5.5 Recruitinq at High Schools

Both the Heritage Front and the anti-racist leadership agreed on one thing: their market for recruits was the disaffected young. The first indication in CSIS files of actions involving high schools is a reference in June 1990 to Wolfgang Droege telling Grant Bristow about plans to distribute leaflets at a school. He also talked about "spray painting and vandalism operations" to respond to actions by anti-racists.

By late 1992, the Heritage Front began recruiting in earnest. According to one account:

" Heritage Front members leafleted and visited dozens of high schools in Southern Ontario, seeking to tap the frustrations of kids who faced dismal job prospects and were willing to blame it all on immigrants and non-whites".[l3]

Recruiting at high schools led the Heritage Front into direct conflict with the ARA, and with High School staff. The ARA started holding meetings at high schools, and putting their positions forward.

Both sides then started targeting students who were members of their opponent's organization.

We learned that to discredit the anti-racists, Bristow advised Droege that he had contacted the principal of Riverdale Collegiate and asked why he had allowed a paedophile to enter the school premises and speak to children. Bristow claimed the principal had been in tears.

In August 1994, after Bristow was alleged to be a CSIS source by the media, Droege provided his version of Bristow's contact with Riverdale Collegiate to another reporter. He alleged that Bristow stated 'we are going to make sure that they will never have another meeting at any of the schools in Toronto.' Droege explained that Bristow had identified someone as being a child molester and he informed the principal and the School Board Trustees that some convicted paedophiles were affiliated (with ARA). Bristow then threatened to make this information public if they (principal and school trustees) persisted in allowing ARA to hold meetings.

The Review Committee spoke to the Principal, at the time, of Riverdale Collegiate. He said that he had not received any calls from any Heritage Front member, and that no school staff member had told him of receiving any such calls.[14]

According to the Source, quite a few people were calling schools. Droege was reported as having called the Ministry of Education as well as schools. The Source said that he told Droege that he had talked to such Board officials, but actually, he had not. The handler said that he believed that the Source was not involved in this type of activity.[15]

Continued

Footnotes

The original plaintext version of this file is available via ftp.

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