Greg Hamilton
Served 1976-2009
The first Black sworn Police Officer in Hamilton was Greg Hamilton, who was born July 18, 1949 in Grenada, grew up in Trinidad and Tobago, and came to Canada via the United States on August 28, 1968, where he lived with a family (Mr. & Mrs. Perry) in Ancaster, Ontario. He was educated at Ancaster High School, and later at Seneca College. Greg’s first job was working at Chedoke Hospital in the kitchen during the summer of 1969, but soon left when Mr. Perry, the Comptroller at the Royal Connaught hotel in Hamilton, was able to secure a job for him at the Hotel. It was working there, that he first met a co-worker, Glyn Wide, who eventually became a member of the Hamilton Police Service.
He subsequently obtained a fulltime job at Westinghouse on Longwood Road, Hamilton, later called Camco, but continued working at Dundas Golf and Country Club on a part time basis. He also met Tom Andrews who would later become a Hamilton Police Officer.
Eventually, Greg decided that he would like to join the Police Service, and every Wednesday for a year and a half Greg travelled down to King William Street, where the Old Central Station was located, to follow up on his application.
During his visits Greg met with a recruiting officer in Human Resources, and each time was told that the Board was not convening for interviews. It wasn’t long before he suspected this was, perhaps, an excuse; that maybe he wasn’t being given an interview for other reasons.
Later in 1976 during casual conversation he learned that Tom Andrews had also submitted an application. Tom had been successful in becoming an officer. Greg wondered if the colour of his skin might be the reason, he was not given an interview.
Greg made an appointment and went to see Deputy Chief Albert Welsh. He asked why Tom Andrews would be given an interview when he had been told there were none being done. Two-weeks later, he got a phone call from Human Resources, asking him to come in for an interview. To his amazement, both the Superintendent and the Deputy Chief said they were concerned he was simply “on a crusade” to get hired as a black man and was “crusading” for the black community. On November 1, 1976, Greg was hired by the Hamilton-Wentworth Regional Police and became the first Black man to be hired by the Hamilton Police.
For the first month, Greg worked as an undercover agent in the Vice Unit, a tactic unheard of in terms of a recruit being used in that capacity. He was told he was needed because they had no “black” faces to work in that role. Once, while undercover, he was sent to a house on Picton Street where there was a bootlegging operation. He was sent in with “buy” money in an attempt to acquire illegal alcohol. The suspect, who was also black, told Greg that if he was a police officer, he’d kill him. When Greg left the house, his cover team staged an “arrest” and took him back to the house where he was able to point out the dealer. Greg experienced the dangers of policing very early in his career.
Going into Woolworths and Kresge’s as well as the Red Lion at Main and James and the Owl’s Roost in Dundas to get friendly with the Bookies operating out of the stores was another operation in which he was used.
After attending the Ontario Police College, Greg was assigned to work in Stoney Creek, where his training officer was Bob Maxwell. When Greg reminisces about his early experiences, he never felt or experienced any racism from his coach office, his coworkers or even citizens he came across.
In 1979, Greg was assigned to work at Central Division and the new police station. While walking the downtown foot patrol beats, people would often look twice, because it was unusual to see a black man in a police uniform. Later that year, Officer Tom Standen asked Greg if he would be willing to join Tactical Emergency Assault Men (TEAM) (quickly renamed the Emergency Response Unit “E.R.U.”) Tom recognized that Greg was always in excellent physical condition. Greg did apply and qualified for TEAM and worked as a Tactical Officer until 1983.
He worked briefly in the Traffic Unit before being transferred to the Kenilworth Station, after which, he worked in the Court Branch Unit where he was promoted to the rank of Sergeant.
In 1989, he was then sent back to Kenilworth as a Sergeant. Always known for being well dressed while on duty, his uniform ironed and his boots spit polished. His physique also added to his appearance as a police officer because he maintained a high level of physical fitness. This level of care and attention to detail caught the eye of Senior Officer Milt Zimmerman who asked Greg if he would join the Honour Guard. Greg was not only the first Black person to join the Honour Guard but he was the only Honour Guard member who was not a Fraud Investigator.
As society changed, more Blacks were being hired by the Police Department and the racial barriers were coming down. Greg was often asked to be a liaison with new black officers. On one occasion, Inspector Charles Boecker asked Greg to speak to a young Black Officer who had been gaining a reputation for being too “heavy-handed”. Greg was being watched by Police Management and he was paving the way for blacks in Policing.
He mentored people like Officer Mike Webber, who was hired in 1983 also came from Trinidad.
In 1992, Greg was assigned to the role of Race Relations after Jorge Lasso. He also became part of the Chief’s Advisory Committee to examine diversity in policing. Robert Middaugh was the Chief at the time.
It was also at this time that the Ontario Employment Equity Act was put into law. This required that businesses have a hiring quota that accurately reflected their community in terms of race percentages. Greg studied the Police Application Process and discovered that there were systemic issues in the hiring process when it came to hiring minorities. He worked with Ms. Sylvia Kaijuru who was the principal of a school on Locke St S. in Hamilton, and also sat on that Committee, spending months going over each interview question to eliminate any hint of systemic racism.
Greg eventually was assigned to work with his Honour Guard friends in Major Fraud. After working there for four and a half years, he was promoted to Staff Sergeant – the first Black of this rank in Hamilton. He went on to work in Vice and Drugs for two years and then to Station 30, on the Hamilton mountain, for a year.
He spent the last ten years of his career as a patrol Staff Sergeant at Station 20, in Hamilton’s east end, before he retired. He now works part-time for the McMaster University Campus Police.
There is no question that Greg Hamilton became a strong asset who paved the way for minorities in Hamilton policing, not only through his persistence in getting hired but also in the work he did to eliminate systemic racism in policing.
We are proud and honoured to have had Greg, not only as a member of the Hamilton Police, but for his advocacy in making the Police Service as open as it is today. We always have more work to do as we strive to treat all people in an equitable manner.
By Dave Bowen, Retired Inspector, Hamilton Police Service