Russell Lucas
Russell Lucas spoke 369 times across 1 day of testimony.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I'll swear, please.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
The Bible, please.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Russell Lucas, R-U-S-S-E-L-L, last name is Lucas, L-U-C-A-S.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Good morning.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I do.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I do.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I have.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
There is only one part that wasn't -- I don't believe it was 100 percent clear, and it was when it refers to my first day as Incident Command was the 21st of January, which is correct, but I first became aware of the planning process on the 18th of January ---
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
--- which I don't think was captured.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That is the only correction.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I recently moved into the Operations Support Inspector role, which oversees the Special Events Section as well as other operations support units such as Tactical, K9, Emergency Services.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That was Staff Sergeant Kevin Kennedy.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
My direct supervisor was Superintendent Chris Rheaume.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
He reported to Deputy Chief Trush Ferguson.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
They manage the daily operations as the planning and most major events, and they also serve as a filter point for labour disputes, protest demonstrations, fairs, festivals, which all go through their office.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It was within the scope of my roles and responsibilities as the Inspector of the Operational Support Unit.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So part of my role as Incident Commander was worked as an in-between between the strategic and the tactical level where the planning team would be doing a lot of the groundwork, the preparation and the building, and I would be providing some guidance, some oversight, providing feedback. And I would also serve as a conduit to the strategic level.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So I was one of the duty inspectors. I worked every day from the time just before they arrived until the day they left, and through the rehabilitation process during the day shift. And we rotated four different Inspectors to cover the night shifts.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So he had two different primary roles. One was to provide strategic direction to the management to the event that was taking place because of the size and scope that it had grown to, and he was to serve as the conduit between the actual operational side and the executive.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So Superintendent Rheaume was more involved in the daily operational oversight, where the Deputy Chief Ferguson would be involved more in the bigger picture strategic, how it interfaces with the public and our roles and responsibilities as one part of the overall operations that were happening across the city because there was still regular operations that were still occurring.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It was basically a protest that was driving across the country to raise awareness and to voice their displeasure with the current government mandates and what they believed was the overreach of the federal government.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I do.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So he was the one who was actually do the plan work, writing the plan and engaged in the - - basically the meat and potatoes of it. And Kevin Kennedy was providing the oversight and the guidance with his experience.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So there was -- yes. There was talk about disrupting, as a protest would, as you would normally see with the protests that we see every day. But the context at this point is no convoys had departed at this point and we were still gathering information about the size and scope of the event.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
At this point, I don’t believe it was 100 percent clear. There was discussion on protests which, again, most protests that we see on a daily basis have varying degrees of disruption in the city.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So they were still doing the background work and so when I first became aware of it when it came up at a meeting on the -- on the 18th, the initial feedback that was provided to me by the members of the planning team that have already been involved in two prior truck protests in as many years here in Ottawa, which -- with the same mandate, the same intent, but they were local groups, not coming from out west, that were successfully managed and mitigated, included parking trucks downtown.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That was part of their -- their messaging that they were sending out, but that is a common theme that we’ve heard before and, as I said, with the previous truck protests that did occur, that was the same message they had delivered but were gone within -- I believe one was gone only after a day and the other one was an overnight.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Actually, what materialized exceeded all our expectations, the size and scope of it.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Basically, by what was shared with me on this, I knew that there was work that was being done by OPP analysts.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I do by this email, but the context of what a high-risk event has not -- was not clearly defined either.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I do.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I think it's important that there's communication within the organization and sharing of information so that they can make -- be aware and make strategic decisions and be aware of things that are coming.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No, it was primarily through meetings and interactions through my role as it pertained to this convoy.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
She would manage -- my assumption, she would be managing the information to determine what he needs to be advised of.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That was the direction that was -- they've been pivoting to over the last few years, and they were -- the Planning Team was working with members of the Intelligence Directorate.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I can't say for sure. As I said, I only returned into that role at the beginning of the year. I'd worked in that directorate before in prior years, but three years prior to that, I'd been working on the road.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So the -- it was moreso at the working level. So the Planning Team members would work with the constables and sergeants in the Intelligence Directorate to make sure that they're getting mutually supportive information for their respective roles.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Not with me personally, but I know there was discussions. They may not shared the full reports. They may vet them before they share the salient information with the Planning Team.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
