Concordia University student Brendan Colin Jones, 25, was sitting in a park when he took a picture of police confronting youths in a park. One of the officers then allegedly confronted him about the pictures and gave him a $628 ticket for sitting on park ledge.
Citizens routinely sit on these ledges and the interest in Jones appears to be his camera rather than his perch. He was cited for “using urban equipment for uses other than those intended.”
Jones is an economics and history student who is already $30,000 in debt and cannot afford the ticket.
What is really interesting is that the granite surfaces at Émilie Gamelin Park were designed to be used as places to sit.
England recently cracked down on people photographing police with a new law and will even cite you for a picture of a fish and chips shop, here..
For the full story, click here.
“We in the USA live in a police state.”
While possibly true, not really germane to an article about Canada. Last time I checked Montreal and the rest of Quebec had not split and joined the US.
This I know for sure: We ARE living in a police state. There are still some good people in law enforcement, don’t get me wrong, but we’re in trouble. Big trouble.
Refer to the following Marjorie Cohn commondreams
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/03/04
Perhaps someone could post the San Fran Chronicle link to the story: “Rule by law of rule by fear” — or something like that.
We in the USA live in a police state.
Clearly an abuse of power. Police want to be able to tell people what they can and cannot do, but as soon as citizens fight back and attempt to monitor those sworn to protect and serve them, those very same police officers cry foul.
AY,
I meant the cops.
BuelahMan 1, July 16, 2009 at 8:44 am
Its time to take these punks off the street.
*********************
If memory serves me correctly, the kid was sitting on the ledge. The cop. . . . Ok, I am confused. Wine making class again. Which punk needs to get off of the street? The Cop or the Kid?
Its time to take these punks off the street.
No Victim No Crime, No Pictures, No Victim, No Crime other than what the police have said.
I was amused that in Dallas a Judge dismissed charges against an “exotic dancer after she took a polygraph and passed” it centered around when consent to search her home occurred.
It is good to know that Canada is dealing with the latest and most offensive crime that we deal with here in the States. I am talking about the serious crime of blatantly sitting in the public park. How could any educated person actually believe that they have the right to sit in a public park? Preposterous! The next thing you know is that people might actually use the street to ride their cars on it! Something must be done about that camera carrying vagrant!