Maxwell Johnson and his 12-year-old granddaughter Torianne went into a Vancouver bank to set up an account and because the teller questioned their status card.
Richard and Dawn Wilson were shopping in line to buy a shopping cart-load of stuff from a Coquitlam Canadian Tire and allegedly had to undergo a security search in front of a busy store at the checkout counter.
Sharif Mohammed Bhamji went into a Clayton Heights TD Bank with his status card to open an account and was refused. Police later came to his house.
According to Heiltsuk First Nation Chief Marilyn Slett, these are just some of the daily indignities of racial profiling that many First Nations people endure in B.C., just going to the store, to a restaurant, to a bank.
All of these individuals are members of her nation, which is centred in Bella Bella.
"[We] don't want to see things like this happen to our people," Slett said.
Richard and Dawn Wilson had complained to Canadian Tire about the search, which happened in 2020, and after several years of working through the process without much success, filed a human rights complaint with the help of the Heiltsuk First Nation. The case is scheduled to be heard by the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal on Oct. 27.
Slett and the Nation commissioned a report on these types of incidents to include as part of the complaint. The report, released on Thursday (Aug. 14), concluded that this problem of racial profiling in consumer settings is an "everyday occurrence" for many of Canada's Indigenous people.
Slett wants to chart a course to change that includes restorative justice to heal the wounds from past ills.
"Real change can happen, but it has to be in a way that is respectful and respects Indigenous people, and our values and beliefs," she said.
She also said that she has experienced this sort of thing herself.
"It almost feels like it's normalized, because we've all experienced it," she said, giving the example of sitting down at an empty restaurant to celebrate her father's birthday and getting no service for 45 minutes. She ended up leaving. She has also been followed around by store clerks while shopping.
Training and education are needed to stop racial profiling from happening in the first place, but these sorts of incidents also create ill feelings in the community that need to be healed so people can move forward, she said.
"It includes healing ceremonies for when incidents do happen," she said. This would allow Heiltsuk to "move beyond it in a good way based on our cultural values."
So far, the incident involving Maxwell Johnson and his granddaughter at a Bank of Montreal branch in Vancouver resulted in bank executives participating in a "washing ceremony" with Heiltsuk members.
Johnson is a well-known Heiltsuk artist and gifted a painting to the bank after the ceremony. This is part of the process for the Heiltsuk, who call it Ha铆色c铆stut, which translates roughly to 乌鸦传媒渢urn things around and make things right again."
The has yet to participate, Slett said.
She hopes Canadian Tire will be open to this type of healing.
Canadian Tire did not respond to a request for comment for this article.
The report authors, Dr. Lorne Foster of York University and Dr. Les Jacobs of Ontario Tech University, contextualize their study and recommendations by examining Indigenous culture and history in B.C., and focus on the need for Indigenous-specific remedies.
The report makes eight recommendations, including more study of Indigenous-specific consumer racial profiling, a recognition that restorative justice must be part of the process, and the implementation of training and education measures for consumer settings.
B.C.'s Ministry of Attorney General reaffirmed the provincial government's commitment to work alongside Indigenous groups to "dismantle systemic racism" in response to the report.
"The experiences detailed in this report are deeply troubling and serve as a clear reminder that systemic racism is not just a matter of history, but a reality many still face today," the ministry said in an emailed statement. "Racial profiling 乌鸦传媒� whether in stores, banks, or other everyday spaces 乌鸦传媒� is unacceptable."
