“They were going to release us until this one cop came and saw that we had the legal number written on our arms. She then said that we were elegible for arrest.”

On sunday morning my boyfriend and i, from ottawa, were sitting in queen’s park waiting for some friends. There were groups of 10 cops or more at every street corner on college st. We had previously been searched and got our goggles taken away so we decided to sit in the park to avoid other confrontations with the police. 5 minutes into sitting in the park a group of cops on bikes came over and searched us again. They were going to release us until this one cop came and saw that we had the legal number written on our arms. She then said that we were elegible for arrest. We got cuffed with twist ties and brought into patty wagons where we spent maybe an hour and a half to 2 hours in waiting without anyone telling us what was going on. Then we got to the detention center and we were separated since we are different genders. We were put into cages and fed cheese and margerine sandwiches every 6 hours maybe and a tiny glass of water. The cops were emotionaly abusing most of the girls calling us all lesbians and making fun of the way people looked. It was freezing in there the air conditioning was blasted and they didn’t have enough warm clothing for all of us. Some people got t-shirts some people got sweaters and some people got pants but not too many people. I didn’t get any sleep at all since it was so cold on the concrete floor. They also wern’t letting people get their medicine or make phone calls. Friends and family were left wondering where i was. After being there for well over 20 hours I was strip searched and let go maybe an hour later. My boyfriend and a few other guys had to get it twice. Some people were detained in there for over 24 hours and some people even 48 hours! I was released at around 1:30 on monday afternoon and I was all alone in toronto. I didn’t know where my boyfriend was. I had no idea if he was still in jail or in court or maybe somewhere lost in toronto. We were suposed to get a bus free of charge on sunday evening at 5 but we were being detained so we couldn’t get it. Luckily our friend came to get us because we had no money or anything to get back to ottawa.