped being vocal about this,” he says, “because every time I spoke on these issues I felt like a band playing the same song. And yet people were still surprised by that song.”
‘Systemic problems require systemic remedies’
With public trust in Montreal’s police force shaken, mayor Martinez Ferrada has publicly called for a moratorium on random police street checks. She also wants to accelerate the implementation of body cameras for police (which many community activists don’t see as a solution.) Chief Dagher has rejected calls for a moratorium on street checks, saying he prefers a systemic cultural shift within the police force.
That cultural shift may be taking longer than some are willing to wait. Reports that the patrol unit currently under investigation was composed mostly of newer recruits are troubling.
“For a while, I stopped being vocal about this,” he says, “because every time I spoke on these issues I felt like a band playing the same song. And yet people were still surprised by that song.”
That culture of impunity may also be enabled in a province where systemic racism isn’t even recognized by the provincial government, and where even the concept of systemic racism has been greeted as a direct attack on Quebecers themselves.
“Of course systemic racism exists,” says Alain Babineau, a retired RCMP officer, jurist, and advocate with the Red Coalition, an anti-racism organization. “Quebec isn’t immune from systemic racism in its institutions and service delivery. That includes policing. And clearly the system allows it, because when folks are caught red-handed they face few, if any, repercussions.”
The Red Coalition recently filed complaints with the police ethics and human rights commissions over the Station 39 allegations, as well as with the province’s ombudsperson, calling on them to investigate systemic racism within the force.
“You can’t dismantle systemic problems without systemic remedies,” says Babineau. “We’ve therefore taken it upon ourselves to use the channels and official bodies available to us to conduct independent investigations.”
The types of complaints they file, he says, are systemic-based. “It’s not two or three bad apples,” he says. “It would be a quick fix if that were the case.”
‘To be treated equally and fairly’
Multiple independent studies have long documented systemic bias in street checks. A 2019 report found Indigenous and Black Montrealers were four to five times more likely than white Montrealers to be stopped by police. Young Arab Montrealers were four times more likely than white residents of the same age to be targeted for street checks. A follow-up report in 2023 showed little progress had been made.
The revelations sparked a class-action lawsuit on behalf of victims of racial profiling and in 2024, a Quebec Superior Court Justice ruled that racial profiling is a “systemic” problem within the Montreal police force. The City of Montreal decided to appeal the ruling.
“It’s not two or three bad apples,” he says. “It would be a quick fix if that were the case.”
“We’re not anti-police,” says Babineau. “All we’re requesting and demanding is fair and equitable policing to all communities. To be treated as human beings; equally and fairly.”
Prosper, who’s currently working on a documentary on Villanueva, emphasizes the need for an inclusive inquiry. “We need to make sure citizens are involved — beyond the judge — to reassure the population that they can come and share what they’re living.”
As a father, he says he worries “big time. I’ve had ‘the talk’ with my son,” he says, “because I want him to come home.”
As calls for an independent inquiry mount, community advocates, politicians and Montreal’s police chief debate how to best restore civic confidence and strengthen police accountability.
“I don’t trust them,” says Bunche. “I’m not supposed to be scared of the police, but that’s the feeling I have every time I’m pulled over.”
