Retribution, Restoration, Rehabilitation

 

(I MAILED THIS LETTER VIA CANADA POST TO THE PRIME MINISTER ON JULY 21, 2023, I.E. TODAY)

Rosthern, SK.

July 21, 2023 

Right Honourable Justin Trudeau

Office of the Prime Minister

80 Wellington Street
Ottawa, ON K1A 0A2

 

Dear Prime Minister Trudeau; 

If “let the punishment fit the crime,” or “an eye for an eye” were the foundational standard of criminal and civic justice in Canada, then Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka would have been stripped naked in the public square, raped by strangers in the presence of the families of Leslie Mahaffy and Kristen French, and strangled. Such a result, most fortunately, can’t happen in Canada … at least not under sanction of the justice system. The death penalty was abolished long ago and currently, even criminals with a life sentence are beneficiaries of a policy that rewards progress in good behaviour with increments of increased freedom of movement. But our grasp of our justice underpinnings easily slide back to Judeo/Christian Old Testament principles and the “eye for eye” sensibility of Sharia law.

Prime Minister Trudeau, yesterday you emphasized a point that the sensitivities of the families of victims of crime are foremost considerations when justice is meted out. That may be emotionally true, but not a good academic description of how Canadian justice is administered. Criminal cases are not between the offender and the offended; they’re between The People and the offender (Queen vs. John Doe, People vs. Jane Doe). The absolutely-necessary support of the families of victims and the role of these families in the justice process must remain separate, or else we risk opening the door to a return to “eye for an eye” sensibility. The impulse for redressing violence with counter violence is a strong impulse among us humans.

Our justice system is by no means fail-proof. It takes public vigilance and informed dialogue to ensure that it remains a system that fits the people’s consensus of what justice is. As this consensus now stands, our justice systems is guided by three signposts: Retribution (punishment enough to convince the offender of the seriousness of his/her/their acts, and to serve as a deterrent to others), Restoration (returning conditions for all involved to a state as close as possible to what it was before the crime) and Rehabilitation (training and educating the offender to be a contributing, cooperating member of society). Implicit in the bars and razor wire of prisons, of course, is the assumption that the public must be protected from offenders lest they reoffend.

We could easily be drawn into debate about the degree of importance of any one of these goals. In the wake of the most horrendous crimes—those of Paul Bernardo in this case—retribution quickly rises to be the top priority, especially since there is no possible satisfactory restoration in the case of murder or other unlawful death, and Bernardo, having been diagnosed as psychopathic, seems far from being a candidate for rehabilitation. But whether he is housed in a maximum or medium security facility is not a judgment for the prime minister, the justice minister, the minister of public safety, the victims nor public opinion to make. We train police, lawyers, judges, prison wardens, etc., strenuously to make such decisions studiously, based on legislated principles and their training and dedication to the job. If their judgment is to be over-ridden by political or social opinion gathering, why train people to make them in the first place? Why not simply make Twitter or Facebook posts the sentencing, incarceration agents? Or why not just load all convicts onto ships to disgorge them in some island far away? (Please excuse the hyperbole; been listening to the Leader of the Opposition too much, I fear.)

For opposition parties who have found in the transfer of Bernardo a juicy propaganda windfall, I would suggest proceeding carefully. Although mistakes are made and legislation has had to be revisited and revised accordingly, the Canadian justice system is one of the best and fairest humanity in its long history has been able to devise. The transfer of Bernardo is not a sign of system failure, it’s evidence that it’s working. At least, it’s working if restoration and rehabilitation are still objectives of the pursuit of justice.

And to the governing Liberals, the legislation that rewards convicts with increasing liberty as their rehabilitation progresses is vital to the entire justice program. Even if Paul Bernardo should after this transfer prove that he is irredeemable in any socially acceptable way, the transfer back to maximum security is there to be exercised, isn’t it? If the restoration of the victims’ families is as important as you say it is, then help Canadians understand that the restoration effort is not helped by granting victims a determinant role in the justice plan for the perpetrator, but in the social supports to which all citizens are entitled.

I add just two personal anecdotes:

First: In 1981, my fifteen-year-old daughter accepted an ill-advised ride with a young man, a ride that ended in tragedy when the car rolled and both died. The driver was unlicensed to drive, the car unregistered. Had the driver lived, my daughter’s death might have resulted in criminal charges and a prison sentence. Saskatchewan Government Insurance sent us a cheque for $2,500, a restorative and well-meant  but bureaucratic gesture. We were told that this was common practice in such cases.

Had the driver lived and been pilloried, or had the government sent me a cheque for two million dollars, that would have only added to the grief I still bear some forty years later.

(My daughter had very loosely-jointed fingers; I can still feel her hand in mine.)

I mourn both deaths.

Second: I spent the better part of a day at the Healing Lodge on the Beardy’s Okemasis First Nation a few years ago. It’s a pre-release, minimum security facility that forms part of an offender rehabilitation process. There are no fences, but few “escapes,” and residents must shop and cook for their “house” and are able to spend some days in a guest house with family at intervals. If we abandon the principle of incremental loosening of restraint as rewards for progress, aren’t we then abandoning the principle of rehabilitation with it?

I wish you and your governing colleagues a good and restful summer hiatus,

Sincerely,

George G. Epp, citizen, voter, happy-to-be Canadian.

gg.epp41@gmail.com

Box 148, Rosthern, SK; S0K 3R0

 

Defund the Police? What?

HI!

“Defund the Police,” strikes me as yet another slogan to accompany “Black Lives Matter,” “I Can’t Breathe,” and so on. A new thing to fit on a waving placard and for me, a good reason to pause and think again about the role and practice of law enforcement as we find it today.

