In this edition of 10-9 Bicycle Messenger
Radio, We call our good friend Nadir, El Presidente of this year’s CMWC
in Panajachel. We had a pretty good visit and our lucky 7th program has
now been dedicated to shining a light on an incredible individual whose
heart is as big and strong as the story that made him that way.
Regarding Panajachel, Guatemala; He says “with what little you bring is
going to change this community, and with what little this community has
is going to change your life.”
The CMWC2010 Compilation CD has 2 new tracks on this show and is going
to help financially contribute along with other plans that are coming
together to involve the surrounding villages during the Championships,
I mean if you haven’t heard the wonderful making of a movie here, where
an industry (bicycle messengers) come to visit and leave a lasting mark
and set a tempo that will be historic in it’s proportion onto a
community who wants to help us celebrate. The news is beginning to leak
out…
But that is not why we called him, we know he is a great guy, it was to
help our community understand a little more about the man, if you don’t
know him, the if not already infamous legend Nadir Olivet. Come share a
couple minutes with us.
When a cyclist is killed by a driver, justice
is nearly always stacked toward the driver. And in this case in
Toronto, the scales were tilted even more than usual.
By Bob Mionske
On August 31, 2009, the worlds of two strangers collided in the posh
Bloor Street shopping district of Toronto. In the aftermath, one of
those strangers, a bicycle messenger, lay dead, while the other
stranger, the former Attorney General of Ontario and a rising political
star, stood accused of causing the cyclist’s death.
About a year later, on Tuesday, May 25, 2010, Richard Peck, the special
prosecutor appointed to try the case, dropped all charges against
Michael Bryant, the former Attorney General accused of causing the
death of bicycle messenger Darcy Allan Sheppard.
I can’t say I didn’t see this coming.
From the beginning, this case involved more than just an encounter
between a cyclist and a motorist gone awry. As I noted in When
Worlds
Collide , issues of race, class, and power were a subtext to
this case from the moment that Bryant shut off his car’s ignition in
the driveway of a luxury hotel, after fleeing the scene where Darcy
Sheppard lay dying in the street.
An analysis of Richard
Peck’s brief reveals that he relied heavily on
the unchallenged statements of Michael Bryant to come his decision to
drop the charges. Peck cherry picked evidence to support Bryant’s
claims and either suppressed or ignored alternative evidence that
challenged Bryant’s version of the events.
On May 25, 2010, special prosecutor Richard
Peck announced that all charges against former Attorney General Michael
Bryant would be dropped ruling that “there is no reasonable prospect
for conviction in relation to either of the charges before the Court.”
Bryant had been charged with criminal negligence causing death and
dangerous operation of a motor vehicle causing death in relation to the
death of cyclist Darcy Allan (AL) Sheppard after a traffic altercation
on August 31, 2009. Most cases end with the ruling of a judge or jury
but this case ended with the ruling of a single criminal defence lawyer
acting as an independent prosecutor.
Peck released an eleven page brief analyzing some of the evidence and
justifying his decision to drop the charges without a preliminary
hearing of the evidence. His brief answered few questions but also
raised many more.
This is a picture
of my wife’s grandfather, Gordon Mackenzie, as a young Western Union
messenger boy in Dallas circa 1923 (third from left). Gordon died last
year at the age of 96 but was a messenger from the age of 12 to 14.
He’d tell us stories about his Western Union days, and wearing down
three different bicycles while working for the company. His bicycle of
choice was a Pierce-Arrow which was outfitted with a shaft drive
instead of a chain.
The interesting twist to the
story here is that Clyde Barrow also
worked for the Western Union as a bike messenger. Gordon didn’t
remember if they worked together, but considering they were only a year
apart in age, the likelihood is high.
For Kevin Keefe, 57, being a D.C. bicycle courier means one thing:
freedom.
Keefe has been a bike courier for 24 years. He works for Quick
Messenger Service. Bicycling might be his business, but he'll never be
caught behind a desk.
"According to a lot of people, I still haven't grown up!" Keefe said.
Many bicycle couriers like Keefe still make daily rounds in defiance of
the digital age. The Internet may be taking over the messaging market,
but there is still enough business to keep D.C.'s bike couriers
pedaling.
Bicycle couriers often spend rush hour weaving through traffic and
cutting across city parks. Businesses and government offices use them
to move documents and parcels across town.
To those outside the profession, couriers' work might seem dangerous.
