Indigenous women overrepresented in Vancouver police checks: rights advocates
VANCOUVER — Indigenous and civil rights activists seeking an investigation of the Vancouver Police Department’s use of random street checks want to amend their complaint based on new data showing Aboriginal women are checked more often than other groups.
In June, the B.C. Civil Liberties Association and Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs asked the province’s police complaint commissioner to investigate a significant racial disparity in the use of street checks.
During the checks, also called carding, police stop a person, obtain their identification and record personal information, even though no particular offence has occurred.
The association says in a news release that recently obtained data show Indigenous women accounted for 21 per cent of all checks of women in 2016, despite only making up two per cent of Vancouver’s female population.