In a class of 300, they were the only two black women. Now they’re top cops
2016/06/28 Leave a comment
Good long-read profile of some of the pioneering Black women in police forces:
Over breakfast, senior officers Ingrid Berkeley-Brown and Sonia Thomas are chatting about a Toronto movement that has taken on the police.
Black Lives Matter came into prominence here in the spring, and both officers saw the images of the group, led primarily by black women, camped outside Toronto police headquarters for two weeks. The group’s members were furious over the decision by the Special Investigations Unit not to charge the police officer who last year shot and killed Andrew Loku, 45, while he held a hammer.
Thomas and Berkeley-Brown are black women, friends who met at Ontario Police College in the mid-1980s. They’re straddling two realities.
“Black Lives Matter makes me a little bit uncomfortable,” Thomas admits.
“Not only am I a member of the black community (who) strives for justice, but I’m also a member of the police service they’re accusing of racism. So yeah, (I’m) a little bit uncomfortable.”
But Berkeley-Brown says she doesn’t share that discomfort.
“If they have areas of concern and get together to voice those concerns, I think that’s legitimate,” she says.
Berkeley-Brown, 55, and Thomas, 52, share a bond. In 1986, they were the only two black women in their largely white, male class of about 300 recruits at the police college in Aylmer, where they met.
Source: In a class of 300, they were the only two black women. Now they’re top cops | Toronto Star