"Most friends outside of this job think I'm crazy for doing it, for
biking like an idiot downtown in traffic," said Patrick Peoples, 24, a
courier for LaserShip Inc. "For me, it's a rush."
Couriers work as independent contractors for dispatch services and take
jobs as customers place orders. Dispatchers contact individual couriers
who choose specific deliveries to make.
Each day bicycle messengers are faced with the
challenge of riding through unpredictable traffic to get time sensitive
packages to clients. The Bicycle
Messenger
Emergency
Fund is a 100% volunteer-run, registered
charity (no. 20-0842274) that has been around for a decade. When the
unfortunate day comes where a messenger is injured on the job, the BMEF
aids individuals to lighten the financial burden when they must take
time off to recover properly.
Toronto's Courier Massive is holding its first
annual fundraiser for the BMEF MAY 1st, DUFFERIN GROVE PARK
Polo all weekend 11am to 5pm
Alleycat registration @5pm
Gun goes off @6pm
$10 minimum to enter events
Work on the upcoming CMWC is in full swing, and I’m pleased to report
that we’ve made some significant progress in the last few weeks. Nadir
has just returned from his month long recon mission to Guatemala with
lots of good news.
La Ocho is on! The track was mocked up on the soccer field where it
will be built, and everything fits (see picture on the CMWC home page).
There was some concern, but just to be clear, the mock up was just in
2D for scaling purposes. The final plans still include a bridge across
the middle, and banked turns on both ends. We are still hoping to
source a set of matching bikes, in various sizes, for everyone to ride
on the track, but for now at least, it remains open to whatever you
want to ride. If anyone out there has a dozen or so matching bikes,
holler at me.
Nadir was also able to catalog about 20 hotels that agreed to provide
CMWC participants with significant discounts. There is going to be
ample room for everyone, and the housing situation is looking real
good. Just for example, I’m personally looking at booking a single room
for myself, and I’m seeing really nice stuff for as little as $120 -
$150 per month. Yes, per month. We are currently working on organizing
all of this information, along with tons of other useful travel tips to
be posted on the CMWC site.
After much delay, our new online registration form is finally up and
running! We apologize for the complete sucky-ness of the old form, and
will be contacting everybody already registered to collect a few
additional pieces of information, not on the old form. The new form
allows you to register without having to login or create a user account
(you still have to do that if you want to post to our blog page, and
eventually to our photo/video gallery pages). It is pretty straight
forward, but just to be clear, we are only accepting paid
registrations. Unless you click the pay button, your registration form
will not go through. Coming very soon, will be a viewable list of
registered competitors. As of now, that list is disappointingly short.
I am hoping that along with the improvements we made, and a few planned
registration incentives, that will change.
Registration incentives: We need people to register! The fact of the
matter is that the CMWC has always primarily been funded by the money
generated from registration. The dilemma is always how to get people to
register early enough so that the organizers have the money they need
before the event, when it is most needed. With that in mind, please
note that the early registration price of $80 goes up to $100 on April
15th and again to $120 on August 15th. A couple of ideas we are
floating around is holding a series of raffles for early registrants,
and the chance to customize the hand made mussette bag your race packet
will be coming in. The details are not yet finalized, but basically we
are planning to raffle off 3 messenger bags, the earlier you register,
the more chances you will have to win one of the bags. Stay tuned! As
the mussette bags are being hand sewn for us in Guatemala, we will be
offering early registrants the opportunity to customize their bags with
their race
r number and perhaps even their name (if it fits). We’ll have to
determine what the cut-off dates for that will be, as well as for
inclusion in the phone directory (all racers will get a pre-paid mobile
phone with registration that not only will keep everyone connected, but
will also be used during the Main Race).
President
Obama’s budget for the 2011 fiscal year (which begins October 1) seeks
to limit widespread abuses by employers who misclassify employees as
independent contractors in order to evade their responsibilities.
In a video chat, Labor Department Secretary Hilda Solis noted that a
budget is much more than numbers. It “is an expression of the
department’s priorities.” Solis was clear that one of the Labor
Department’s top priorities will be the independent contractor issue.
As part of the 2011 Budget, the Departments of Labor and Treasury are
pursuing a joint proposal that eliminates incentives in law for
employers to misclassify their employees; enhances the ability of both
agencies to penalize employers who misclassify; and restores
protections to employees who have been denied them because of their
improper classification.
