Dehumanization and Neglect: A Protester’s Arrest Story on Burnaby Mountain

I was arrested on Sunday November 23rd for crossing an arbitrary police line at Burnaby Mountain. It has recently come to light that the injunction zone had not been accurately marked, and therefore all 125 arrests up to (and including) November 27th are now considered to illegal. This is a fantastic victory, but we still have quite far to go. I will continue to protest against Kinder Morgan and make it clear that they are directly destroying Coast Salish land as well as contributing to climate change. Before I share my arrest story, I want readers to know that I am aware of my white privilege as a cis-gendered female – many others have been treated worse than I have. I am so, so sorry. I am a white female citizen with no criminal record, disabilities, or addictions. Though my arrest story might be the case of all standard arrests, it is still unacceptable. My story is for anyone who has experienced police violence and neglect, and especially for anyone who has had violence inflicted upon them when they were protesting. I am with you, even though I recognize that I can only speak from my subjective experience.

I was arrested around 3:00 in the afternoon. Earlier, the Klabona Keepers and their supporters, including Loretta Behgeyawlè, Tamiko Suzuki, Midori Campos, Hannah Campbell, and Desirée Wallace, gave powerful speeches against Kinder Morgan and their unethical practices. When they asked for supporters to cross the police tape with them, I couldn’t help myself – I had not gone up to the mountain in order to get arrested, but I needed to stand up for what I believed in, and to stand with such incredibly brave women. I joined them in singing the women’s warrior song and in walking across the police tape. My heart pounded in my chest, and I felt both exhilarated and slightly anxious, not knowing what was really going to happen to us. My hands met Desirée’s and we lifted our arms up in solidarity, in strength. While we sang, the energy of our protectors surrounded us, and we knew that what we were doing was both right and necessary.

As protesters chanted, “protect the people, not Kinder Morgan,” my arms were grabbed from behind and forcibly brought down by a blond female officer. I did not resist and I allowed her to use zip ties on my wrists. Her hold internally bruised my arms, and I knew then that would only be the beginning. I fully cooperated as I was led away from the group of women, who were still singing.

The officer proceeded to lead me to the front of a police van, and failed to tell me what my rights were. I did not have my rights read to me until 7:15 pm by an officer in the Burnaby Detachment, long after my arrest. I was too stunned to even think about that fact in the moment though, and tried my best to focus on whatever would come next. I was told to enter into the back of the police van, which became extremely stuffy and hot as 10 more women joined me inside, a group that included Donna Clark, Tesia Hackett, and Isabella Aidar. We were singing, laughing, dancing, and we were celebrating our bravery together as the women warriors we had become just then. We shook the van and banged on it. We wanted both the protesters and the police to know that we still had a voice.

The protesters were unfazed by our arrest and held up mirrors to the faces of the RCMP. They blocked the road that would have allowed the police to send us down the mountain, and during that time David Suzuki gave his speech. We were initially unsure about what was causing the delay, but a woman who had been arrested earlier in the compartment next to us, Tiara Rodgers, overheard several officers complaining about the protest block. We felt incredibly supported and grateful to everyone who was keeping us on the mountain, but at the same time we were having lots of difficulties. Inside the police van we were in need of air and were sweating through our clothes – thick beads of sweat dripped down my body and face the entire time I was in there. While spirits were high, we were all very uncomfortable, and my zip ties dug deeply into my skin. The woman next to me, Isabella, had ties that were cutting off her circulation. I was already feeling what it meant for the police to have full control over everything that was happening to me, and it was distressing. 

Thanks to the protesters, the police were pressured to open the van and took a few of us (myself not included) to have our rights read. I used this opportunity to ask a male police officer if he could adjust my ties because they were really hurting me. I had never experienced such unfriendliness from police officers before Sunday, yet I remained hopeful that they would still help me if I were in pain. He agreed to try, and the female officer that had arrested me joined him. I asked if I could get a new tie – he said no, and the woman told me they didn’t have any more on hand.

Rather than loosen my ties, he actually made them tighter, which is something I’ve learned often happens when you try to adjust them. I cried out, “stop! You’re hurting me!” to which the male officer responded, “they’re not supposed to be comfortable,” and ordered me back into the van. Isabella also tried to get them to look at her own wrists, but they completely ignored her and slammed the door once more. We were shaken and tried as best as we could to support each other through our women’s warrior song.

Over an hour after we were arrested, the RCMP were finally able to divide the protest line so that they could pass through it. We banged our feet against the wagon and slammed the ceiling, singing as loudly as we could while driving down the mountain. Through the window I could see protesters waving and singing back to us, and I was overwhelmed to the point of crying. Two female police officers were in front, including the one who had arrested me, and we made our way to the Burnaby Detachment.

By our arrival, we had used up much of our air. It was extremely hard for us to breathe, and once the female officers stopped the car we were hoping to get some much-needed oxygen. Tiara heard our pleas and conversed with the female officers, but they did not get out of the vehicle – instead they realized that they should probably “turn the heat off.” We asked twice more for air, and were completely ignored. It was only around ten minutes later that we were finally let out of the vehicle. We were trapped inside the van for at least an hour and a half.

When we were finally allowed to exit the van, we were led into a garage and told to line up against the wall. Our song had begun again, and we sang at the officers as they did everything they could not to look directly at us. We imprisoned them with our voices – as long as we were still singing, they could not contain us. There we realized that a courageous man had also joined our protest but had been arrested and taken down in a separate vehicle. He joined us in singing as a fellow warrior. About fifteen minutes later, Tiara was brought into the garage too, letting us know she had been completely forgotten about and left inside of the van until that moment. By then, we had grown used to their degrading neglect. We waited. We sang. We waited, I don’t know how long. We were tired but still strong. At one point we asked an officer, Constable Dave Sharein, what time it was, and he said it was 5:20. We weren’t sure what was taking so long, but at least we were together.

