Even in a country with gun laws as warped as Canada’s, the story of Jessie Sansone is still mindboggling.
Sansone, 26, is a father of three and Kitchener, Ont., resident. As a younger man, he admits getting into trouble with the law, but claims to have lived clean for years. He’s now a certified personal support worker, husband and father of three. He was even reportedly offered a job at the very same school where this bizarre story begins. On Wednesday, Sansone arrived at his children’s’ school to pick them up. He was asked to step inside and meet with the principal. In the principal’s office, Sansone was met by three Waterloo Regional Police officers and immediately arrested. He was taken to a nearby station, strip searched and locked in a cell. His wife was also summoned to the station, and their children taken by Family and Children’s Services. At no point were they told why this was happening. It was not until officers had told Sansone that he’d be held in custody overnight before a bail hearing in the morning that his lawyer was finally able to tell Sansone that he had been arrested for possession of a firearm.
After hours in custody, during which time Sansone understandably became alarmed, he was suddenly released, without charges or conditions. A detective with the Waterloo Regional Police service apologized to Sansone, and explained that the entire sequence of events had been set in motion because a teacher at the school became alarmed when his four-year-old daughter drew a gun and said the picture was of her father. The teacher then notified Family Services, who decided that the police needed to be involved, telling the police that they had reason to believe that there was a gun in Sansone’s home that his children had access to. That is what led Waterloo’s finest to bust Sansone in front of the entire school, strip him naked, confine him in a cell, bring his wife to a police station and take away their children.
That sounds bad, but it’s actually worse even than that. The drawing that set all this off was a drawing of Sansone being a good guy — according to what his daughter told her kindergarten teacher, the picture was of her daddy using a gun against “bad guys and monsters.” Protecting her, in other words. It was essentially a comic strip with her father in the role of the hero. Good Lord! We’d better call in the SWAT team, quick!
The good news, if we can call it that, is that Sansone was released relatively quickly, and the police at least had the good grace to apologize for this unmitigated fiasco. But what is bad news, and entirely predictable, is how quickly all three groups involved in committing this injustice upon Sansone and his family are trying to insist that they did everything exactly right.
The school is insisting that its teachers are obligated to report potential signs that their students might be in danger to Family and Children’s Services, which in turn insist that when they receive such notifications, they are obligated to investigate. And given the nature of the accusation, Family Services was compelled to notify the police, who have procedures for dealing with allegations of an unauthorized weapon in a home, especially one with children.
Showing posts with label Canada. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Canada. Show all posts
Saturday, February 25, 2012
Sunday, January 15, 2012
Yes, Pacific Fish Are Radioactive
But there is a good chance Canadians have already eaten some of the types of fish most likely to be contaminated with cesium, based on the Japanese fisheries data.
Japan exported $76 million of food products to Canada in 2010, including $13 million of fish and crustaceans. No figures were available for 2011.
The Gazette analyzed the Japanese fisheries data for 22 seafood species that Japan has exported to Canada in recent years.
Some cesium was found in 16 of these 22 species in November, the last full month for which data was available.
Cesium was especially prevalent in certain of the species:
73 per cent of mackerel tested
91 per cent of the halibut
92 per cent of the sardines
93 per cent of the tuna and eel
94 per cent of the cod and anchovies
100 per cent of the carp, seaweed, shark and monkfish
Some of the fish were caught in Japanese coastal waters. Other catches were made hundreds of kilometres away in the open ocean.
There, the fish can also be caught by fishers from dozens of other nations that ply the waters of the Pacific.
Yet, Japan is the only country that appears to be systematically testing fish for radiation and publicly reporting the results.
CFIA is no longer doing any testing of its own. It did some radiation tests on food imports from areas of Japan around the stricken nuclear plant in the weeks after the Fukushima accident.
Only one of the 169 tested products showed any radiation. CFIA stopped doing the tests last June, saying they weren’t needed.