They did.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I would have received it on the day it was sent to me.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I remember reading different versions of this one. I do.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I did -- so the intelligence was stating that -- I want to provide a little additional context. So we knew the convoy was going to be arriving. At this point, I believe it was only the western convoy that was en route. The other convoys were not yet started. And we were monitoring the actual size and their behaviours and their actions, which was included as part of our building our plan.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I wasn't involved in it, but the information that was relayed to me by the Planning Team was that they had experienced this before, and we had experienced with other similar vehicle protests downtown as well.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes, because the core that started out from B.C., I believe, was around 50 with vehicles that would join it and then depart at various parts of the leg.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Well, it was going to be larger than what we'd experienced before, but again, the intelligence is only one piece of the puzzle that they're using towards the planning process as well.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So on the -- around the 25th, 26th, the primary focus, we originally planned this as a - - main portion of our planning was focussed on how do we manage... Because the number of vehicles that were potentially going to arrive you were not going to stop. So it was how do you work with them to mitigate the risks and the impacts to the community? So with this, that statement that a lot of our -- the challenges and disruption would be around traffic, but we also had to focus on the -- as well that -- the fact that the convoy organisers were actually cooperative and were not demonstrating disruptive behaviour on their way there, the ones that were already -- the one that was already under route.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So part of the context to this, and knowing the writer and knowing the people involved, is part of the challenge is the topic of mandates, the restrictions, vaccinations is an extremely divisive topic. I've seen it in my own family, and you see that those challenges arise and it becomes a polarising topic of discussion. So yes, it does have the potential to create language and debate amongst people who are normally cooperative.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So on the 21st, I was aware of five potential convoys, and by the time we got to the 28th, we were at 13 confirmed convoys.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No, I don't recall top of my head.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It's my duty book, yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I do.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
To make sure that we were sharing information about the developments of the convoys across the country.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So there was 11 convoy groups that we have identified. Not all were enroute, and they were looking at information about where they were coming from and who the leaders were, yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So it constantly changed. So as they were travelling, they had -- the core group that originally left, they would pick up people that would join in with them in support through their areas where they resided or their province, and then they would break off. So the number was inconsistent.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes. "West Group staying until mandate lifted."
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It would have been addressed by somebody else on the conference call that I made a note of.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Most of them are getting to me.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
And I said, there was the core group, and they would have people who would join them for parts of their route, and then would disperse and wouldn't be staying with them for the whole way.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So that's where -- that's how many people that were associated to that section of the convoy at that point in time.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
As of this date?
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So the original information that came back was saying that we could see upwards of 100 vehicle per province. We knew that it would be -- those numbers would average out. It would be based on we may not see as large numbers from some of the smaller provinces but we would see larger ones from West and from Ontario.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So that's in trucks.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That’s how many people that they thought would show up for the events on the Saturday.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct. But those are also local people as well, and local supporters are coming from the neighbouring area. Like, Canada Day is, you know, 100,000 people at any given time. Ten thousand (10,000) people of a group that is demonstrating behaviour as peaceful and cooperative is not a concern at this point.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I do. And there was concerns. And the concerned weren’t necessarily about the convoy, it’s about who is attaching themselves to the convoy and some of the online rhetoric that we were starting to see that was arising.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
There was a lot of references that were popping up on social media saying this was going to be their January 6th, and this was the -- I believe this was the same day that we started reaching out to have other public order units from other police services to be in town to support us.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I knew that there was a potential for a group of them to remain behind. The size and scope of that, it exceeded what we were anticipating.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes. And because I’m not sure who is getting those Intersect, there are different levels of Intersect messages that go out. So it depends on, is that a general public one or is that one that’s going to policing partners?
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay. And so the bullet you commented on reads: “…this will be a significant and extremely fluid event that could go on for a prolonged period (January 28[th] to 30[th]).” And you wrote: “Do we want to commit to dates, it could last much longer” How much longer did you think the Freedom Convoy could last, as of the 26th?