Take our experience of the mass killing in Nova Scotia recently, the skepticism about police actions in that event, questions about whether or not it could have been prevented and the subsequent attempts by the RCMP to justify its actions. And given the way we currently deal with violence and crime, and given that the perpetrator always has a huge advantage over enforcement, the reasons and excuses for the tardy apprehension of the perpetrator may well be valid.

And I think about the role of policing in the demonstrations/riots currently going on full bore in the USA, triggered by the police murder of George Floyd and the ongoing attempts by police to find their way out of charges of endemic racist practices in their ranks. We’re familiar with the scenes of battalions of robot-like, Darth Vader-like riot police in full conflict gear descending on demonstrators as if this were a face-off between two teams, one angry and unarmed, the other equipped like a military force with lethal weapons. From the president, meanwhile, a tunnel-vision preoccupation with brute force as the solution to every conflict.

I think it’s reasonable to say that our policing is primarily engaged in apprehending and punishing breakers of the law. There is a preventative aspect to that, of course: you can’t rob a bank from a jail cell. But on the whole, we’re putting a great deal more tax money into cleaning up after deviance than we are spending on preventing it in the first place. Perhaps this is what “Defund the Police” is all about; reducing the budget to policing and diverting it instead to social services, schools and wholesome recreation for youth. Poverty, discrimination, racism and the ennui of “nothing to do” are all like petri dishes for the culture of anger and deviance. Why not reinvest scarce dollars into preventative facilities?

I’m not well versed in the training of the police, I admit. What I’ve gleaned, though, is that a similarity to military training can’t be ignored. I’ve seen prospective Mounties marching in crisp uniforms and in strict formation in Regina. There’s weapons training, self defense practice and, of course, enough law and human rights indoctrination to prevent abuse. In part, it’s reasonable. It strikes me that police being summoned, for instance, to a weapons incident would be deathly afraid for their own lives given the history of so many of their fellows dying in service. But as surely as the parameters of medical practice, for instance, are bound and governed by the social contract we’ve agreed to as citizens, so our policing has always responded to what the public demands.

Perhaps citizens are beginning to change their minds on what policing shall look like in the future, their clues coming from the news of the Nova Scotia massacre, the “lynching” of George Floyd and myriad stories of guns, gangs, shoot-outs and mayhem in the streets of our towns and cities. Too often, police involvement has made conflicts worse, even when officers and constables are decent, compassionate people. Fear for our lives changes how we react to the world around us.

So often, families of people who’ve died while being “policed” have cried out for justice. Unfortunately the justice they are calling for isn’t justice at all, it’s retribution akin to “an eye for and eye and a tooth for a tooth.” The justice that the Old Testament prophets, that Jesus Christ cried out for is something else: it’s in righteous and compassionate dealings in all aspects of society, evenly and mercifully distributed to every child of creation so that all can rest in the good will of their neighbours.

The adult in us is shaped by the experiences of our childhood and adolescence. Perhaps it makes a lot of sense to put our dollars into a better school for every child; more and better-trained teachers; a universal guaranteed income plan; engaging recreation, music and arts opportunities everywhere children are growing up; fabulous, universal daycare.

And finally, determining together to pursue a real and forward-looking plan to eliminate every injustice that ends up necessitating retributive policing. A country without guns, because, “Why the hell would I need one, stupid?”

And, putting our money where our mouths are, eh?

Do not pass go . . .

Athabasca Falls

CTV’s W5 replayed a documentary called “The Trials of Conrad Black” tonight with Lisa Laflamme interviewing Black and anchoring a variety of glimpses into his homes, his businesses of the past, his wife, Barbara Amiel and the notorious security camera tape of him carrying file boxes out of his office. According to Black he has never committed a crime and is the victim of a combination of stupidity in the US justice system and vindictiveness on the part of people who envy him his success.

               He may be correct in these assumptions, as well as in his confession that the way he acted and carried himself for many years invited the outcome he’s struggled under for the past 9 years. He’ll finally be released from prison a week from yesterday.

               One thing Black is right about; his return to his Toronto home (as a temporary resident; as a convicted felon he doesn’t qualify for anything more) will not be heralded by brass bands and parades. It’s my sense that a poll of the Canadian public would show that most people here consider him a criminal, despite what he or others might say in his defense.

                And therein lies a dilemma, both for Conrad Black and for us. So often, we are faced with the news that someone has been indicted of an offense or tried and found guilty. Unfortunately, we— the general public— don’t have access to the trial proceedings, have little or no background information except the more lurid bits provided in the media, and no good reason to make any assumptions about whether or not the court outcome is just or not.

               And yet, we decide. Once a person has been named by the justice system, the assumption needle swings quickly to “guilty” in the eyes of the public. There are, no doubt, logical reasons for this phenomenon, one being the supposition that innocent people don’t get arrested.

               Furthermore, we don’t forgive easily, even after a convicted person has served his/her sentence. People who are found not guilty by a court seem often to be assumed to have “gotten away with it” and therefore worse than guilty because of that outcome.

               It’s possible that Conrad Black never did anything illegal and was wrongfully convicted. How would I know? It’s certainly a fact that the punishment meted out by the court has been administered and that in the eyes of the law, Black has “done his time,” whether he did the crime or not. But I wouldn’t put big money on the possibility that the general public will help him rehabilitate his reputation.

               The rule as seen through this window? Stay out of the justice system, even if it means scrupulously obeying the laws of the land. The alternative is unthinkable, and largely irreversible.