The Labor department would receive about $25 million and 100 additional
enforcement personnel to work in support of a new “multi-agency
initiative to dramatically strengthen and coordinate federal and state
efforts to address employer misclassification of workers. “
Jane Oates, assistant secretary of the Employment and Training
Administration said that “the goal is to improve capacity to identify
misclassification through increased information sharing and targeted
audits in high-risk industry sectors. These efforts will prevent
misclassification, increase statutory enforcement where appropriate,
and enable collection of payroll taxes previously lost due to
misclassification, such as in the Unemployment Insurance program.”
On August 31,
2009, former attorney general for Ontario, Michael Bryant, killed
cyclist Darcy Allan Sheppard in one of the most violent and horrific
cases of road rage in Toronto's history.
Neither Michael Bryant nor his wife, entertainment lawyer Susan
Abramovitch, gave statements to police regarding the circumstances that
led to Darcy Allan Sheppard’s death. They will have many months to
tailor their testimonies to fit the known evidence and weave it
seamlessly into a vigorous defense mounted by one of the most elite
criminal lawyers in the country.
Bryant’s victim, Darcy Allan Sheppard, who was known as Al to his
friends, will not have a voice at the trial. He will not have an
opportunity to challenge Michael Bryant’s carefully scripted and
rehearsed testimony. He will not have a chance to correct Bryant's
devoted wife and an experienced lawyer when she unconditionally
supports her husband of twelve years on the witness stand.
Al’s voice needs to be heard. It's important that people have an
opportunity to understand his life's last moments. Al could have been
any one of us. He just happened to be the cyclist who crossed paths
with a driver on the verge of a road rage meltdown.
I have attempted to rebuild those last moments of Al's life from his
point of view. All of the events are based on the factual evidence
contained in security camera video, witness statements and news
reports. Al's point of view is also primarily based on the factual
evidence as well as my own experiences as a bike messenger and cyclist.
Toronto like
most cities has a massive problem with bike theft and many of its
victims are bike messengers. The possibility of having my bike stolen
is always in the back my mind whenever my bike is out of my sight and
every time I walk out of a building I am relieved to see my bike still
there.
For years most cyclists in Toronto suspected that Igor Kenk, owner of a
notorious used bike store on Queen Street West, played a part in the
stolen bike racket. Anyone that had their bike stolen was first advised
to go and check out "Igor's bike shop" on Queen Street just east of
Strachan. Despite what was common knowledge amongst Toronto’s cyclists,
it appeared that Igor would never be held accountable for his sketchy
dealings with stolen bikes.
I first met Igor
in 1993 when his shop was located further west on Queen St between Shaw
and Ossington, across from the Queen Street Mental Health Centre. At
the time I was living on Shaw Street, a little south of Queen Street
and I just started working as a bike messenger. I was happy to have a
bike shop nearby, especially one that was often open as late as
midnight.
Bicycle
Coalition
of
Philadelphia,
December
4,
2009
City Council
received an overwhelming response to the proposed bicycle legislation
and they are listening and responding to our concerns. We have been
assured that there will be no action on the two bills for the time
being and we do not believe the two bills can pass City Council in
their present form.
In an opinion-editorial that should appear next week, Councilman
DiCicco writes that he was surprised at the "passionate and emotional"
response to his registration bill. Recognizing problems with
enforcement and that the "fee structure may be onerous," Councilman
DiCicco states that his proposal "is not the be-all and end-all in
dealing with bicycle safety" and that the registration bill "may need
to be abandoned altogether."
All of the
attention the bills have generated may actually result in a positive
for bicyclists. We met this week with Police Commissioner Ramsey's
staff to discuss how the city can better enforce existing traffic laws
equitably on motorists, bicyclists, and pedestrians to calm our city's
streets and make them safer for everyone.
A few days after one of their own suffered serious facial injuries in a
hit-and-run crash, city bicycle messengers upset with what one courier
describes as "rising anti-cycling sentiment" are rallying at LOVE Park
this evening.
Rachel Fletcher, a 30-year-old experienced and well-known Center City
courier, was struck at 23rd and Locusts Streets early Thanksgiving
morning and remained at Hahnemann Hospital until Saturday after surgery
to repair her face and jaw.
Despite the severity of the crash, police did not take a report until
12 hours later Thursday, which some in the bicycling community said
yesterday is part of a culture in Philadelphia that treats cyclists as
less important on streets than cars. A sergeant at the Ninth District
declined to comment on the incident last night, citing an ongoing
investigation.
The number of bike couriers zipping around Ottawa has plummeted in the
past two decades, and those hanging on to their two-wheeling careers
are blaming technology for the demise of their kind.
