Kahnawake peacekeepers hired in the shadow of the Oka Crisis ready for retirement

Clint Jacobs and Walter Montour, who joined the Kahnawake Peacekeepers after the Oka Crisis, are retiring this weekend.

Two Kahnawake peacekeepers are retiring this weekend after 34 years on the force.

They are the longest-serving officers in the history of the Indigenous police force.

Clint Jacobs, 59, and Walter Montour, 56, began their careers a year after the 1990 Oka Crisis when the Kanien’kehá:ka community on Montreal’s South Shore was in a different era.

“When I was hired on, and after the crisis, we had to struggle to keep our jurisdiction because there were other police forces that were patrolling the territory, and there was always jurisdictional issues,” said Montour. “There were times when those same policing organizations would try to contest our jurisdiction, but we’re always here.”

“It certainly was not a popular job at the time,” said Jacobs. “Within the community, there were a lot of divisions. We had the Oka Crisis that just occurred a year before, and our council was ... feeling they were going to be losing jurisdiction within the community, within the territory.”

Jacobs is the longest-serving Kahnawake peacekeeper, joining in July 1991. Montour was right behind him, getting his badge in October of the same year.

The two men felt called to the job. For Montour, it was a family legacy.

“My father before me, and his father before him has been a peacekeeper here in Kahnawake,” he said. “As long as there’s been police in Kahnawake, there’s been a Montour on duty here.”

Montour’s brother, Kenneth, serves on the force and will continue in the family tradition.

Montour took his father’s advice for the job seriously.

“When I was hired on, he sat me down and he imparted wisdom to me. He said, ‘You know, you’re going to be a police officer now. You’re going to be wearing a uniform, you represent the Kahnawake Peacekeepers. You’re here to protect the community and make it safe,’” he said.

For Jacobs, it was about moving home from Pointe-Claire, where he was living and giving back to his community.

“During the Oka crisis, when the blockade started in Kahnawake here, I felt so distant from my own community,” he said. “If you looked in Pointe-Claire, it was like it didn’t affect them one bit. And some people [asked], ‘Why do you even want to live there?’ You know? ‘Why do you want to associate with that there?’ And they just didn’t quite understand.”

A wealth of knowledge and experience follows them as they leave.

“With that many years of service, 34 years, you lose a little bit of the history,” said Chief Peacekeeper Dwayne Zacharie. “They were here at a time when it was difficult. They went through times where there weren’t as many resources as there are that are available now. They kind of weathered the storm over those years, and they’ve always been good standing members.”

Unlike many police officers, Kahnawake’s peacekeepers work and live in the same neighbourhoods as the people they are called on to protect and even arrest at times.

“We know everyone,” said Jacobs. “I think that gives you a bigger insight about the people you deal with. You also live here, outside of your work, you’re interacting with community members. You’re part of all the processes in society here. So I think that that has a lot of advantages. It’s not just anonymous faces you’re working with.”

Jacobs added that this familiarity reduces the cynicism some officers fall into.

“To me, Kahnawake is a model of community policing,” said Montour. “It’s because we live where we work, and it’ll affect your thinking processes. You’re always looking ahead, and I think that’s that’s the big difference. You have a sense of community.”

Both men, as all peacekeepers, function as ambassadors to those outside of the community. Montour recently worked on the multi-force anti-gun trafficking task force with the Montreal police (SPVM), and Jacobs works as a liaison officer with the Superior Court in Longueuil.

“Every peacekeeper, no matter what position they hold, is an ambassador of First Nation policing, and, at the same time, they represent our service and they represent our community,” said Zacharie.

Both men are leaving proud of their work.

“What I’m most proud of all these years of service, I would have to say, is again, successfully living my father’s legacy, being a peacekeeper on the reserve that we know and love,” said Montour.

“People have come up to me and they said, ‘Hey, Clint, I know it was kind of hard, but thanks. Thanks a lot,” he said. “I can take some gratitude that even though, in the face of it at the time, it’s kind of difficult, that extension I gave is kind of reciprocated now, and I think that lasts longer because it’s also your reputation.”

Jacobs had some advice for young officers entering any police force.

“Try not to get cynical. Really look at why you’re doing the job, and always go back to that original desire,” he said. “Ultimately, it’s to help your community.”