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
As of the 26th, I anticipated the vast majority would leave after the first weekend. And as a matter of fact, I would say between 60 and 70 percent of them did leave after the first weekend. The unfortunate part was the footprint remained the same. And then we thought maybe a week or so for the remainder.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
And to provide clarity to that, again, we weren’t expecting the numbers that actually attended.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I believe so.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I don’t recall.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Well in hindsight, yes. But at the time of this, I would say no, because, again, we’re fully engaging PLT with the various organizers, convoy captains. The demonstrated behaviour of the convoys through their transits has been peaceful, compliant, and working with police, not against.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I do.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I said that, yeah.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct. We -- to me, at that time, we believed the highest risk would be the core group that was coming from the furthest distance from out west.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
With a core group of about 50 ---
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
--- in the convoy.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
What I -- what we worked towards and how -- you also have to be aware of worst-case scenario, and that’s what we were discussing, what is the worst- case scenario, what do we do as we go forward. And when we cover the operational plan, I’ll cover more of that off.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No. It’s about the fact that they may stay.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So we were still -- at this point in time, we were still having the initial discussions with the other services about what resources from Public Order Units can be sent, and that’s what we’re looking at. So until I know what we’re going to have for firm resources that are going to be available, we got to make sure that what we do have is sustainable to achieve the public safety, which is our first and foremost goal.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So there’s two parts to that. The first part with regards to the broken windows, so one of the standard practices that we push out for demonstrations that have the potential for violence, so if somebody is -- if they were having a crowd that is very volatile and somebody breaks a window, we’re not going to rush officers in to try and make an arrest that’s going to agitate the crowd and escalate the event. We will document, we will investigate and we will lay the charges at a later time. It’s about the timeliness and how we’re going to maintain public safety. That’s what the reference for the broken window is. With respect to our resources, we were already short staffed. We have a hard time meeting our current mandate with the staffing levels we have in this organization and we were already pulling from all different directorates to be able to staff for this event. And as has been previously mentioned by my Deputy Chief and the Chief, it’s been a long hard two years for them.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
At this point in time, it wasn’t about being overwhelmed. It was about if we ended up where violence does erupt, are we going to have the resources to quickly regain the safety and bring order back in to the city.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Well, there is -- yes, but again, context. So depending on the convoys if they arrive on their schedules and they remain cooperative, it was not -- and they go to the places where we work locations out for them, then we would not have been overwhelmed. Then we would have been able to manage it with the framework that we have in place. But if they didn’t stick to their schedule or they all tried to come at the same time, then there was a potential for our resources to be stretched too thin.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
There was a potential, yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
There was an email attachment on another document where it actually provided feedback and that will tell you the date that I received it.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
With a few minor amendments to it, yes, I did.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It was told that by the -- to me by the planning team, that that had become the standard practice that they would go to the Chief for final approval.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No, there’s not.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Usually my understanding is the practice is it is a collaborative effort between the two.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No, it does not.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No, because it was built into the other components of the plan and how they were approaching it.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes, because it did happen.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes, it should have been there.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
The initial plan, I believe, was three days, and it primarily rotated around the scheduled events that they learned was taking place with the protest organizers.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So part of the ISC model, when we send it to the Incident Commander, is a planning and stocking contingent. On the Friday the 28th, we stood up our service Command Centre, to start looking at resourcing, planning, and succession planning to go forward for this event as of the Friday.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It would depend on the size and scope and the footprint. So as I said -- as I stated, at the end of that first weekend and into that Monday, two-thirds or more of them left and we had an opportunity to shrink that footprint, which didn’t take place. And in -- we would have been able to rearrange our traffic plan to mitigate that. Similarly we’ve seen to other protests that have occupied Wellington Street in the past, if there was no volatility with crowd dynamics, you create a traffic plan and provide a robust police presence to ensure public safety.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No. So part of that discussion was already taking place about where would we be diverting traffic if there was an extended presence. It’s not included in this plan, no. The plan was -- again, you have to look at the short timeline. This was the 27th, 28th, and the event was arriving the 28th. We can’t wait till we have 100 percent solution to have a framework up so that we can get troops on the ground to make sure that we’re responding to the needs of the public, and that’s why the Service Command Centre was stood up to ensure that we were building succession planning to be able to go forward. You have to work off of -- you can look at different speculations on what could or could not happen, and -- but at this point you have to take a look at if two-thirds left and we did compress and we were Wellington Street only, it would have been a very -- much more easier to manage with the resources that we had.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Or if they stayed where we asked them to park.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Based on dynamics of what was happening at the time.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
This plan does not have it.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
As with any event, there could be improvements. I think there was good communication between the two. Was it robust enough? Obviously we did not have as much as we needed in advance. But I also want to point out that the context of this is a little different as well. This is something that was very fluid, that they were planning in a week. If I were to use my previous planning experience working in the 2016 North American Leaders Summit where I was the lead planner for the Ottawa Police, which was about the same scope, maybe even a little bit smaller for a head of state visit, we had months to plan and prepare. And months to get resources into place. This was less than a week.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I certainly do.