"The first thing that affected our business was the fax," said veteran
Ottawa courier Eric Moisan Tuesday as he paused for a break outside the
World Exchange Plaza in downtown Ottawa, "Then the internet ate up a
chunk of our business."
When Gary Watson first started working as a courier 20 years ago, there
were around 100 couriers dashing through the city's streets. Now, local
couriers estimate there are only around 20.
The nature of the deliveries made by couriers has also changed, he
said, without pausing to take off his helmet and drybag backpack.
Cyclist takes city
to labour board, claiming roads are unsafe workplace for those who bike
for a living
Toronto Star, November 24, 2009
Ten years ago,
bike courier Wayne Scott won an epic battle against Revenue Canada. His
arguments persuaded the Federal Court of Appeal to rule that bike
couriers could claim food as a fuel expense on their tax returns.
Now Scott is taking the city to the Ontario Labour Relations Board,
claiming Toronto's streets constitute an unsafe workplace for those who
cycle on the job. Three months after former Ontario attorney general
Michael Bryant was charged in the death of bike courier Darcy Allan
Sheppard, Scott is asking the board to force Toronto to make its
streets safer.
He wants the city to study the dangers on its roads and address the
problems with better street design, enforcement of traffic rules and
more bike lanes, within two years.
Scott, a once and future federal Green Party candidate, says the city
has failed to apply the provisions of the Occupational Health and
Safety Act, which says employers must take reasonable precautions to
protect their workers. On Monday, city officials said they didn't know
how many employees use bikes on the job, but police, EMS workers and
bylaw officers are among those who cycle on duty.
They run the same risk as any cyclist or bike courier of having a car
door opened suddenly in their path or being hit at an intersection.
That's because the rules of the road are poorly enforced and the city
is years behind on completing its own bike plan, contends Scott, who
retired from the courier business about four years ago.
The tragic death of Toronto bike messenger,
Darcy Allan Sheppard and the resulting charges faced by Michael Bryant
highlights the risks cyclists endure on our roads and the challenge all
road users cope with sharing our streets. But this is not an unfamiliar
situation for Toronto. Cyclists and motorists have confronted these
challenges for at least a hundred years with little progress.
Seventy-five years ago, in 1934, another Toronto bike messenger was the
victim of a selfish and negligent driver whose only concern was
himself. Similarly to Michael Bryant, the killer from long ago employed
advocates to construct a narrative that blamed the dead victim.
Downtown Toronto streets in the 1930’s were not much different than
today. The glory days of cars from the 1950’s through the 1970’s were
yet to come. Cyclists, pedestrians, motorists and streetcars shared the
roads and cyclists were well represented in the mix.
The streets were filled with hundreds of bicycle messengers too. They
worked for telegraph companies, courier companies, department stores
and drug stores. In 1937, the Tamblyn Drug Store chain boasted of
employing over 300 Toronto bicycle messengers in their drug stores
alone.
The case of the road rage killing of Toronto bike messenger, Darcy
Allan Sheppard by former attorney general Michael Bryant has many
similarities to the murder of another bike messenger, ten years earlier.
Sheppard was killed on August 31, 2009 after Bryant deliberately rammed
his car into him knocking Sheppard to the ground. Before mowing
Sheppard down, Bryant had threatened him twice by accelerating his car
up close to Sheppard and then stopping without hitting him. After the
initial attack Bryant attempted to flee the scene on the wrong side of
the road with Sheppard holding on to Bryant’s vehicle. Bryant killed
Sheppard by smashing him into trees, a mailbox and fire hydrant before
driving away.
On the morning of April 26, 1999, Thomas McBride was riding eastbound
on West Washington on his way to work as a bike messenger in the
Chicago Loop. Witnesses reported a near miss or minor altercation
between McBride and the driver of a green 1997 Chevy Tahoe.
The SUV, driven by Carnell Fitzpatrick, cut McBride off after running a
stop sign. McBride slammed his hand against the SUV as a means of
alerting the driver to his location and that Fitzpatrick was coming
perilously close to hitting him. The two exchanged words and
Fitzpatrick like Michael Bryant steered his vehicle up close behind the
cyclist before accelerating forward to deliberately hit him.
Lawyer Michael Cochrane wrote a piece in The
Mark advocating the acquittal of Michael Bryant in the killing of Darcy
Allan Sheppard. The problem with reading anything written by lawyers is
that they sometimes cherry pick the facts and set up flimsy
straw men to knock over.