Isabella asked Constable Sharein if he could cut off her ties, and he did so, replacing them with handcuffs. He was visibly alarmed at how tight they were, saying “that’s ridiculous,” and he could barely get his scissors through to cut them. They left deep red indents around her wrists. We all asked him to take pictures of Isabella’s injuries, but he refused to do so (she was only photographed upon being released after the swelling had gone down). I also asked him to look at my own ties – he did so quickly and responded that they were “perfect” before leaving us once more. They were far from perfect. As I sit here writing my story a few days later, my wrists are still hurting me.

I was one of the first women to be called inside. This next scene was the most trauma-inducing given my experience as a survivor of rape and sexual assault. Several male officers faced me across a counter and one female stood next to me. Finally cutting off my ties, they told me I needed to take off my clothing save for one layer, so I stripped down to a cotton t-shirt and pants. The woman informed me that she would be searching my body for drugs or weapons of any kind – she patted me between the legs and touched many parts of my body (including my breasts). She did this while the rest of the male officers watched me. I felt completely out of control, scared, and extremely cold, in direct contrast to the overheating I had experienced in the police van. After she finished I told them I was now very cold and that I would like to put on my sweater. Responding sharply, they told me I was only allowed one layer – one officer specifically said that I would either have to take off my t-shirt in order to put my sweater on, or I would have to just stay in what I was already wearing. I was not told that I could go change elsewhere, and this being my first arrest and experience of this kind, I had no idea that was even an option. I felt body-shocked.

I told them I would stay in my t-shirt (having just been watched by several men as my body parts were touched, I was hardly comfortable with taking my shirt off in front of them) and asked if a blanket would be possible. They told me, rather severely, that they were out of blankets. I was led to my cell, shivering. The inside was dirty – there were other people’s hairs everywhere, the seating was stained and unwashed, and the steel toilet wasn’t in great condition either. I hugged myself to keep warm as the other women joined me; because there was nowhere else for us to go to the washroom, a couple of us had to do so right in front of each other. We joked, we shared stories, we sang, we clapped, we did all we could not to feel violated by such an awful place. We were violated though – our rights were violated. We did nothing to deserve our treatment.

We didn’t know what we were waiting for – we were told nothing about the state of our arrest or what would happen to us. We waited. We sang. We loved each other a little more. An officer came into our cell at 7:15 pm and asked for me to follow him, and I complied. He was kind to me – the only one who had treated me like a human being up to that point. He read me my rights, asked me a few questions, and informed me that I would need to appear in court for civil contempt. I thought after this I would be free to go, but he said that I needed to return to my cell for the time being. I xplained to the women what had happened, but none of them were taken out of the room. We waited. We sang. We loved each other, more and more. Finally, about an hour later, I was called out again and told I would need to say goodbye to the others. During that time frame none of those in the cell with me had been released or even questioned.

I gave the police my information – they know where I live and what I do, and I also signed a promise to appear in court on January 12th 2015 (now that date has been repealed because the arrests have been deemed illegal, but I still want to share what I was told). They took my picture, and I asked them to take pictures of my wrists too. I was informed that my injury would probably not be considered in court and that I might even get charged for having “resisted arrest,” when I really did no such thing.

Constable Sharein told me that if I violated the agreement not to cross the police tape again, I would be criminally charged and could spend up to two years in prison. He also said that if I did not sign the promise to appear in court, I would be detained indefinitely. I had no idea if these were only scare tactics or whether he was actually giving me factual information, and by that point, I was feeling more than frightened. They had so much power over me. I gave them everything they wanted – the more I gave, the friendlier they were. Constable Dave Sharein, initially hostile, began treating me as a person should be treated the closer I got to my release. The other police officers also treated me kindly as I was leaving. I was the first to be officially released at around 8:20 on Sunday evening, but the last woman was held until just after 11 pm.

I don’t think this experience is acceptable for anyone to go through – but I need to make it clear that I am not a criminal. I am a civilian and was only peacefully protesting for the sake of our planet. The RCMP had ceased to see or treat us as human beings when we were arrested. Most of the other women with me had not been charged before (with the exception of the one woman in the police van compartment) and we should never have been treated so poorly. Not only did we receive bad treatment, but the tape set up by the police did not represent the actual injunction zone, making our arrests completely illegal.

The force the RCMP used and is still using is completely unjustified, and they need to be held accountable for their actions. They are defending a deplorable company and are linked to the violence that Kinder Morgan is enacting upon the earth. Not all of the officers are like this – some are genuinely kind, like the one who asked me questions and read me my rights. However, all of them are directly ignoring the consequences of their actions, along with the rights of the protectors, whether those have to do with being able to breathe in a police van, or with the right to protest Kinder Morgan’s undemocratic actions. I hope this inspires some officers to shift their perspectives, and to realize that their behavior is part of a larger systemic problem in which people are continually oppressed, and their rights are ignored. I also hope that instead of punishing peaceful protesters, the court will choose to try those who have committed acts of violence – whether they are the officers responsible for physically assaulting and neglecting protesters, or they are Kinder Morgan’s employees who directly contribute to ecological destruction.

This weekend, let’s show everyone that we are still strong, that we are peaceful protectors, and that we will not neglect the natural world or each other.