Chief De Caire under fire for distributing citizen’s email

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A spree of shootings in Hamilton’s North end this year has claimed one life, and brought tensions to a boiling point in a Macnab St. housing complex. The murder of Shariek Douse last month put the neighbourhood on edge, with many residents angry and demanding more effort from Hamilton police. Since then, there’s been a delicate dialogue between the community and rank and file officers. But as Scot Urquhart reports, an apparent lack of sensitivity by Hamilton’s top cop now threatens that fragile relationship.

” I’d like to know what is the context of that statement? Does the chief endorse that idea… ” Ward 3 Councillor Matthew Green is disturbed by a recent email that Chief Glenn De Caire sent out to rank and file officers,. The email, from a member of the public, contained not only inflammatory language, but the Chief’s signature beneath a hand written commendation for the officers that handled the aftermath of the August 12th shooting of Shariek Douse.

“As it was presented to me, there was a clear racial undertone that seemed to pit the black community against police” said Councillor Green. The problematic passage from the citizen’s contentious email says: ” I believe it is time for these black kids to stop blaming the police for the problems and take responsibility for the actions of the youth.”

Seeing the Chief’s signature below those words, not only surprised, but shocked the Ward Three Councillor. Green says even if there was no intent to connect the two statements, the provocative nature of the comments should have been apparent to Chief De Caire.
“I don’t know what the Chief was thinking. I’d like to ask him, and I’d certainly like to have a public response to this issue; given the sensitivity, and the fact that this is a recent murder victim.”

So, what does the Chief say? “We’re going to continue to work on this case, we’re going to continue to pull the community together and we will not allow anybody else to infuse their intentions into what has taken place. What we need to focus on is the way forward and how we can support each other because we have a senseless death of a young person that we need to solve. “