After examining Cochrane’s facts, the public would be better served by
listing all of evidence and facts:
Bryant was driving home with his wife
from an anniversary celebration, through an area under construction on
Bloor Street. As he stopped at a red light Sheppard passed him
and stopped his bicycle in front of Bryant’s car.
While stopped, angry words were
exchanged with Sheppard. Video evidence shows that Bryant deliberately
rammed his car into Sheppard knocking him to the ground.
It’s unknown if either Sheppard or
Bryant were impaired. Police say Sheppard had been drinking that day
but that he was not impaired. Bryant was celebrating his 12th wedding
anniversary. We will find out if Sheppard was impaired as his body
underwent toxicology tests. We will never know if Bryant was impaired
as police never submitted him to a breathalyser test.
After getting slammed by Bryant’s car
Sheppard hit Bryant’s car with his backpack.
After ramming into Sheppard Bryant
reversed his car and tried to drive around Sheppard and flee the scene.
Sheppard grabbed on to Bryant’s car in an attempt to prevent Bryant
from leaving the scene of the accident.
According to eyewitnesses, Bryant then
sped away at about 90 km/hr on the wrong side of the road. He mounted
the curb and intentionally drove into obstacles to knock Sheppard off
his car.
Bryant’s reckless driving caused
Sheppard to smash into a mailbox, fire hydrant and other solid
obstacles until he could no longer hold on and fell. Bryant ran over
Sheppard with his rear wheels as Sheppard lay bleeding and battered on
the ground. Bryant once again fled and Sheppard died.
What would a reasonable person in Bryant’s
situation have done? Would a reasonable person deliberately ram
their car into a vulnerable cyclist? Did Bryant have control of his
car? Even if Sheppard somehow could control the steering of the car
while hanging on for dear life, Bryant still controlled the car. Bryant
controlled the acceleration and brake pedals. He controlled the car’s
speed.
Based on the facts currently available, a reasonable person would come
to the conclusion beyond any reasonable doubt that Michael Bryant
is guilty.
Project Green: Bike couriers are
inexpensive, quick, and eco-friendly
WHAS11, Louisville, Kentucky
In many big cities, bike messengers are part of the street scenery
dodging traffic to make deliveries from one company to another.
They serve a business purpose, but they're also part of the charge to
'go green' and in this week's Project Green, they want the rest of us
to join in.
First thing in the morning the phones start ringing at the Bike
Courier’s Bike Shop, Louisville businesses are calling with deliveries
they need made.
Couriers at the Bike Shop on West Market get on their bikes and head
out.
“The alternative is to put an 8 ounce letter in a car and send that car
halfway across town to deliver an 8 ounce letter. It doesn't make
sense,” said Jackie Green, co-owner of the Bike Couriers Bike Shop.
Green began the messenger service 8 years ago as an
environmentally-friendly alternative to traditional business delivery.
“It reduces congestion, it calms traffic, it minimizes the, well, it
practically eliminates fuel consumption,” said Green.
WHAS11 followed one of the couriers as he easily navigated his way down
clogged streets on a morning run.
“We like to use them because its environmentally friendly and they're
so friendly,” said Katie Coulter of Coulter Reporting.
But being a bike courier can be dangerous. Bike courier Daniel Penrod
said, “as long as you're careful about it and you just try to be, have
some personal responsibility about the whole thing, it’s really not
that bad. You've just got to be careful.”
Couriers say they're being used more in the downtown district and as
increasing businesses and residents re-locate there, they see cycling
as an easy way many of us can "go green."
“Green depending on the context and circumstances and this is an
alternative we need to be exploring as a city,” said Green.
And bike deliveries are cheap, too. The average delivery costs
companies $6 and takes about 15 to 30 minutes.
The International Federation of
Bike Messenger Associations (IFBMA) is
pleased to announce that Zurich messenger Luk Keller has been awarded
the 2009 "Markus
Cook Memorial Award" (MCA) for Services to the
International Messenger Community. The IFBMA has awarded the Markus
Cook Award (MCA) since 1998 to the person who has inspired and
empowered the wider messenger community, and who put all messengers
before themselves.
For over ten years messengers around the world have benefited from
Luk’s commitment to community. He was one of the organizers of one the
most influential Cycle Messenger World Championships, CMWC 1999, the
race that brought “Goldsprint” roller racing to the international
messenger community. Luk has also been a driver behind many other major
events such as the Swiss Messenger Championships and the X Days Side
Show.
But Luk is much more than an ordinary race organizer. Human Powered
Rollercoaster champion, Dirk Dijkhuis notes that Luk
“organizes races to
benefit other people.”
