Pubdate: Thu, 13 May 2004
Source: Barrie Examiner (CN ON)
Copyright: 2004, Osprey Media Group Inc.
Contact:  http://www.thebarrieexaminer.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2317
Author:  Michele Henry

TORONTO POLICE RAID BARRIE HOME

Local News - A Barrie woman received the shock of her life before daybreak 
yesterday, when 12 police officers wearing bulletproof vests raided her 
east-end home and handcuffed her lying in bed.

"I was scared, because you don't know whether it's police or criminals," 
said Andrea Butcher, who lives on Steel Street. "The police started asking 
about gangs and street names. I had no idea what they were talking about."

The 5 a.m. raid was part of a sweeping "guns and gangs" bust orchestrated 
by Toronto police.

Officers, both OPP and Toronto, acted on 71 search warrants at 59 
residences, businesses, storage locations and detention facilities in 
Toronto, Barrie and Durham, Peel and York regions yesterday.

More than 500 criminal charges were laid, including participating in a 
criminal organization, conspiracy to import prohibited firearms, possession 
of prohibited weapons for trafficking purposes, conspiracy to traffic in 
cocaine and possession of proceeds of crime.

Sixty-five individuals, all in their 20s, were charged.

No one was charged at the Butcher residence and nothing was found, Butcher 
said from her home last night.

She said police were looking for her father, 62-year-old John Butcher, who 
had lived in the house previously, or evidence connecting him with certain 
criminal offences. She said police seized a few of her father's documents.

The Barrie Police Service had no comment on the raid. Const. Janet Schefter 
said the operation had nothing to do with Barrie police.

Toronto officers could not release any details about the incident in 
Barrie, saying the volume of raids conducted and charges laid is slowing 
the rate at which information comes out.

More information is expected to be released today.

Butcher said her father is currently in custody in Windsor after being 
arrested March 22, for trying to smuggle firearms across the U.S. border.

She said after his arrest, she was expecting police to search her home, but 
she hadn't anticipated they'd do it in such a violent manner.

"I was ready to open the front door, but they never asked," she said. "I 
was ready, willing and able to co-operate."

Butcher said she's disappointed in her father, whose arrest six weeks ago 
shocked, saddened and angered her.

"I'd be angry at my father for putting us through this," she said, adding 
she isn't upset with the police and she understands they were acting on a 
search warrant. "My father says he's innocent."

Butcher said police searched her home for four hours while she, her husband 
and another resident, were confined to the living room couch.

She pointed the officers in the direction of a few boxes she packed that 
contained her father's possessions.

"I didn't want anything of his associated with mine," she said, adding she 
refuses to post bail for her father, a financial adviser for 30 years.

Police recovered 28 firearms and drugs, including large quantities of 
ecstasy, marijuana, cocaine and hashish, from many of the raided locations 
throughout Ontario.

The raids were the culmination of 14 months of work by Toronto and regional 
police, as well as provincial police, RCMP and Canada Customs in an 
operation known as Project Impact.

"The problem of street gangs is so serious, their malignant impact so 
damaging to the communities they seek to destroy, we felt we had no choice 
but to adopt a new intelligence-led enforcement approach, and one 
integrated with our partners in law enforcement," Toronto police Chief 
Julian Fantino said. Fantino said it's one of the first times police have 
used new legislation directed at organized crime.
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MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart