York police say dashcam footage paints different picture of Markham crossing guard incident

York Regional Police say dash cam video they have obtained shows there is more to the incident between an off-duty officer and a crossing guard in Markham than what was originally reported.

On Oct. 9, 70-year-old crossing guard Muhammed Hameed was working just outside Mount Joy Public School when he said a vehicle kept going, even after he raised his sign signalling the vehicle to stop.

“I banged on the vehicle to stop because children are crossing there in front, but nothing happened,” Hameed told Global News.

Witnesses at the time said the driver eventually came to a stop and the passenger hopped out of his vehicle and approached Hameed.

Hameed said the passenger, who was an off-duty Toronto police officer, grabbed him, pulled his collar up, tore his vest off and pushed him across the road.

Cellphone video shared with Global News showed the off-duty Toronto police officer holding Hameed against a vehicle as witnesses behind the camera protested the arrest. Hameed was arrested but was eventually released without charges.

York police said that during the course of their investigation into the incident, other dash cam video was discovered that painted a different picture of the situation.

“We know that there are certain elements that have been out into the public and that people have seen portions of this and not gotten the full story,” Const. Laura Nicolle told Global News on Monday. Police said the video they obtained showed the vehicle did come to a complete stop and the off-duty officer made a lawful arrest.

However, that video will not be made public.

“When an investigation is concluded and we are not laying charges, we are not seeking additional suspects, it would be irresponsible for us to start to release evidence or paint anyone in terms of an offence when we are not laying charges to corroborate that,” Nicolle said.

Hameed told Global News on Monday that as a result of the incident, he now feels like a “criminal.” His daughter, Safra Najeemudeen, said she is disappointed the investigation by police did not highlight the behaviour of the officer, which she deemed “unacceptable.”

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“If you co-operate with an arrest, you do not expect to be assaulted and this was assault,” Najeemudeen said. “The fact is that we are just allowing police to behave violently, aggressively. Even if he did something wrong, but the fact is that that behaviour is not OK, it shouldn’t be OK.”

Hameed defended his actions that day, questioning why, if the vehicle was parked, would he have proceeded to bang on it?

“It’s 8:10 in the morning, 8:15 school starts and they are telling me no one is crossing?” he said.

“What is more important, a human life or a vehicle? After something happens, it’s too late, I don’t want it to happen.”

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Hameed has not returned to work since the incident. He said he loves his job but if he can’t be a crossing guard without fear of arrest for attempting to protect the children, he doesn’t want to do it at all.