Curbing high-speed chases

August 19, 2010 Brantford Expositor

High-speed chases are a major problem on Six Nations.

To bring home the details and dangers of the chases, the Crown attorney's office took the unusual step of presenting a slide show in the midst of the court case against Burt Carter, who confessed to leading police on at least four high-speed chases.

"This problem has been referred to anecdotally but I want to show that we really do have a problem," said Crown attorney Bob Kindon.

Insp. Rob Davis from the Six Nations Police was called by the Crown to outline statistics gathered from around southern Ontario.

"There's a misconception out there that Six Nations is rural and lightly populated so if there's a high-speed chase out there, who cares?" Davis said noting the reserve's population of 15,000 makes is relatively dense in proportion to nearby areas.

"We have a public safety issue with a disproportionate problem with pursuits when compared to other jurisdictions."

Not only is Brant County, which includes Six Nations, now No. 1 in the country for stolen vehicles on a per capita basis, but the relatively small community of Six Nations recovers between 500 to 600 vehicles each year on the reserve.

Most of those, said Davis, are high-end Chevy and GM products and are often found stripped of their saleable parts. He said there's a connection between the thefts and organized crime off the reserve, as well as the growing oxycodone problem on Six Nations.

Of the 77 chases that took place in 2008 and 85 chases in 2009 in Brantford, Brant County, Six Nations, Haldimand County and Norfolk County, most of them took place on the reserve.

In 2008, there were 54 chases and in 2009 there were 39. Brantford also has a high number of chases with 18 in 2008 and 22 in 2009.

Davis broke down the high-speed chases on the territory into five categories: vehicles that police confirmed were stolen after stopping them: vehicles they identified by seeing the licence before calling off a chase or losing the vehicle; vehicles that matched the description of the most common stolen vehicles and the behaviour of the driver led police to believe it was stolen; vehicles that weren't confirmed as stolen or synonymous with stolen vehicles; and vehicles where the pursuit was for other reasons, such as outstanding warrants.

Of the 54 chases in 2008, 29 were due to stolen vehicles. Those cars and trucks came mainly from Hamilton, Brantford, Toronto and Halton.

"So these vehicles all came from outside Six Nations," said Davis, "but the pursuits happen in Six Nations."

Similarly in 2009, of the 39 high-speed chases, 21 involved vehicles that were confirmed as stolen, mainly from Hamilton, Brantford, Guelph, Halton and Niagara Falls.

With partial statistics available for 2010, up to July 15, Davis noted that the pursuits were dropping almost across the board and definitively on Six Nations.

"We made headlines as the auto theft capital of Canada but Six Nations police recognized the problem a while ago and took the lead in an initiative to combat it."

Davis added that the number of unpaved roads and the narrow road shoulders add to the dangers of highspeed chases.

"If our guys are rammed or bumped, we don't have the luxury of a shoulder to try and correct our driving and all the drivers involved and bystanders are endangered."