Nothing demonstrates that more than the annual Global Gutz benefit race
which was created by Luk and others in 2000. Global Gutz is a race that
occurs simultaneously around the world so that messengers can race
against the each other without leaving their city. Funds raised from
the
race are used to send the winners to the current year’s CMWC. The base
for Global Gutz organizing has passed around the world over the years,
returning to Zurich this year as Luk took the reigns of organization
once again in 2009.
After a very successful CMWC 2009 in Tokyo. The Tokyo Bike Messenger
Association (TKBMA) found themselves about $34,000 in debt. Luk
stepped forward to again to benefit others. He announced the “Tokyo
Fundraiser Cup” which challenged messenger communities to organize
local fundraisers to help erase the TKBMA’s debt. The city
that raises the most money will receive a trophy as the most supportive
city and two free registrations for the 2010 Cycle Messenger World
Championships in Panajachel Guatemala.
As fellow 2009 Markus
Cook Award nominee, Steve Froehlich said, this year has once again
shown the world that, Luk "is the spirit of our community."
Province
takes
a
pass
on
health
and
safety
for
bike
couriers
facing
daily
road
risks
Now Magazine,
October 14, 2009
By Wayne Scott
Toronto’s world renowned more than century old human-powered delivery
industry is ailing.
Battered further by the horrific demise of much missed bike messenger
Darcy Allan Sheppard, it seems now to have reached a new ebb in its
storied history.
A dozen years after Canada began working in earnest on a Sustainable
Transportation Strategy, the busiest streets of the nation’s most
congested urban centre are still clogged with more and more huge,
motorized (often illegally parked) courier and postal cube vans when
the number of active transportation workers continues to dwindle.
The reasons as to why won’t soon be publicly addressed.
A complaint I filed over a year ago with the Health and Safety branch
of the Ministry of Labour – that our streets are an unnecessarily
unsafe workplace for occupational cyclists – has been dismissed.
It’s 10 a.m.
and Ted Webb weaves through traffic in downtown Toronto. He jumps the
green light, hugging the curb as he makes a tight right hand turn. A
slow cyclist putters along in the bike lane. He quickly passes them.
Webb has five minutes to deliver a bulky envelope to Bay and Queen
Street, if late; he has an angry client and dispatcher to worry about.
He races down University Avenue, overtaking taxis and family sedans.
Now on Queen Street, he brushes shoulders with a moving streetcar,
nearly knocking him off his bicycle. Aware of perilous parked cars,
Webb dodges a car door that flings open in front of him. With a minute
to spare, he delivers the package to the receptionist.
All of this for $3.
As a bike courier, Webb’s weekly pay cheques would amount to around
$200 for 50 hours worked. He lived on these wages for an entire year
before he quit in October 2008.
Toronto - 230909 // The Toronto Bike
Messenger Association (TOBMA) has called a press conference for
this Friday at 2:00 pm. They want to speak ahead of their Saturday,
September 26 evening memorial celebration to raise money for the
children of Darcy Allan Sheppard, and help his family pay for his
burial.
Since the cyclist lost his life in a high-profile accident with Michael
Bryant on August 31, TOBMA has chosen to remain silent, making no
“official statements” until emotions had calmed. In that time, major
media including Maclean’s, Globe & Mail and the Toronto Star have
featured articles
damning the life, personality and background of their co-worker Al
Sheppard.
MORE:
Read the letter - http://www.tinyurl.com/allans-family-
(pdf)
handed
"To
Allan's
Family"
by
a
stranger
at
his
memorial
service.
It
shares
a
touching
story
from
a
woman
who
had
crossed
paths
with
Al
Sheppard
many
times
before
his
death
The night of August 31, Darcy Allan Sheppard
was on his bike on Bloor Street, riding home from his fiancee’s
apartment. It was 9:45 p.m. As he approached a traffic light, he passed
to the left of a Saab convertible that we now know was Michael
Bryant’s. After passing Bryant, who was stopped at the light, Sheppard
cut in front of his car and also came to a stop. Shortly thereafter, as
the light turned green, Bryant drove forward, perhaps bumping
Sheppard’s wheel. Sheppard turned his head back, in Bryant’s direction.
Witnesses reported that when the light turned green, there was a toot
of the horn from Bryant, and a shout to “get moving,”
followed—perhaps—by a return shout from Sheppard. Then, incredibly,
Bryant hit the gas, pushing Sheppard forward into the intersection,
knocking him off his bike. As Sheppard struggled to get to his feet,
Bryant backed up, stopped, turned his wheel and began to drive past
Sheppard as he sped away.
