Office Worker Becomes Face Of Massive G20 Lawsuit

Sherry Good is a petite, unassuming 51-year-old office administrator who works and lives in Toronto’s downtown core.

She’s also one of hundreds of people who were ‘kettled’ and detained by police at the intersection of Queen and Spadina on June 27th during the recent G20 Summit — the ripples of which are still spreading.

Trapped in a downpour for four hours, she was cold, scared, and for quite some time after her eventual release, riddled with anxiety.

Now she’s the face of a massive class action lawsuit launched against the Toronto Police Services Board and the Attorney General of Canada.  

Good, who is the representative plaintiff, is being represented by prestigious attorneys Murray Klippenstein and Eric K. Gillespie, who addressed media outside of Queen’s Park on Friday.

The suit seeks $45 million on behalf of those detained and arrested without charge during the G20 weekend. 

“Approximately 800 Canadians, who it appeared had done nothing wrong, were arrested, and hundreds of them were thrown in prison.  As a Canadian I feel privileged and proud of the freedoms we have, which so many in this world do not have,” Klippenstein told reporters.

“But that sense of privilege and pride suffered (after) the arrests and imprisonments of hundreds and hundreds of Canadians, who it appears were not breaking any laws, and in fact…were just exercising their basic rights that millions of us thought we had…”

“Today we are announcing that a class action has launched yesterday in Ontario Superior Court on behalf of all the individuals who were wrongfully arrested and sometimes imprisoned without charges at the G20 Summit.”

“They never thought that this could happen in Canada,” he added.  “But the money asked in the lawsuit is not the real point, the real point is to try and repair the damage that has been done to our Canadian society, to our basic assumptions about our freedoms by those hundreds of what seem to be arbitrary arrests.”

In order to proceed, the suit must first receive court approval, a process that attorney Gillespie, who recently won a $36 million class action environmental suit, notes will likely take several months.

The class action is also seeking to examine the conditions at the Eastern Avenue detention centre.

Gillespie added that one of the goals of a class action suit is to provide those affected, who may not be legally savvy, with ‘access to justice, access to legal process’, and to avoid cluttering the courts with numerous individual claims.

“People do not need to sign up for a class action,” he stressed.  “…people are automatically in this class action if they fall within the definition and if the court approves that definition…there’s no need for them to come forward and sign up.”

You can learn more about the lawsuit at the recently launched website G20classaction.com.

If approved by the court, the lawsuit would primarily cover those wrongfully arrested or detained on the following dates at the noted locations:

•     Queen’s Park on Saturday, June 26th, 2010.
•     The Hotel Novotel Toronto Centre on the Esplanade on Saturday, June 26, 2010
•     Outside the Eastern Detention Centre during the night and early morning of June 26-27, 2010.
•     At the intersection of Queen Street West and Spadina Avenue on Sunday June 27th, 2010.
•     At the intersection of Queen Street West and Nobel Street in Parkdale, on Sunday, June 27, 2010.

Good, who claims she joined the peaceful protest Sunday after coming across it by chance, read from a prepared statement.

“I’m just an ordinary person.  I’m not an organizer, I’m not an activist.  But I got caught up in the police kettling operation at Queen Street and Spadina Avenue on Sunday afternoon that weekend.  I just feel that what happened to me, and to hundreds of others, was very wrong.”

“It was a very frightening and disturbing experience.  I couldn’t believe this was happening in my country.”

(Read her full statement below)

 

NDP Justice Critic Peter Kormos closed the press conference with a typically passionate call for justice, applauding Good, and citing the controversial 5-metre rule as evidence of Dalton McGuinty’s lack of transparency surrounding the G20.

“The New Democrats commend and applaud (Sherry) Good for agreeing to be the representative plaintiff, because that in and of itself requires a great deal of courage.

“Having said that we remain concerned about the Premier’s failure to call a public inquiry, we remain concerned about the Premier’s failure to accept responsibility for what appears at the end of the day to be, not just a secret, but a fake regulation, that he kept secret from the community and then misled the community as to its impact and effect.

“It’s a very disturbing thing when the Premier of a province misleads not only the parliament and the members of legislature, but misleads the public and people of Ontario.”

michael.talbot@citynews.rogers.com

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Statement of Sherry Good, Class Action Plaintiff, August 6, 2010

I’m here today to represent those who were wrongfully detained by police on the weekend of the G20 Summit in Toronto.

I’m just an ordinary person.  I’m not an organizer, I’m not an activist.  But I got caught up in the police kettling operation at Queen Street and Spadina Avenue on Sunday afternoon that weekend.  I just feel that what happened to me, and to hundreds of others, was very wrong.

I live in downtown Toronto – on Queen Street.  It shocks me that I was surrounded and held by police because I was just walking on the street where I live.

At Queen and Spadina that afternoon, during a peaceful protest, with no warning, we were surrounded by hundreds of police in riot gear, fully armed.  We could not leave.  They kept us standing in one of the worst rain storms of the year for over four hours with no information disseminated to us, no food, no water, no toilets.  Sometimes the police charged into the crowd, picking out people indiscriminately for arrest, and dragging them away.

It was a very frightening and disturbing experience.  I couldn’t believe this was happening in my country.  Despite what I went through, I still consider myself lucky compared to the people who were taken and held at the Eastern Detention Centre.

I couldn’t sleep that night, I had to take off work the next day and I suffered from a panic attack on the way to work the following day.

But the biggest consequence of that weekend is that I have lost my trust in the police.  Now, I am nervous when I see a police car.  I consistently look over my shoulder.   Sadly, it will take a long time to regain that trust.

I’ve launched this lawsuit on behalf of the class of plaintiffs to seek the truth, and to hold those responsible for these actions accountable.  I hope that accountability will make things better for the future for all of us.

I believe this could be a difficult journey, but in the end, I consider it a privilege to be able to represent all those detained without charge on the G20 weekend.  You folks know what you went through.  Hopefully I can help right that wrong.