The incident was essentially a “starlight tour,” said Gull Bay First Nation chief Wilfred King (aka Kiashke Zaaging Anishinabek). This is a practice where the police removed people from a town, often natives suspected of poisoning, and then left them on the side of the road to fend for themselves. “This person’s charter rights were violated. His human rights and his legal rights were violated,” King told CBC News. “He should be fired from the police service, because it is criminal behavior. This type of behavior should not go unchallenged.” In a statement to CBC News, OPP spokesman Bill Dickson said the matter was investigated and the officer in question was removed from the Gull Bay area. Dixon said he could not elaborate “on any informal disciplinary action that may have been taken” because it is a confidential personnel matter. CBC News was unable to independently verify what happened and asked Dickson if the sergeant could be interviewed, but the OPP did not respond to that request. King, and other experts who have researched star tours and police desertion, say any officer who detains someone without due process and then abandons them is engaging in criminal behavior.

“I could have died”

The man left on the side of the road, Jeremiah Skunk of the Mishkeegogamang First Nation, said OPP Sgt. Tammy Bradley needs to be fired. In an interview with CBC News, Skunk said he was visiting his then-girlfriend in Armstong, Ont., located 250 kilometers north of Thunder Bay and 70 kilometers north of Gull Bay, in July or August 2019. He was out of home after having an argument, when Bradley arrived she handcuffed him and put him in the back of the cruiser. She was going to bring him to the detachment in nearby Whitesand First Nation, but asked her to drive him to Thunder Bay, located 190 kilometers south of Gull Bay, because she didn’t know anyone else in the area. Instead, Skunk said she drove him about 10 minutes down the street, removed his handcuffs and let him out with half a bottle of water and a sandwich. He told me not to go back to Armstrong or I would be charged with trespassing.- Jeremiah Skunk, recounting his encounter with OPP Sgt. Tammy Bradley “He told me not to go back to Armstrong or I’d be charged with trespassing,” Skunk recalled. So he walked 10 to 14 hours to Gull Bay, the next closest community on the remote highway, on a hot summer day, Skunk said. Along the way, he had to drink water from roadside puddles to stay hydrated and had an encounter with a mother bear and two cubs. “I could have died,” he said. “I could have [been] he was killed by a bear.” When Skunk arrived in Gull Bay, he told one of the two officers at the Gull Bay Police Station and said he also filed a complaint with a police organization in Toronto, but he doesn’t remember where he filed the complaint. He says his memory is hazy, but sometime in 2021 an officer he believes was in Kenora, Ont., called to hear what happened. Skunk says he never heard back and doesn’t know what happened to Bradley or if she was disciplined. “Any cop who does stuff like that should be fired,” he said, adding that he doesn’t trust officers after this happened. OPP spokesman Dickson said the allegations were investigated by their Professional Standards Unit and Skunk was informed of the findings — although Skunk says he doesn’t recall any meeting with the OPP. Bradley has not served in the area around Armstrong since February 2022 and has been reassigned to “non-frontline duties” in another part of the province, Dixon added.

Long history of police “tours” in Canada

This practice of abandoning Indigenous people by police has a long history in Canada, according to two researchers who spoke to CBC News. Both said they were disturbed but not surprised to hear Skunk’s claims.
Susan Schuppli, based at Goldsmiths, University of London, has explored how cold and temperature have been used as an often covert policing instrument in North America. The Starlight tours are one example, Schuppli said, of a practice uncovered in Saskatchewan in the early 2000s where aboriginal people in particular were detained by police, often late at night and in the dead of winter, driven to outskirts of the city and abandoned, forced to walk back alone. in 1990, Neil Stonechild, 17, was found frozen to death in a remote field on the outskirts of Saskatoon.and more than a decade later, two officers were fired but never criminally charged for their roles in Stonechild’s death. Three other men were found frozen to death outside Saskatoon in January and February 2000although inquests into their deaths did not reveal what happened leading up to their deaths.Two police officers were found guilty of unlawful confinement in relation to conducting a tour with a fourth person during the same period in January 2000. “Any case where someone is arrested by the police, where the necessary paperwork is not filed … where there is an abdication of all institutional responsibility and moral responsibility for that person, as far as I’m concerned, it’s really a starlight tour,” Schuppli said. “The moment someone is abandoned, when they’re not properly processed when they’re picked up by the police, that’s a crime … it’s an extremely abusive and violent act.” It’s a practice that dates back to the very creation of policing in Canada, said Travis Hay, an assistant professor at Mount Royal University in Calgary. Historically, police have enforced a system of removing indigenous people from city spaces, restricting their free movement and keeping them in reserve, he said. It started literally, with the pass system, which required First Nations people to get a pass approved by an Indian agent to leave the reserve, and continues with episodes like what Skunk described happening to him, said Hey. “Indigenous people, especially if they are found to be intoxicated, can open themselves up to forms of police violence ranging from harassment to assault to unlawful restraint and even murder in the case of some of these frozen deaths. [in Saskatchewan],” he added.

Gull Bay is awaiting a response to 3 complaints

Gull Bay Chief Wilfred King said this behavior requires a transparent investigation and public accountability, something they have not seen happen in the past three years. In addition to the complaint he said Skunk made, King said Gull Bay had also filed a complaint with the OPP in 2019. Nothing came of it, so King said they filed an additional complaint directly with OPP Commissioner Thomas Carrique in February 2022 , who assured the community that he would investigate and share the results of the investigation. King says other than a few calls and emails, they are not aware of the investigation’s findings or the disciplinary process. To him, the OPP’s decision to post Bradley elsewhere in Ontario is actually “a promotion and not a disciplinary measure, considering most OPP officers don’t want to be posted to the North. “He still holds the rank of sergeant and I’m not sure if he supervises other officers [or if] it is in and around First Nations,” King said. Gull Bay Chief Wilfred King (aka Kiashke Zaaging Anishinaabek) says he has lost faith in the Ontario Provincial Police who provide policing services to the First Nation. (Nokiwin Tribal Council) Dickson said they could not share the results of the investigation with Gull Bay leadership because they “were not whistleblowers in the matter.” Two additional serious complaints have been made to OPP Commissioner Thomas Carrique about Bradley’s conduct. These include allegations that he stole equipment from the Armstrong OPP detachment and led to charges being laid against a Gull Bay community member and a First Nation staff member — both without reason or evidence. King says the OPP has yet to respond to those complaints. In a statement Monday morning, OPP spokesman Dickson said the force considers one of the complaints resolved and the organization is currently looking into the other against Sgt. Bradley. Gull Bay will continue to push for answers to these complaints, King said, and plans to present proposals at upcoming meetings of Ontario Chiefs and the Assembly of First Nations. “I have absolutely no faith in this police service and I really believe there is a real need now to have First Nation policing across Canada in all First Nation communities.”