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Sure. So on the Friday, for the most part the arrivals were actually very -- for the most part were orderly. People were -- the convoys were going to locations that were predesignated, and areas that we -- again, it goes back to we were expecting a few thousand and it still exceeded what we were -- what we actually, truly expected. And my personal opinion is it probably exceeded what the organizers were expecting. But on that Friday, people were going to places we designated, where we were actually -- if you look at those -- on the maps, on the Parkways and on Wellington we were doing everything we could to keep them out of the residential areas. The analogy I use is I have one load of sandbags and we’re building a wall, but you see the waters are rising faster and you know you’re going to get overwhelmed with the water that’s coming. So you use your sandbags to divert them to minimize and mitigate the damages and the impacts to the area that it going to be the recipient of those floodwaters. And that’s what we were trying to do. But what happened was on the Saturday, the Western convoy arrived. Unfortunately, they’re the ones that created this event and they didn’t get the locations downtown. It was other people that raced downtown to get that. So what had happened was people who were frustrated that were individual operators who wanted to take part weren’t complying with the directions and we were redirecting them, trying to keep intersections, emergency roads clear. And -- but they would start to weave through different side streets, so that would -- in those individual vehicles that were going off the planning and the agreements that were in place originally with the various leaders and organizers of the convoys, we’re creating one-offs; we’re drawing one more resource here, one more resource there. And it got to the point it was, okay, we have to stop responding to those individual, smaller ones on the Saturday and indicate where are we going to get the biggest bang for our buck by deploying officers to go back to what is our key primary goal of public safety.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I knew there was an agreement; I wasn’t part of the conversations.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I know we -- at that point in time, I was still at the National Capital Region Command Centre. Basically, I was providing command for live operations, and we were doing what we could to facilitate some of those moves through the Police Liaison Teams, but to one point in time it stopped because it was not having the intended affect.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
There may have been. I don’t recall.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It says me, I was there, but participating on Teams.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I remember there was numerous times where we were asked about what the status was, and I would have provided an update of wherever we had all the cameras. So if I said there was -- if there's notes in there that say that there was room, then there was room, but these aren't my notes so.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes, that would seem logical.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Thank you.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Good morning.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I've been an incident commander and then a critical incident commander as well.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I have.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I would hope so.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Most of the time.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I would assume so.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Is she on that call?
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay. Sorry, I didn't look at the list.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
We all have a role to play, but, yes, it would fall to her.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes, with an event commander between her and I.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Not to my knowledge at that point.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Not that I know of.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No, I was focussed on my role. I can't say what his role and his responsibilities were overall.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
He's got his hands in everything.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes, in the beginning.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I was one of the approvers, yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
He did not.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
And above.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct. In different sections but ---
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
--- in the role.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I would hope so.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
On the road, no. I had only recently started in that section at the beginning of the month, so I'd only been there for three weeks.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So to clarify, the -- my role as the Duty Inspector on the Road are, for the most part, unplanned events that I would respond to that wouldn't necessarily have formal written plans. If I was assigned to come in for a planned event to provide support as an Incident Commander, I would not be involved in that Incident Command planning process. That would be -- I would be just coming in to fill a role. And so there would be, like, planned protests in the past where I would be coming in, and those plans would be written by the events section up through the chain of command, and then I would be available should there be a critical incident during those events.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I don't know. By the 28th, it was game time, and my role and my priority was making sure that we had people doing what they needed to do.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
On the document there, no, he did not.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That’s part of the problem.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
They were.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
There’s a difference between raising your voice to get somebody’s attention across the room, and yelling at somebody.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
They were.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
They were not.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Critical.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
They are not a silver bullet, they are not.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
They did. And it varied throughout that. So to provide context -- so part of the negotiations -- and I think it’s important to realize, that from the time of the arrival to the time of the departure, the crowd dynamics and the crowd composition evolved. And the longer that they were there, and the number -- and the people who -- that were participating changed, which changed the dynamics for -- but negotiations.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
One of them, yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
They did.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It did.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
The -- to, which decision?
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I don’t know. I said, my focus was maintaining live operations of what was happening on the ground.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I don’t know who made that decision.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That was my understanding.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Based on that statement I would say it is.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It was.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No. I was, actually on a day off.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
At the end of the day, the Chief owns the Service and the decisions that come out of it, so ---
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
--- he needs to do what he needs to do.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
He needs to do what he needs to do.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Thank you.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Good morning.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct, because at this point the operational planning and what was -- what we were learning and how we were adopting was consistently changing.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No. The high-level speaking points were provided and then it was left to the Executive to decide what they would share.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So if they go -- if you go back, one of the statements was in intelligence reports that I was provided was assuming on an average of a hundred vehicles per province, so about a thousand vehicles. We ended up with, I would say, close to five thousand vehicles, of which we still diverted on the Saturday thousands out of -- not -- out of the downtown by keeping them on the Quebec side thanks to our great partners, Sûreté du Quebec and Gatineau. The original group, and what it was, it wasn't necessarily the trucks, it was actually all the associated vehicles that joined in that were creating the chaos that all wanted to be downtown.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So the context is we had -- if the vehicles went to the locations where we designated spots for them, they actually plotted it out, including maintaining emergency lanes on those roadways, we could host up to 3,000 thousand vehicles on those designated spots.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Fair.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct. "Intel from SQ".
