A police disciplinary hearing for a Hamilton officer accused of arbitrarily stopping a city councillor while he waited for a bus started Monday.
Matthew Green says he was “humiliated” when he was stopped by police while waiting for a bus home in the middle of the afternoon last April. He says it was cold so he stood across the street near the bridge at Stinson Street and Victoria Avenue to get away from the wind. He was looking at his phone when he was stopped and asked who he was and what he was doing there.
During the hearing he said he “felt psychologically detained” and “how are you” was the last question he was asked not the first. Green is Hamilton’s first black city councillor and has been vocal about carding. His lawyer called on the hearing officer to find it a case of racial profiling.
Constable Andrew Pfeifer is facing a discreditable conduct charge. His lawyer, Bernard Cummins says Pfeifer was checking on Green’s well-being because it was cold.
Green has also filed an Ontario civilian police commission complaint against his fellow councillor and police board chair Lloyd Ferguson for comments he made on the radio about the carding case in June.
Green’s cross-examination continues Tuesday.
