OPP pay Big Brother-style visit to Facebook user's home

If the drift of Canada towards a police state has not yet affected you directly, you would do well to recall the words of Pastor Martin Niemoller, writing in Germany before his arrest in the 1930s: "The Nazis came for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I was not a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I was not a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics and I was a Protestant, so I didn't speak up....by that time there was nobody left to speak up for anyone."

OPP pay Big Brother-style visit to Facebook user's home

Postby Thomas » Sun Feb 13, 2022 4:42 pm

WARMINGTON: OPP pay Big Brother-style visit to Facebook user's home

Pamphlet handed out by cop warns what "you can" and "can't do" at protests

OTTAWA — Nadine Ellis-Maffei thought the knock at the door of her farmhouse was someone who spotted one of her livestock getting loose.

She said she never dreamed it would be the “thought police and Big Brother.”

Or, in this case, Big Sister.

This was a female Ontario Provincial Police officer letting Nadine know they had spotted her online political commentaries and dropped by to give her some help in how to proceed.

“I was flabbergasted,” the mother of three, who operates a farm in Warsaw in Peterborough County, told the Toronto Sun. “I still can’t believe it.”

It was like something out of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four.

Nadine had no idea that musings or opinions on Facebook were being monitored by police or that they would actually send someone to her farm to guide her in how to think and try to encourage her on how to act if she decided to attend the Freedom Convoy protest at Parliament Hill on Saturday.

“I was thinking of going but still had not decided,” she said.
The OPP knew this.

“Because of the protest happening provincewide, yes, we have been monitoring the protests,” the officer said, in video of the encounter Nadine recorded with her phone.

Nadine hadn’t considered consulting the OPP first, nor did she think they could have any role in her decision.

“I thought this was a free country,” she said.

Certainly the officer is free to knock on anybody’s door and hand out a pamphlet or discuss any public safety concern.

And any person is free to record video of the interaction, which Nadine did.

It was quite a conversation.

“So you saw something on my Facebook?” Nadine asked the officer.

“No, on the Facebook group,” the cop said.

The line certainly seems crossed when you have police responding to a home based on information found on social media or in chat groups, but that’s what happened. It’s creepy that police would veer away from criminal concerns and put resources into the political.

“So, there’s a protest coming up,” the officer said, standing on Nadine’s front porch. “I’m simply providing you with information about a peaceful protest, and now I’m leaving. That is all.”

The OPP confirmed the video but has yet to comment.

So how many others like Nadine did police visit?

One is too many in a free society with a Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The OPP flyer the officer gave Nadine explains what “you can” and “can’t do” at protests.

For example, “you can gather peacefully to assert your rights” and “express your thoughts, beliefs and opinions.” But “you can’t … block or obstruct a highway, breach the peace or cause a disturbance.”

The pamphlet also suggests to know which protests are considered legal and which ones are not, and “know the consequences,” which could include “charges resulting in a criminal record … travel limitations and future employment.”

It’s like a Philip K. Dick-style Minority Report pre-crime kind of effort.

“It’s an intimidation tactic,” Nadine said, “and a complete overreach of power.”

That said, she is not upset with the officer, who was polite and was just doing her job.

“I felt sorry for her,” Nadine said.

She can’t imagine the OPP brass sending out a young officer to let a law-abiding citizen know her social media activity is being surveilled.

“Never in my life would I have imagined that they would knock on my door because of something I posted, shared, liked, or because of a group I belong to aligning with my personal beliefs,” Nadine said.

She can imagine it now.

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OPP Pay Surprise “Visit” To Local Woman Who Posted On Freedo

Postby Thomas » Sun Feb 13, 2022 4:44 pm

OPP Pay Surprise “Visit” To Local Woman Who Posted On Freedom Convoy Facebook Page

PETERBOROUGH-A local woman says she is shocked after receiving a surprise visit from Peterborough County OPP on February 10th.

“While I was making dinner there was a knock at my door.” Nadine Ellis-Maffei told Kawartha 411 News. “We live on a farm in the country, so we don’t get too many people knocking on our front door. My daughter thought it may have been a customer that needed something from our farm store.”

The knock on the door was from Peterborough County OPP who explained they were there because of a Facebook post that Ellis-Maffei had made.

She says the only post she can think of is one she had made just a few hours earlier on a Havelock Freedom Convoy group.

“This is the only page I can think of, it’s in regards to a peaceful protest that is happening this weekend. I have family members there I grew up there that’s why someone had shared it with me to become part of that group.” say says “This afternoon I went onto the Facebook group liked the page as well as like some of the posts.”

Ellis-Maffei videotaped part of the conversation. In the video, the officer states she is there simply to provide a pamphlet on “peaceful protests”.

The OPP says this is something police do on occasion.

“Publicly available information is used at times by the Provincial Liason Team (PLT) to identify event organizers for outreach. Proactive contact is one way to help facilitate events that are safe and lawful.” Gosia Puzio, Media Relations & Community Services Coordinator, Central Region Ontario Provincial Police told Kawartha 411 News.

However, a former police officer we spoke to says this is not normal practice and could be illegal.

“This is surveillance. Facebook is a public domain. That’s fair game. But to find where someone lives you would need to use a police database and that’s wrong.” a retired officer, who wanted to remain anonymous, told Kawartha 411 News. “I question the use of MTO, NICHE or CPIC for this.”

The OPP says there was no threat of violence mentioned in the post that prompted the visit. We asked how many other visits like this the OPP has made but did not get an answer to that question.

Ellis-Maffei says she doesn’t blame the officer who was just “doing her job” but she says police brass should be held to account.

“What happened was not right, and it shouldn’t have happened,” says Ellis-Maffei.

“I am in shock, it is unbelievable that this is happening at all.” says the former officer.

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