Sheppard gave chase, grabbing onto Bryant’s car as it sped by.
Witnesses reported hearing shouting, and noted that Bryant was “very,
very angry.” They also reported that as Bryant sped down the street
with Sheppard clinging to his car, he was driving on the wrong side of
the street, at about 60 miles per hour, driving up onto the sidewalk,
driving against the trees and posts and newspaper boxes lining the
street in what they reported appeared to be an attempt to brush
Sheppard off his car. Down the street 100 yards, Sheppard was slammed
into a mail collection box, and crumpled into a heap in the street as
Bryant’s rear wheels ran over him. Witnesses reported that Sheppard,
who lay in the street bleeding heavily from his nose and mouth,
attempted to get up, but was advised to remain still until an ambulance
arrived. Bryant continued driving down the street to the end of the
block, before turning in to the driveway of a luxury hotel, where he
finally stopped his car.
After killing Darcy Allan Sheppard,
Michael Bryant immediately called
his lawyer and then his PR firm Navigator Ltd. He held his first news
conference as he stepped out of the police station the next morning.
Other than his resignation letter from Invest Toronto we haven’t heard
from him, even though it sounded like the PR plan was for further
statements.
Navigator Limited senior partner Robin
Sears confirmed Mr. Bryant had
retained the top-tier communications firm. He said Mr. Bryant will
speak publicly again in the coming days.
- Globe
and
Mail,
September
3,
2009
Perhaps the exposure of Navigator as the
source of speculation set them back or perhaps Bryant does have a side
to the story.
To see it best watch it in high quality on full screen
From the video
description:
This
is security camera footage edited in the time sequence according to
eyewitness accounts from August 31, 2009 9:45pm Eyewitness
accounts
are
avaible
here There may be gaps of time between the
available footage.
Security camera shows Bryant repeatedly charging Sheppard with his car
and running the bike down, throwing Sheppard over the hood. (@ Bay and
Bloor)
Car backs away from a bike and man getting up from the ground. The car
accelerates away, driving past the man who runs down the street
after/beside the car as it passes him. The bike is left behind.
Car drives speeds down the street on the wrong side.
Bryant leaves the scene of the killing and is apprehended, apparently
1hr 45 minutes later. Questions remain about the intervening time. His
second phone call after the accident was to the PR firm Navigator:
www.navltd.com
Update: Below
is improved footage of Bryant deliberately ramming into Sheppard
Michaels
Bryant’s killing of Allan Sheppard has garnered a vast amount of media
attention but how much of the media coverage is generated by Bryant’s
PR firm. Rick Salutin of the Globe and Mail
reports on the PR campaign to contoll the media message.
Salutin reports that Bryant's
second phone call in custody
was to hire the PR firm. From that moment the facts of the story have
been crafted by those employed by Bryant.
Remember Bryant is a skilled
politician with ten years of
experience in holding press conferences, public self-promotion and
political campaigns. And that's what this story is turning into -
political campaign by Bryant and his PR firm, only in this campaign the
"opponent" is dead.
Another aspect of Bryant's campaign is to flood the media with
speculation, rumour and in some cases outright lies. The Globe asks:
When a
news story says, “We have new information from a source …” is that
source Navigator? Or someone egged on by Navigator? We won't know
because Navigator “prefers to be inconspicuous.”
Reporters talking to them have to agree
that everything is off the record.
Former Ontario attorney-general Michael Bryant was charged Tuesday with
criminal negligence causing death and dangerous operation of a motor
vehicle causing death in relation to the violent road rage death of
bike messenger Darcy Allan (AL) Sheppard after a traffic altercation on
August 31.
It was a senseless and tragic event that in a few short moments altered
the lives of many, leaving one young man dead.
On August 31, around 9:45 pm Bryant
was driving his sports car along Bloor Street. Finding himself behind a
cyclist, Bryant reportedly grew impatient. Witnesses report an angry
Bryant honked his horn and shouted at Sheppard to get moving.
Unsatisfied with Sheppard’s response, Bryant edged forward
intentionally hitting Sheppard’s bike. Sheppard then allegedly
dismounted his bike and walked over to confront the shouting Bryant.
As the confrontation escalated, Sheppard grabbed hold of the door or
mirror of Bryant’s car and Bryant sped off, tires squealing, with
Sheppard holding on for his life as Bryant dragged him through the
street.
