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Montreal Mayor Soraya Martinez Ferrada says a moratorium on police checks would be a “good first step” in helping address allegations of racism within the city’s police service.
In an interview Friday on Radio-Canada’s Tout un matin, Martinez Ferrada said her husband, who is Black, has been stopped while driving “at least five or six times — for nothing” in the past year.
Martinez Ferrada said this is the reality facing many Black Montrealers.
“We have to start by calling things what they are,” Martinez Ferrada said, adding that we can’t “be afraid” of talking about the existence of systemic racism and racial profiling.
The mayor made the comments a week after Montreal’s police chief held a late-night news conference, revealing that 16 of its own officers at a station in the city’s Montréal-Nord borough were under investigation for racist and hateful acts against Black and Arab people.
In a recent interview with Radio-Canada, Premier Christine Fréchette refused to acknowledge the existence of systemic racism in Quebec, following in the footsteps of her predecessor François Legault.
New data reinforces mayor’s comments
Her comments are reinforced by new data by a team of university researchers, which suggests Black and Arab individuals in Montreal remain far more likely to be stopped by police than white residents.
The report, shared with CBC News, examined police stops across Quebec for 2024, comparing them to previous data from 2023 and 2019.
Victor Armony, one of the report’s authors and a sociology professor at the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM), said the findings suggest an ongoing problem that can’t be solved by removing a few “bad apples.”
“This stems from a systemic issue,” he said in an interview.
“The main danger here is just to say this is a bunch of individuals who are racist and this is isolated and this is bad apples in a good context. That’s exactly the false response to the problem.”
The 2024 data shows that, in Montreal, Black people are four times more likely to be stopped than white individuals, while Arab people are five times more likely to be stopped.
In Laval, where data was analyzed for the first time, the disparities are even higher: Black and Arab individuals are four and seven times more likely to be stopped, respectively.
The data made avalaible was too small to make a meaningful statistical calculation about the treatment of Indigenous people, Armony said, though previous research has found they were more likely to be stopped by police.
The report noted the disparity in police stops remains, even when adjusting for the relative rate of criminal offences; Black individuals are still stopped at a rate approximately 47 per cent higher than the white population.
The report recommends an immediate end to arbitrary street checks across the province, echoing Martinez Ferrada. The report’s authors made the same main recommendation in 2023.
Armony said his research group was already working on the latest analysis, but the investigation into the officers in Montréal-Nord compelled them to move more quickly to release their findings.
A Quebec network of organizations that work with Black youth is calling for a public inquiry into racism within police services throughout the province. The call comes after Montreal police confirmed that 16 officers based in Montréal-Nord are under investigation for alleged co-ordinated racist behaviour.
Renewed calls for an inquiry
Also on Friday, community organizations and civil liberties groups sent an open letter to Quebec’s premier, reiterating the call for the province to hold a public inquiry into racism and racial profiling within Montreal police.
The joint letter, written in French, states that “recent events are not isolated incidents.”
“A public inquiry is the only mechanism that can address the broken trust between the population and police forces,” the letter reads.
Martinez Ferrada said Friday she would also be open to a public inquiry but wants to ensure that it doesn’t impede the criminal investigation into the police officers.
At a news conference Friday, Fréchette reiterated the provincial government would assign an observer to oversee the police investigation. She didn’t rule out ordering an inquiry in future.
Two of the 16 officers under investigation in Montréal-Nord have been suspended, and Quebec’s director of criminal and penal prosecutions is determining whether charges will be laid.
Some officers allegedly collected pieces of locs cut from people’s hair during police interventions. Radio-Canada also reported that tickets were allegedly issued to citizens solely on the basis of their ethnic background.
Montreal’s police chief announced Friday that 16 officers from Station 39 in Montréal-Nord are under investigation for alleged racist and hateful acts committed against Black and Arab people. Residents gathered outside the station on Monday evening to demand justice and change.
