STANDING COMMITTEE ON JUSTICE AND HUMAN RIGHTS

COMITÉ PERMANENT DE LA JUSTICE ET DES DROITS DE LA PERSONNE

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Thursday, March 11, 1999

• 0913

[English]

The Chair (Mr. John Maloney (Erie—Lincoln, Lib.)): On our schedule this morning we have four witnesses. The first two will start now and the remaining two will be at approximately 10.30 a.m.

I'd like to welcome this morning, from the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, Chief John Lindsay; and from the Canadian Police Association, Grant Obst. Welcome back, gentlemen. Thank you very much.

We will have approximately 10 minutes for your presentations. We'll go to questions and answers after that. I realize that John Lindsay has an appointment at 10.30 a.m., so we'll meet that deadline for you, sir.

Chief Lindsay, would you like to proceed?

Chief John Lindsay (President, Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to begin my presentation by thanking the members of this committee for giving the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police the opportunity to express our views concerning Bill C-251.

When I say “our” views, I'd like to make it clear to the committee that we, as members of CACP, Canada's chiefs of police, consider ourselves to be deeply rooted in the communities we serve. So when I come before you today, I'm saying we believe we're speaking in concert with and on behalf of the average Canadian, rather than simply on behalf of a special interest group that's composed of chiefs of police.

My comments with respect to Bill C-251 will not be directed at the technical merits of the proposed legislation. Instead, I would like to focus my remarks on the underlying purpose of the amendments that have been presented for consideration.

The mischief or the evil that's to be addressed by this bill is, in the words of its sponsor, the volume discount many offenders receive in relation to the crimes they've committed. For example, a person who commits a multiple murder is automatically eligible for parole after 25 years. I would submit this reality is not accepted by Canadians as a just consequence for such horrific misconduct.

• 0915

The present state of the law disregards the torment and loss experienced by each individual victim. When I use the term “victim”, I include in that the loved ones of those who have lost their lives because of the criminal acts of other individuals. In our present system of justice there continues to be a decided imbalance between the interests of those convicted of horrendous crimes and the victims of those crimes.

This proposed legislation seeks to acknowledge and validate the pain and suffering of each individual victim and to hold serious offenders truly accountable for their actions. It is quite simply a matter of justice.

The Criminal Code already provides that a fundamental principle that must be considered in the sentencing process is that a sentence must be proportionate to the gravity of the offence and the degree of responsibility of the offender. That is section 718.1.

In our respectful submission, the inability to oppose a consecutive sentence on an offender in relation to, for example, a second murder committed by that individual violates this fundamental sentencing principle in that they do not experience any practical consequences for the second murder. It cannot truly be said that an individual who has been held responsible for their actions, or who is being sought to be held responsible for their actions, has any accountability when there are no practical consequences flowing from their misconduct.

In making these comments, I don't want to leave the committee with the impression that the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police believe harsh penalties are the answer for all crimes. In this regard, the CACP acknowledges that flexibility in sentencing is an important and appropriate concept with respect to the majority of crimes that are dealt with in the criminal justice system.

For the most part, the circumstances of each case must be considered in determining the most appropriate sentence. However, when dealing with the most serious crimes, such as those set out in this bill, the luxury of flexibility can no longer be afforded. For such crimes, the issue of accountability of the offender and the recognition of the price their victims have been made to pay must be the paramount considerations in sentencing, otherwise the credibility of our system of justice is eroded in the eyes of the Canadian public, and the pain and the suffering of those victims of these serious crimes is made that much worse.

The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police therefore supports this bill in principle. We would strongly recommend the committee give favourable consideration to the objectives that form the basis of this proposed legislation.

With that, Mr. Chairman, I'll conclude my comments. Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you, Chief Lindsay.

Grant Obst.

Constable Grant Obst (President, Canadian Police Association): Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.

Thank you very much for allowing the Canadian Police Association the opportunity to make their feelings and opinions heard with regard to this proposed bill.

