Black Hamilton council candidate’s advertisement vandalized with white supremacist poster amid rise in hate crime

Hamilton | Community | Crime | Latest News | Politics |

By

Published October 11, 2022 at 10:23 pm

This poster for a white supremacist group was stuck to a Black Hamilton council candidate's ad. - Via Cadence Weapon.

Editor’s note: The following story contains descriptions and videos of alleged hate crimes and incidents that may be distressing.

A Hamilton ward councillor candidate has had his poster vandalized with a poster in support of a white supremacist movement, leading to a police investigation.

The candidate for Ward 14, Kojo “Easy” Damptey, is a Black man born in Ghana who immigrated to Hamilton at age 17. After his graduation from McMaster, he settled in the Falkirk area in Ward 14. In the 21 years since coming to Hamilton, Damptey has worked “change-maker, community builder, civic leader, musician, and educator.”

Damptey’s campaign, which was announced back in July, discovered one of their posters in a bus shelter at Upper Paradise and Mohawk Rd. W had been vandalized with a white supremacist sticker on October 10.

The sticker, placed squarely on Damptey’s nose, shows two white people surrounded by “White lives matter…Time to take a stand.” Beneath the pair is a link to an account on Telegram, a social media platform the Anti-Defamation League describes as a “safe haven” for far-right extremists such as white supremacists and Neo-Nazis.

The Telegram page describes this organization as an “initiative that furthers the interests of White Children through real-life action.” The evocation of “white children” is common among white supremacist, neo-Nazi, alt-right and skinhead movements.

The infamous white supremacist slogan, the Fourteen Words, concludes with the phrase, “secure a future for white children,” and has long-been a rallying cry for white supremacists.

This slogan was coined by David Lane, member of the supremacist groups The Order and the Klu Klux Klan, while in prison on a 190-year sentence for his involvement in the murder of Jewish talk show host Alan Berg in 1984.

The poster, once discovered, provoked widespread condemnation. Damptey himself, on his arrival, said “the bus ad is going to stay standing regardless of what people say.”

“The campaign ad…was vandalized with anti-Black racism and hate posters,” Damptey continued in a later live-stream. He thanked the community members how found the poster and removed it. The poster left behind some residue and Damptey pledged to clean it off.

“While we clean this sign up, this is a reminder of the things that are wrong with Hamilton and Canada. Where a bus ad has been put there to provide everyone in Ward 14 about an election…and someone or some group of people take the time to put up anti-Black and white supremacist messages.”

“This speaks to some of the things we’ve been trying to bring attention to in this city,” Damptey continued, “Anti-Black racism, transphobia, xenophobia, Islamophobia. These are the things we’ve been talking about for years in this city.”

“This is a despicable act, but we’re here. We’ve cleaned it up. The message is buck up. Whatever those individuals continue to do, we will stand up against their hateful message.”

The vandalism as been sent to Hamilton Police Service, who are investigating the sticker as a hate crime.

The campaign as a whole has been something of a lightning rod for white grievance. A noted white supremacist with ties to the Ku Klux Klan and other groups, Paul Fromm, is running for mayor, though he has been excluded from televised debates.

Additionally, a lower-tier candidate, “stop woke” School Board nominee Catharine Kronas, has promoted the so-called “benefits of colonialism” and the belief white people are the real victims of racism.

These incidents come amid a steep rise in hate incidents and hate crime in Hamilton over the past few years. In April, Hamilton Police Service reported they saw a 35 per cent jump in reported hate crime in 2021.

While hate incidents are under-reported, Hamilton police reported a 108 incidents last year up from 80 incidents in 2020. These reported incidents resulted in 20 criminal charges, up from eight the year before.

Racial bias was the second most-common motive of these incidents, with Black Hamiltonians targeted in nearly a third of all reports.

Since then numerous other incidents have been put under investigation this year.

In May, two schools were vandalized “with graffiti that contained racist and homophobic language,” including damage to the a nearby Pride crosswalk. The next day someone spray painted swastikas and white supremacist slogans on the Hamilton Farmers Market.

Later in August, Hamilton police were informed of a transphobic tirade on a city bus after a video of the attack went viral. A man sitting on the bus filmed himself, harassing two others mocking them with Gay stereotypes and hurling several transphobic and ableist comments.

As the victim holds their ground, the man gets increasingly hostile and threatening, eventually shaking his fist in the victim’s face. Christopher Pretula, 41 of Hamilton, was later charged with assault and uttering threats.

A road rage incident in the city went viral later that month when a driver got out of his car to argue with another driver, and directed the N-word at the other driver’s wife. The man was fired from his job at Hamilton Health Sciences but police did not lay charges.

Most recently, Hamilton’s Jewish community was targeted in two incidents in September, through anti-Semitic graffiti on September 4, and a break-in on September 9.

While Hamilton police continue to investigate these incidents, they too have been accused of racism through excessive force. The violent beating and arrest of Patrick Tomchuk, an Indigenous man, occurred in May.

Tomchuk was tackled to the ground and repeatedly kicked in the head by an officer, according to video of the arrest that emerged in court in August. Cst. Brian Wren has been suspended pending an assault charge.

Mere months later on October 4, Hamilton police came under criticism again after they tasered Marcus Charles, a 27-year-old Black man. The officer had responded to a medical distress call at a local Canadian Tire, where Charles worked.

Charles suffered an epileptic seizure and called paramedics. They in turn called police who claimed they were brought in because Charles had grown “combative.”

Anyone with information about these crimes and incidents can call Hamilton Police at 905-546-4925, or Crime Stoppers anonymously at 1 800-222-8477. 

insauga's Editorial Standards and Policies advertising