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That's probably the Operational Support person that was working in there. So there is multiple OPS members that are in there providing different roles.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It is police.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
What time are you talking?
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Oh, sorry, I was looking at the wrong one.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yeah.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It was.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So if they were going into the inner core, right in the middle of the crowds, they would need us to be there ---
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
--- and then we'd have to assess. So when those actions -- and again, it comes under context. What is the dynamics? I am not going to allow somebody to go in to achieve a minor action and put their safety at risk or risk inflaming the crowds.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No. So -- and in all respect to Superintendent Brookson and the PPS, their role is protecting Parliament. My role is to protect the city, and I have to weigh the options and where my risks are, and you have to say is that actually necessary, is it risk effective, and is it acceptable? And I will never get 100 percent solution, I know that, and I will make the best decision I can at that time that's going to ensure public safety and the safety of our members.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct. And to provide context to that, we do take their concerns -- they weren't completely disregarded because we did maintain access to Parliament and we still were able to get their vehicles into there.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So to provide clarity, the PLT were negotiating since day one.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct. So this "load safe", though, is the one lone rogue truck driver that put his vehicle on an angle, and the Load Safe was the name on it. And it was actually closer to the Chateau Laurier, and they were concerned about not only Parliament but access to where -- the centre of the city.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Begrudgingly.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Good morning.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I know there was two. That was my understanding of how they transpired.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
There was always a risk that some would be staying longer, yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No. My understanding was that -- and again, like I stated, the evidence shows that between 60 and 70 percent of them at least left on that Sunday, into the Monday morning. The size and scope of the vehicles that came in exceeded everyone’s expectations.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
There were never any guarantees.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
You’ll have to rephrase the question, sorry.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
And that’s why we brought in the public order units from other police services.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No, so the community impact was actually -- was part of the consideration right from the beginning. So if you actually were to go to the original plan and take a look at where they were diverting the trucks to, they were away from residential areas. And if you look -- like, put them along the Sir John A. MacDonald Parkway and onto Wellington, we were trying to find places where they were trying to go that we would actually minimize the impact on that. There was no plan to put them down the length of Kent Street to double and triple stack on Kent and block Kent and things like that. that was never part of the original plan. And on the Friday, that’s not what took place. And again, like I state, when we look at alternate locations, we can’t put them on to people’s private property. So the City, being a great partner, provided RCGT, and those trucks that actually arrived on Friday night that went there, they actually carpooled to go downtown to actually minimize the impacts to downtown. So there were a lot of wins, but what happened was the size and scope, and I know I’ve said this numerous times, and -- but it exceeded everybody’s expectations, and I would probably say even that of the organizers weren’t expecting the volume that we ended up -- and what happened was, when we got that volume, it just pulled our resources too thin to address those concerns.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
But even diverting the trucks to an area such as Wellington Street, for instance, was there any consideration of the residential areas that are just south of Wellington, or the businesses in that area? What was that consideration?
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So the -- when we’re doing the planning, it’s like I stated, where are you going -- we’ll never get to where it’s not going to impact anybody. So it’s about how do we manage -- they are going to Parliament Hill. That is the focus of their event. So how do we minimize and control, in the planning process, as much as possible to mitigate those impacts on the local community? And, you know, we’ve learned a lot of good lessons. And again, if we had put barricades up, we would have pushed them further into the communities, which is what we did not want in the planning process.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
In the early planning stages?