“The quantities of radioactive material reaching Canada are very small and within normal ranges,” CFIA spokesperson Lisa Gauthier said in an emailed statement.
“They do not pose any health risk to Canadians, the food we eat or the plants and animals in Canada.”
NOTE: This is but a tiny excerpt from the lengthy article, well worth reading entire article
Japan exported $76 million of food products to Canada in 2010, including $13 million of fish and crustaceans. No figures were available for 2011.
The Gazette analyzed the Japanese fisheries data for 22 seafood species that Japan has exported to Canada in recent years.
Some cesium was found in 16 of these 22 species in November, the last full month for which data was available.
Cesium was especially prevalent in certain of the species:
73 per cent of mackerel tested
91 per cent of the halibut
92 per cent of the sardines
93 per cent of the tuna and eel
94 per cent of the cod and anchovies
100 per cent of the carp, seaweed, shark and monkfish
Some of the fish were caught in Japanese coastal waters. Other catches were made hundreds of kilometres away in the open ocean.
There, the fish can also be caught by fishers from dozens of other nations that ply the waters of the Pacific.
Yet, Japan is the only country that appears to be systematically testing fish for radiation and publicly reporting the results.
CFIA is no longer doing any testing of its own. It did some radiation tests on food imports from areas of Japan around the stricken nuclear plant in the weeks after the Fukushima accident.
Only one of the 169 tested products showed any radiation. CFIA stopped doing the tests last June, saying they weren’t needed.
“The quantities of radioactive material reaching Canada are very small and within normal ranges,” CFIA spokesperson Lisa Gauthier said in an emailed statement.
“They do not pose any health risk to Canadians, the food we eat or the plants and animals in Canada.”
NOTE: This is but a tiny excerpt from the lengthy article, well worth reading entire article
Friday, October 21, 2011
Health Canada Covering Up Radiation
After the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986, Soviet officials were vilified for hiding the impacts from the public.
But when Japan’s Fukushima nuclear accident took place last March, public officials in Japan and Canada alike jumped straight into Chernobyl-style damage-control mode, dismissing any worries about impacts.
Now evidence has emerged that the radiation in Canada was worse than Canadian officials ever let on.
A Health Canada monitoring station in Calgary detected radioactive material in rainwater that exceeded Canadian guidelines during the month of March, according to Health Canada data obtained by the Georgia Straight.
Canadian government officials didn’t disclose the high radiation readings to the public. Instead, they repeatedly insisted that fallout drifting to Canada was negligible and posed no health concerns.
In fact, the data shows rainwater in Calgary last March had an average of 8.18 becquerels per litre of radioactive iodine, easily exceeding the Canadian guideline of six becquerels per litre for drinking water.
“It’s above the recommended level [for drinking water],” Eric Pellerin, chief of Health Canada’s radiation-surveillance division, admitted in a phone interview from Ottawa. “At any time you sample it, it should not exceed the guideline.”
But when Japan’s Fukushima nuclear accident took place last March, public officials in Japan and Canada alike jumped straight into Chernobyl-style damage-control mode, dismissing any worries about impacts.
Now evidence has emerged that the radiation in Canada was worse than Canadian officials ever let on.
A Health Canada monitoring station in Calgary detected radioactive material in rainwater that exceeded Canadian guidelines during the month of March, according to Health Canada data obtained by the Georgia Straight.
Canadian government officials didn’t disclose the high radiation readings to the public. Instead, they repeatedly insisted that fallout drifting to Canada was negligible and posed no health concerns.
In fact, the data shows rainwater in Calgary last March had an average of 8.18 becquerels per litre of radioactive iodine, easily exceeding the Canadian guideline of six becquerels per litre for drinking water.
“It’s above the recommended level [for drinking water],” Eric Pellerin, chief of Health Canada’s radiation-surveillance division, admitted in a phone interview from Ottawa. “At any time you sample it, it should not exceed the guideline.”
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