For those of you who may not know who I am, my name is Grant Obst. I'm the president of the Canadian Police Association and I'm also a constable, a uniformed patrol officer, with the Saskatoon Police Service in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

The Canadian Police Association represents approximately 35,000 front-line, rank-and-file police personnel. As I'm sure you all know, we've been here a number of times to express the front-line police officers' position on amendments to the Criminal Code.

At the risk of my political future as the president of the CPA, I would pretty much like to just say what he said, but there is not a whole lot more the rank and file would argue about with the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police on this particular bill.

As front-line police officers, we are in constant contact with people who are unfortunate enough to become victims of the criminal element. Quite often that face-to-face contact with those unfortunate people really brings home what serious criminal crime does to an individual, a family, or a community. Of course, this particular bill focuses on what we would call the most reprehensible crimes against humanity that are possible: murder and sexual assault.

We support the principle that people should be held accountable for offences they commit, and we support the principle that they should be held accountable for each and every offence, especially with regard to murder or sexual assault. We don't think there should be any volume discounts for anyone who is fortunate enough to commit several offences prior to being apprehended.

• 0920

Obviously what's going through my mind at this point is a serial killer who would probably continue to take victims. The only difference is the point at which the police are able to step in and apprehend. As it stands right now, the second, third, fourth, fifth and subsequent victims are freebies as far as our sentencing process goes.

The philosophy or principle that you only have one life and life means life doesn't really fly with the rank-and-file police officers. Quite frankly, I don't think it would fly with the general public if they understood it or knew it was the principle that is continually being put forward. I genuinely think most people out there think murder in Canada carries a life sentence, and that's what it means.

I don't think it's common knowledge that after 25 years you'll be considered for parole, or if the judicial review at 15 years is put in place, it could be earlier than 25 years. I don't think the general public really knows that if you kill more than one person, the second, third and subsequent victims are freebies, so to speak.

We believe each victim is important. I can't imagine being the parent of a murdered child—and now I have Clifford Olson's face in my mind. I know we always bring him up because he's probably the most glaring example and one we're all familiar with. We constantly work with mothers and fathers—parents of children who were unfortunate enough to become victims of Clifford Olson. I don't think the general public knows that the second, third, fourth and up to eleventh child are really just lumped into the first offence.

You have the brief from the Canadian Police Association in front of you. I'm not going to read it to you; I know you're all capable of reading. You probably have a collection of briefs at home from the Canadian Police Association. I would ask that you read this one carefully before you add it to your collection.

There are a couple of areas that front-line police officers might suggest as amendments to this particular bill. We're not certain that aggravated sexual assault, sexual assault with a weapon, and sexual assault causing bodily harm are addressed here. I don't profess to be a lawyer, but if they're not addressed here we think they should be, so we put that to you.

Again, if you feel there are weaknesses in this bill, we certainly hope you will make whatever changes you feel are necessary—and hopefully not dilute the bill to any degree—so it goes back to the House of Commons and gets the attention it deserves from our MPs.

I'm sure you all know the Canadian Police Association was in town over the last couple of days visiting MPs with regard to specific issues in the forefront for the police association agenda. This is one bill that was unanimously supported by rank-and-file police officers from across the country.

I will be happy to answer any questions I'm able to.

I should mention Mr. David Griffin couldn't be with us this morning. I have with me the Canadian Police Association executive vice-president, Mr. Joe Ross, in David's place.

Thank you very much.

The Chair: Welcome, Mr. Ross.

Mr. Joe Ross (Executive Vice-President/Secretary-Treasurer, Canadian Police Association): Thank you.

The Chair: We will hear from Mr. Abbott for seven minutes, please.

Mr. Jim Abbott (Kootenay—Columbia, Ref.): Thank you to representatives of both organizations for making the time to make a presentation here. Obviously you consider this to be a very serious issue, as I believe the majority of members of Parliament do.

I was interested in Chief Lindsay's comment—if I wrote it down quickly enough and accurately enough—that in his judgment there are no practical consequences for a second murder. It is also interesting that Mr. Obst made the same observation.