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So our concern was, when we talk about them shutting down movement, is what if they blocked off certain intersections? And if you look at the first weekend, it’s about mitigating it, managing it with traffic officers and our Police Liaison Teams. So again, first weekend, I know it doesn’t look like a success, and people are -- the end results are going to look at everything that went wrong, but there were a lot of things that went right. The intersections were kept open, the emergency lanes were kept open. We had busses still running on that first weekend. So there were a lot of wins. And I know people don’t see that. We -- with the amount of officers and the resources we had, and the amount they were overwhelmed, they did a phenomenal job. And I will always give them the credit for the work that they did to try and mitigate the impacts to the community.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Good morning.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes. And there’s a couple really good examples. So the -- I’ve learned a lot. and the power of social media has evolved and it continues to evolve. And when we look at -- when somebody sends out, I’ll call -- we try to put out information from legitimate sources and you try to make sure that they’re verified. So we always refer people back to our website to look for true information. Misinformation comes when people are sending out unintentionally wrong information, and then it gets shared, and then you’re trying to put that genie back in the bottle. And then the other issue was the disinformation, where people are knowingly putting out false information, which is drawing on resources or creating a different narrative that you’re trying to deal with. So, like, for example, the wooden fence that’s protecting the construction site on Parliament Hill was being shared repeatedly, over and over again, saying they’re fortifying Parliament Hill in advance of the arrival of convoys. And it was enflaming people. But you’re trying to get the information out through your PLTs. It’s there. There’s construction. There’s a big pit on the other side. We don’t want people to get hurt. And that was a big challenge to try to stay ahead of.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I know that there was messaging going out, and what happens is things start because they get taken out of context. So one of the pillars of policing response to events that have the potential to be volatile, whether they’re a regular call for service from 911 or going to a protest, is about de-escalating. You want to -- if people are running at a nine or a 10 emotionally, you need to bring it down a level. So if that means being friendly with them and having a chat with them and taking a picture with them so that people are getting more relaxed and it doesn’t turn into a confrontation, that’s what, traditionally, we have encouraged our officers to do. Then what happens is, it gets twisted and gets shared as, as I said, disinformation or misinformation.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
There’s my example, yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
We -- they have a right to protest. We are not supporting any cause. And part of it -- if you go back to our operational plan, it tells them, “you can’t wear symbols”. We tell them they cannot overly support or not support an event. They’re there to be neutral.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Because they were taking -- allowing selfies to be taken with protectors, correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I remember that Tweet being shared, yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I don’t remember the full details. I do remember that there was a concern that these -- that some of the participants were drawing up arrest warrants. There was also another one where they were actually swearing themselves in as peace officers. Those -- the one for the warrants was forwarded to our Intelligence to review, to validate, and then assigned to investigators as applicable.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
They’re -- my understanding for the most part is that they are focused on anti-government, anti-mandate group based out of Quebec.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So the email that you’re referring to, I am aware of that email. So what happens -- this is an important part about, again, having our officers that are on the ground being engaged not only with local residents, but with the truckers. And so when they get that information, we provide it and send it forward to Intelligence to validate what -- is it -- is that information valid and is it reliable. So there was rumours, but whether it was validated, I can’t confirm.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It was -- yes, because it was -- they have a $10 million war chest. Is it plausible? Absolutely. It needs to be further investigated.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Good morning.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Personally, but they should not be doing it professionally.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I can’t say for sure.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
We anticipated the vast majority would leave.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
And I believe I explained that in my earlier testimony.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No. So what I’m referring to is, for example, if we have an emotionally-charged crowd that is marching and protesting and going through the city and somebody breaks a window in that crowd, we are not going to rush in to arrest them right away for that event because it has a high volatility to escalate the crowd to more violence or cause injury to the people that are going to make the arrest. We will document, we will investigate and we will lay charges as applicable for that broken window. It just won’t be an immediate action.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No, broken window theory says if you continue to ignore the broken windows that nobody will care any more.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No, you’re referring to broken window theory. That’s not applicable in this case. Broken window theory’s complete -- is not the same theory as this. This is about timing your investigation and your charges of when you actually make an arrest. There is no requirement for us to immediately rush in to arrest somebody who breaks a window or spray paints something. That’s something that can be investigated, followed up, and the applicable charges can be laid after the fact. Now, if somebody were to pull a knife, we are going into that crowd and that person will be arrested because we have a responsibility to ensure public safety.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That was my personal interpretation, yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I believe it was Superintendent Drummond was assigned to do the follow-up with respect to the negotiations.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I know she works in that office, yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
She was in the NCRCC almost on a daily basis, so.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
The first day of the arrests?
