It was a frigid December night in 2013 when Godfred Addai-Nyamekye, a Black Calgarian, was taken by police and abandoned in a deserted part of the city. He wasn’t dressed for the extreme cold. After he called 911 for help, he was beaten by the responding officer — an assault that was caught on video by a police helicopter.
Now 10 years later, a review board is holding an inquiry examining the investigation into his complaint.
This inquiry, led by the Law Enforcement Review Board, focuses on whether the Calgary Police Service’s actions and investigation into Addai-Nyamekye’s complaint about his arrest complied with the Police Act, the Police Service Regulation and CPS’s internal policies and procedures.
The review board is an independent body that reviews public complaints about officer conduct.
During the first day of the inquiry on Monday, held virtually, Addai-Nyamekye said he wanted consequences for the unfair treatment he received.
An inquiry into the assaulting officer’s attack never happened because he resigned ahead of the inquiry.
This inquiry into the investigation is scheduled to run from Monday to Wednesday, Dec. 4, and then again in mid-January.
Another starlight tour
Addai-Nyamekye was with his two friends when their vehicle got stuck in the snow a few days after Christmas 2013 in the southeast community of Ramsay.
As they assessed their options, a marked Calgary police vehicle pulled up and two constables stepped out. One constable, Ben Donockley, later alleged Addai-Nyamekye “became verbally and physically aggressive.”
A third officer arrived on scene and the three took down Addai-Nyamekye. His lip split open as he hit the ground.
The officers detained him and ticketed him for public intoxication.
Addai-Nyamekye said he hadn’t been drinking. During the inquiry Monday, he said he had not been given a ticket and was not aware of the citation until he attempted to file a complaint against the Calgary police.
While officers had Addai-Nyamekye’s identification, and knew where he lived, they dropped him off far from his home — dressed in a light shirt, track suit and sneakers with no tuque or gloves — with temperatures as cold as –28 with the wind chill.
Addai-Nyamekye’s lawyer, Tom Engel, and the counsellor for the police chief and police service, Michael Mysak, agreed the event was comparable to “starlight tours,” the practice of police in Saskatoon, Sask., of driving Indigenous people to the edge of town and dropping them off in sub-zero temperatures.
An inquiry found the Saskatoon Police Service was at fault for the death of an Indigenous teenager in November 1990 because of the practice. At the time, police said the teen had gotten drunk, wandered off and collapsed.
“The Calgary Police Service does not want its officers doing starlight tours,” said Mysak.
“Should that happen, it wants those officers to be investigated. That did not happen here, and our task in this inquiry is to productively work to ensure it does not happen again.”
Police helicopter footage shows the violent arrest of Godfred Addai-Nyamekye in December, 2013.
Addai-Nyamekye said he wanted those officers investigated as well and never specified that he wanted to narrow his complaint to just the assaulting officer.
It was sometime before 4 a.m. when Addai-Nyamekye was left in Calgary’s East Village, still a construction zone at the time. He called police.
Addai-Nyamekye made multiple calls before an officer arrived.
A video of the interaction captured from a police helicopter shows the constable punching Addai-Nyamekye in the back of the head before kneeing him repeatedly in the back, head and neck.
At the end of his testimony, Addai-Nyamekye said he wished it hadn’t happened and that the Calgary Police Service had handled his complaint better.