Construction workers reported Bryant veering his car into oncoming
traffic and mounting the sidewalk several times in an attempt to throw
Sheppard off the car at high speeds.
One of the workers said Bryant was “yelling pretty loud and he sounded
very, very angry.” The other worker said, “He meant to knock him off.”
Another witness said, "The driver was going so fast that at one point
the biker was holding on to his car and there were sparks coming from
the bottom of his shoes."
Three players sit tall in their saddles at each end of the tennis
court, staring down their opponents. An orange ball rests on a yellow
line at centre court. “Three, two, one — go!”
A lead player from each team charges toward the ball, swinging a mallet
fashioned out of an old ski pole and plastic tubing. It is a Sunday
afternoon in an Ottawa park and the six riders are playing polo — on
bikes.
It’s not uncommon to spot polo players on bicycles at the court at Ev
Tremblay Park, just west of Preston Street.
Three days a week, members of the Ottawa bike polo club, Mallets of
Mayhem, many of whom work as bicycle messengers, gather to practise
skills and play a pick-up game.
Bank of Ireland Business Banking announces,
today, Tuesday 24 March 2009, the four finalists selected to the take
part in the Dublin final of its 'Bright Ideas Challenge' which takes
place on Wednesday 25 March from 4.00-9.30pm in the Stillorgan Park
Hotel in Dublin. The four selected companies for the Dublin final of
the competition are ASimil8, which is based at NovaUCD, iFoods, Trezur
and Velocity Couriers who will present to a panel of judges and a
public audience on the day. The final will form part of the Bank's
first Business Advice Show during the Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown Enterprise
Week.
Held in conjunction with the City & County Enterprise Boards the
'Bright Ideas Challenge' aims to encourage and support both innovation
and enterprise in business start-ups, SMEs and individuals who are in
the beginning of early stages of development. The chosen winner will
receive a cash prize of €5,000, along with a mentoring and training
package from the associated County Enterprise Board valued at €5,000.
They will also go forward to the national final of the Bright Ideas
Challenge in early 2010 with the opportunity to win another attractive
investment package.
Couriers pointed to a unique vulnerability due to exposure to both the
ground-level ozone and particulate matter present in smog and to
exposure to
peek levels of pollution together with long-term exposure to non peak
levels.
“Bicycle couriers work all day, year round in the midst of smog. Our
lungs have minimal opportunity to recover from the effects of polluted
air. We are chronically exposed to high doses of dangerously polluted
air for long term, extended periods of time.”
The athletic nature of the profession requires messengers to “spend
more time outdoors, breathe faster and engage in vigorous physical
activity.”
This danger to couriers is exacerbated by the location of the athletic
activity which means that a bike courier’s “lungs are not more than
about 10 feet from an exhaust pipe for most of the day.”
Since the release of “Choking us to death,” many studies have confirmed
couriers’ concerns.
Strong, brave, fast and free. No wonder we
admire messengers and their style
For years
civilians have watched and immitated the functional fashion of bike
messengers. From bags to clothing to accessories the bike messenger's
influence on urban lifestyle continues to grow. Why?
Jeffrey Kidder's paper in the Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, "Style and Action: A Decoding of Bike
Messenger Symbols" concludes that "messenger style is intertwined
with messenger practice." The marriage of style of and function lends
an authenticity to messenger style. And it's a piece of this
authenticity that civilians seek in their immitation of messengers.
In the introduction to the photography book, "Messengers Style", Valerie Steele,
Chief Curator of the Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology,
notes that "when high fashion draws on street style, it’s not only
because there is something special about the clothes. It is the
lifestyle and attitude associated with subcultural clothing styles
which attracts attention. Sometimes straight people want to live the
life."
Everywhere you look the media is hyping some new aspect of messenger
culture as the next big thing. And they may be right. Messenger culture
and its youth oriented styles, street edge and outlaw image has been
making inroads into the mainstream since the first Cycle
Messenger
World
Championships
(CMWC) in 1993 in Berlin Germany.
Since then messenger bags have become the accessory of choice for
office workers and students.
And now recently many urban cyclists have started trading in their city
mountain bikes for the fixed gear bikes associated with bike
messengers. They even refer to messenger events as part of their “fixed
gear culture.” Stylist John Steinberg describes messengers
as being “ahead of their
time.” He says “They’ve got that edge. You see something on a courier.
Maybe in a year later it will hit the mainstream. They’re slick.
They’re cool. For want of a better word, they’re cool. The real world
for them is cool.” More....