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It was cold.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It was cold because I actually remember watching the video of them lining them up and the officers giving up the -- their own personal hand warmers to the people waiting in line to be processed on the bus.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
There is a risk.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I’m aware of the plan. I did not see it.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So at that point, the Integrated Command and Planning Group were planning and coordinating, and my focus was on getting our officers through the next 3 hours or the 12 hours that they were working under my command. Those actual operations were -- would be planned and coordinated by a separate group.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
The concept of operations - --
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
--- but not the minutia or the details.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I know nothing of that. I can't speak to it.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Don't recall.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I can.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
For the security, correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That's -- you're talking about the fencing in front of Centre block, correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I couldn't say. They weren't under my command or control, but there was a PPS element that was working with us in the NCRCC ---
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
--- which is the Command Centre.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
On Wellington? No, I know that they were dealing with the spillover that was coming onto their -- the grounds.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No. That's correct. Most of them stayed on Wellington.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
We would not leave them alone, no.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct, yes.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So on the first weekend, the RCMP were allocated to one in reserve, one at Harrington Lake, and one at Rideau Hall. The -- we brought in, I believe, six Public Order Units, which -- and ours, plus ours, and the two from the OPP were reallocated strictly to support PPS operations on that first weekend.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct. As well as any of the -- there's the rotating and Public Order Units, so we had support from a lot of services, London, York, Durham, and that, Toronto, and we -- they were rotating, they were available to provide support on Parliament Hill as required, but we were not sending officers up there as a routine basis.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Good morning.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct, on the early days.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It's just the sheer number of vehicles that had the potential to arrive, if we set up road blocks, we're going to set up on the basis of the fact that we think they're going to engage in criminal activity. The original arrival was to come to protest. They've been cooperative, demonstrated behaviour, and if -- we want to make sure we're working with them, because as this event grew, it would have been impossible to stop them. So, like, I use the water analogy. It was about how do we divert them to places to minimize the impacts on the community.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It would have been substantial, because part of the problem is, with the number of vehicles that were coming, where do you stop them and where do you prevent them from going to because they're going to be displaced, and where is that displacement going to be to. Are we going to be pushing them all the way out to Orleans, or into Kanata, and those are things we can't answer. So it's about how do you minimize the risk with the resources you have.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I think we would have pushed the -- my personal belief is we would have pushed the trucks further out into the community, and the impact would have been significant for a larger part of the population, and it would have even been more difficult for us to contain and manage.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
We were already spread thin. We would have been spread thinner.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It says January 28th.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
This is the one the Special Events Section under Support Operations wrote.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct. That was a separate plan that served as a supporting document or an annex to this overarching plan.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No, it's a supporting document to the overarching plan. So this overarching plan has three components that I recall the top of my head. One is the Traffic Management Plan, a Tactical Plan, and a Public Order Plan.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Daily. As the information and the intelligence changed, we were trying to adapt the plan, and really it came down to is at one point you have a put a plan out so that the people on the ground know what they're doing and what the framework is, and then we adapt.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So a lot of it will be the -- getting a lot of information dialogue with our partners, through our PLT, having a conversation with our police organisations, watching the impact, seeing what their plans and their schedules are. As you said, their schedule of events ran until I think Monday morning, and then there were no other planned events. They would reach out to interactions of what their behaviours were along the way, what's the dialogue happening between the Police Liaison Teams and the convoy organisers. Looking also as well, what's the past history been? What's been our best approaches for managing these types of events?
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Multi-dimensional.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Completely -- that's not correct. So what happens is people look at the cover and they think it's the same plan, it's not. We follow a template, but the data and the information is constantly changed for that specific event. We use a template to ensure we are not missing things, and it helps cover off the planning process. Those with a military background or even at Ad Hoc Incident Command is -- we call it SMEAC: Situation, Mission, Execution, Administrative Support, Command and Control. And those are -- that's a planning standard that's been used for 50, 60 years as the natal standard for planning, and the reason is for interoperability to exchange information and the people know where to find that in a plan right away. The template is the same; the data is different.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So the Public Order Team is a trained group of police officers that we would use. The worst case scenario is in their full tactical gear where they're basically what you've heard, of the, you know, the riot control officers in shields and the padded uniforms. We try to -- and then they can go to a lower level of just the uniform presence as well. But they're training cadre dynamics. And after that meeting, the more we started reviewing things, that's where we really started doing the reach out, and that's where I said we brought in, I believe, it was five or six Public Order Units from outside of OPS to supplement us on that first weekend.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So a full Public Order Team would be anywhere between 80 and 100. I am not a Public Order member, so I can't say for certain, but -- so even at the low end we're looking at two from OPP, one from York, one from Durham, the one from London, we had one from Toronto, and we had ours. So we had the seven, so even that we're, you know, close to 500 officers.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
They did.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
We did.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
We mobilised them. So we rotated them to deploy in large groups through the crowds on the -- for the first weekend, knowing that they also have a limited shelf life of how many hours they can work as well, to ensure that we had a -- one on -- at least one or two on standby, and then we would rotate the others through the -- to give the appearance that we had a very robust police presence.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
We did not see any of that come to fruition.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
There was just the volume, and them wanting to get to a specific point. The original people that arrived, and even on the Saturday, there was still a good percentage of them that complied. There was frustration between the two groups, which led to some disputes, which -- and then -- but again, our focus was to keep intersections clear, keep emergency lanes open.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So right after the -- I said that, when the first weekend was wrapping on -- you know, into the Monday, and we're looking at two-thirds that had left, they -- were holding the same footprint with not enough officers, and there was an opportunity to compress as many of those people into a smaller footprint onto Wellington. There was an engagement with PLT working with the organisers. The request went up through the chain of command, and the direction came back is we're not giving them one inch.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
My -- I was told it came from Chief Sloly.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I do.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I do.
