Racial attack leads to guilty verdict

Professional motorcycle racer pushed Asian fishermen into water, sparking wild car chase

Gail Swainson Urban Affairs Reporter
The Toronto Star

Published On Wed Dec 16 2009

From: http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/crime/article/739389--racial-attack-leads-to-guilty-verdict

Trevor Middleton will be sentenced in 2010 for aggravated assault, criminal negligence.

A 23-year-old Georgina Township man has been found guilty of aggravated assault and criminal negligence causing bodily harm following a racially motivated attack on a group of Asian anglers in 2007.

The incident sparked a wild, early-morning car chase that left a young man permanently brain damaged and in a wheelchair.

An eight-woman, four-man jury found Trevor Middleton guilty on all six charges – two charges of criminal negligence causing bodily harm and four of aggravated assault at 11 a.m. Tuesday.

Middleton, a professional motorcycle racer, was accused of repeatedly ramming his pickup truck into a Honda Civic driven by angler Ruohang Liu after a dispute following a "nip-tipping," a racist term used to describe pushing Asian fishermen into the water.

The incident started after Liu and his friend Charles Hogan were pushed into the water at a popular Sutton-area fishing spot.

Court heard Liu was fishing with Hogan and longtime friends Shayne Berwick and Shiv Kumar at the "Blue Bridge" of Mossington Park.

The family of Berwick – who suffered severe brain damage that has left him in a wheelchair after Middleton ran the car into a tree with his truck – held hands tightly and wept after the decision was read.

Outside the courtroom, Berwick's father, Colin, said the family is gratified with the conviction.

"Now we are just trying to get Shayne back to where he was before," Colin Berwick told a crush of reporters. "But we didn't see the (outcome) being any other way. The evidence was overwhelming."

Brad Lee, spokesman for a group of Asian Canadians, urged Justice Alfred Stong to give Middleton a stiff jail sentence in the hope it will act as a deterrent.

Since 2007, there have been 25 reported attacks on Asian anglers, many on Lake Simcoe, Lee said.

"We are hoping the judge will consider hate crimes as an aggravating factor in sentencing," Lee said.

Middleton's family and his lawyer Gerald Logan declined to comment.

Middleton is due back in court Jan. 4, when a date is scheduled to be set for sentencing.

During the trial, court heard that three truckloads of youths drove to the fishing spot in the early morning hours of Sept. 16, 2007, in anticipation of "nip-tipping."

The four friends and three others were fishing at the Mossington Park bridge when Middleton and his group of 10 to 20 youths arrived in pickup trucks and an SUV.

Witnesses testified Liu and Hogan were pushed into the water after the youths demanded to see their fishing licences.

Following a scuffle between Kumar and one of Middleton's friends, the four anglers piled into Liu's Civic, with Middleton in pursuit.

Court heard a frantic 911 call to the police from Hogan as the Civic was being rammed by the truck. Hogan said two trucks were trying to drive their car into Lake Simcoe.

Middleton testified he chased the vehicle to make a citizen's arrest after his friend was beaten up.

Liu testified that after his vehicle hit a tree and his friends were ejected, he pleaded for Middleton's help, but was refused. Middleton drove off without calling police.

Hogan was thrown from the vehicle into Lake Simcoe. Berwick suffered a fractured skull, a blood clot on the brain, 10 broken ribs and a punctured lung. He spent three months in a coma and is expected to need constant care for the rest of his life.

Colin Berwick said his son, now 26, was three years into his five-year electrician's apprenticeship when he was injured.

His son has no memory of life before the accident, Berwick added.

Justicia for Migrant Workers - Call for Support

To whom it may concern,

We are writing from Justicia for Migrant Workers (J4MW), a volunteer-run non-profit collective that strives to promote the rights of migrant workers. As students, community, and labour activists, we seek to build relationships of trust with migrant workers, support and empower them to address work-place issues, and to amplify workers’ voices to the public and decision-makers in Canada. We do this through: community outreach in migrant communities in rural Ontario, providing information to migrant workers about their rights, and engaging in ongoing training of legal issues affecting migrant workers.

The Supreme Court of Canada, based on our nine years of organizing to address migrant worker’s precarious status, recently granted J4MW intervener status in the upcoming Ontario (Attorney General) v. Fraser; an important legal challenge for the right to organize Ontario’s 100,000 agricultural workers. As interveners, J4MW will bring forth a unique set of arguments to address the specific plight of Canada’s Seasonal Agricultural Workers and Temporary Foreign Workers. This will be the first time in history, that Canada’s highest court will hear arguments relating to the particular experiences of migrant workers.

We are asking for your support to help us ensure migrant workers’ voices can be heard by the Supreme Court on December 17th. The financial and in kind support will help us to cover the costs of transportation, food, lodging, and other materials associated with organizing a series of events for the day of our court appearance.


Background

Since 1966 thousands of workers from Mexico, Caribbean countries, and South and East Asian countries have come into Canada seeking employment on Canadian farms. However, the conditions of their contract prevent workers from accessing basic social resources like Employment Insurance. Workers are subject to low pay, long hours and dangerous working and living conditions that regularly lead to injury and even death. The exclusion from basic human rights legislation such as Health and Safety, and the explicit prohibition from collective bargaining make workers extremely vulnerable.

Furthermore, worker’s access to healthcare is difficult, given the lack of support and interest from the government, and growers to facilitate transportation to medical centres, and translation when needed. Injured workers are often repatriated back to their home country. In fact, any dispute with the employer typically leads to this unjustified resolution. Recently, legislative changes to immigration law will ban workers’ entry into Canada for six years, after they have completed a four-year period of continuous work.

Although it is widely accepted that migrant workers’ labour is a necessity for the survival of the farm industry, given that domestic workers are not willing or compelled to do farm work, migrant workers are systematically racialized, exploited and oppressed.

These are just some of the issues that governmental programs such as SAWP and TFWP represent for migrant workers. We consider it imperative that the Supreme Court hears arguments that illustrate the reality of overt and systemic racism towards migrant workers.

We are asking that your organization make a donation to help with our costs. Any amount is welcome. If your organization would like to arrange a presentation about this issue for your members please let us know. You may mail a cheque to,

Justicia for Migrant Workers
c/o Workers' Action Centre
720 Spadina Avenue, Suite 223
Toronto ON
M5S 2T9

Thank you for your support.

In solidarity,

Justicia for Migrant Workers
info@justicia4migrantworkers.org
http://www.justicia4migrantworkers.org