I'll be very quick.
First of all, most of my police officers were with the 10,000-plus people who were lawfully demonstrating. We have a responsibility to them as well. We had our public order people arrayed to protect the summit site.
Unfortunately, when police officers were being assaulted and attacked, police officers in their cars were driving into the area surrounded by, frankly, the mob. The choice was either to drive through the mob, thereby putting people—even if they're involved in criminal activity—at considerable risk. As they attacked the cars, the police officers, on a couple of occasions, were compelled to abandon their cars because they were attacked and physically assaulted in the cars by the mob. That's what transpired on the streets.
It took some time, quite frankly, to disengage from the 10,000 people in the demonstration and from the summit site to bring people up in an effort to contain those several hundred people who had run away from the police to begin smashing windows, burning cars, and looting stores. It takes some time to do that. Then they immediately went into another area and took off their disguises.
But fortunately we have many video images and, through the good work of our investigators, we have been able to identify these individuals. Because I think there's an expectation among Canadians that the people who engage in criminal acts will be held accountable for their crimes. That's why we've worked so hard to identify these individuals.
But let me assure you that my officers were put in a very dangerous and difficult situation in those circumstances. Many of them acted with great courage and restraint. I can also tell you that over the course of that weekend we had thousands of cameras pointed at us every day—every hour of every day, in every action of the police.
With great respect, I think that all of those video images that have been posted and displayed demonstrate quite clearly that the officers acted with restraint; they acted according to the rule of law; they acted within their lawful authorities; they maintained their discipline; and they did their very best to protect the citizens of Toronto, while at the same time trying to facilitate lawful, peaceful protest.
The overwhelming majority of citizens helped us and cooperated with that. Some chose not to and placed themselves at risk of being apprehended and arrested.