-
Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Because it started to change after the first weekend. And they were -- we just had the question about shrinking the footprint, was -- I knew there was a strategic and a political impact from that, and that's why -- and it wasn't time sensitive, and that's why that consultation, what I thought was going to be a consultation piece, took place, but it turned out that it -- we -- I didn't have the autonomy to make that decision. And that was the first of a number of incidents where I realised I was more the -- just managing live Operations.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
It was -- there was draw on our resources. There was -- again, and I appreciate the numerous demands on the police service as a whole, but in the Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday time period, when we were trying to build a stability plan, and then what happens is where we think we have the rsources to get us through that day and we find out a bunch of the officers are being pulled to do community engagement. So we rebuild -- we have the Planning Team that's sectioned off from our ICS model at our Service Command Centre, so it's rebuilding and redrafting the staffing and planning model for the next operational period, and then we get into the next operational period and then our traffic officers are pulled. Well then, now we have to rebuild and look it up because they want strategic -- or the strategic direction was they needed to do -- go do traffic enforcement.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
I would -- so the Police Liaison Team, to me, and I don’t think they get enough credit for the work they do. So they successfully deal and they manage dozens of successful wins every day during the protest that don’t make the news. But what happens is when -- they need the flexibility to make concessions, because you can’t -- it can’t be a one-way conversation, otherwise you’re not having those negotiations in good faith. So they need the autonomy -- a bit of autonomy to be able to do stuff that’s not going to affect the overall operation to make those -- a certain level of decisions, which they just didn't have. And -- but when they started getting some of it back, for example, at the Confederation Park, they saw phenomenal success. It was slow, but it was great success. And that’s really what PLT does.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
That was one of the benefits, but that wasn’t the only role. The role is you need to ensure that the people feel that there is enough of a presence that we are -- that police are out there. The problem is, we’re not going to be asking -- Toronto Police, or York Police, or any of our partners that are there have the ability to intercede on something, but it’s going to -- if they do, the investigation is going to be turned over to the Ottawa Police. So it’s about ensuring the presence to mitigate and intervene at the earliest stages to prevent things from getting worse.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
No, not at that time.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So there’s two parts to the that. So the first part is, under the ICS model, there’s a planning, logistics, finance, and what happens is we pull them out away from the operations in the incident command and let them work offsite with information we’re feeding them of what those operations and preparing our next planning cycle and things like that that’s going to exceed. And that’s what we’d be looking for, because we’re -- at this point, the plan has changed multiple times based on the changing dynamics. And again, once we realized the size and scope of what we had was substantially larger than what we anticipated, then we’re adapting and we’re trying to flex through that. When we get through the first weekend and we’re looking at options -- because one of the -- what we’ve done before is we have had people stay behind and we go back to, I believe it was the Tamils had their protest. You close -- you compress your footprint. So what happens is I only need to block off two ends of the street, and they’re only on that one street, where when we had that opportunity, and even if it was 500 trucks, and say it was the full length of Wellington, three lanes, but we could have blocked it at Wellington, and maybe out to Bay. And we would have been able to get the vast majority of those people in there. And what happens is, instead of having all those vehicles that were pushed further out, Rideau/Sussex, Sir John A. MacDonald, and other places, they would have been where they wanted to be to get their message out and we would have had -- instead of spreading our resources so thin to manage all those traffic points, because as soon as Rideau/Sussex closed, your traffic point -- traffic perimeter has to be larger to divert people from getting caught at a road block. So it just was a significant draw on resources, and when we didn’t get that opportunity to use PLT to shrink that footprint, we would have reduced it to a smaller size and I wouldn’t have needed all those officers all through the ByWard Market and on Rideau Street, and I could have pivoted them into other proactive engagement activities in the downtown.
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Russell Lucas, Insp (Ott-OPS)
So again, when they had that first -- again, this is the earliest days of the protest, with Rideau/Sussex, if they had the opportunity to bring them out of Rideau/Sussex, it would have freed up that whole side of the canal. And the direction that came down was, “We’re not giving them one inch.” So that’s what we worked with. And then again -- so again, we’re spread thing. And now we’re -- the next few days, it’s just about building a stabilization plan so that we’re not burning our members out and getting enough rotation and food and things like that before we can get into the next phase of an operation.