Presentations were made to us yesterday by the departments that were somewhat critical of the fact that the sponsor of this bill spoke of discounts for multiple murders, which has a certain flourish to it. That's fine; it's the kind of thing that attracts attention to the fact that indeed in the case of multiple murders, in the case of multiple serial sexual offences, there are no consequences currently, in practical terms, under current sentencing provisions.

• 0925

It was pointed out by Mr. Daubney yesterday, who was representing the justice department, that sections 272 and 273 were not covered by the bill. I think the presentation by the CPA, which includes the proposed amendment that would include sections 272 and 273, is quite helpful, and I would hope this committee will pay particular attention to that.

I'm working at a bit of an advantage to your disadvantage, gentlemen, but I'm just going to pose a couple of questions on the basis of some statistics that were given to us yesterday.

Yesterday we had CSC, who gave us percentages of sex offences, parole statistics, the grant rate, the average percentage of sentence served before release, and recidivism rates, and they were all in percentages but didn't give us any concept of years. Do you think that's particularly helpful? I'm wondering if you would agree with me that by putting things into percentages instead of years we don't get to the issue of how many years is the public protected from these most serious of violent offenders, that perhaps it would be good for us to have it in years.

We also received statistics from CSC making comparisons with other countries in terms of first-degree murder, but they failed to give us statistics on multiple offences—in other words, comparing country to country on the basis of multiple offences. Would you agree that we should probably have both of those statistics as well—in other words, to give us just first-degree murder statistics really was unhelpful?

Cst Grant Obst: It's somewhat coincidental that you would bring up CSC this morning. We had a very informative discussion with the commissioner yesterday and had a number of questions for him, and he was very forthcoming with the information we extracted from him.

I think, on any issue, the more information you get, the more accurate the information, the better informed you are and the better decision you could make. That, to me, is a fundamental principle. I can't commit Mr. Ingstrup to anything, but he certainly gave us everything we wanted. I expect you probably asked him for what you need as well.

Mr. Jim Abbott: It was unfortunate that in the presentation yesterday the department chose to just give us percentages instead of years.

What is the effect to the front-line police officer of a situation where it almost seems like a revolving door? I'm thinking now particularly for repeat, multiple and, particularly, violent sexual offenders. What does that mean in terms of the policing efforts? Can you give us a description of that, because I think all of us are concerned about the safety of streets in Canada, particularly for the most vulnerable? What does it mean when we see people serving one-third to one-half of their term and then are back out on the street?

Cst Grant Obst: Obviously the bill we're here on is directed at very serious offences, but in general terms, as a front-line police officer, what I hear all the time, speaking with my colleagues.... When you're dealing with the public—and we almost always deal with the public who have been victimized by crime, and the types of activities that you've described, Mr. Abbott—it's like a lack of confidence in the justice system. We're the front line for that system and we come to tell you quite often what we think is wrong with it. We're in the public forum as a police association, in a lot of cases, attempting to get certain things fixed and make improvements.

As a police officer, when I'm on the street it's my job to defend the justice system, and I believe in the justice system. I'm your front-line officer out there; I have to believe in justice. It's what I do. It's what I'm committed to. But what some of the things you've described do is lend frustration; they lend that lack of confidence on the public's part, which we try to offset with a fuller explanation of what's going on.

• 0930

But it's very hard to explain to anyone who's lost a loved one to a murderer that life doesn't really mean life. I know we're not here to talk about section 745, but you know where we stand on that. Fortunately, I've never had to deal with a situation where multiple murder is the issue, but I can only believe it would be compounded a hundredfold if the victims.... And although I've never been in a multiple murder situation, I have spoken to Sharon and Gary Rosenfeldt, whose son was a victim of Clifford Olson, and I've seen how they react to—I can't remember the term you used, I think “volume discounts”, which I believe we also had in our brief—the fact that the subsequent murder has no consequence, that it's a freebie.

Mr. Jim Abbott: What does it mean to your members? How do your members react in terms of morale, of getting out? They have the greatest intentions in the world, and I'm not questioning that for a second, but what does it do to morale?

Cst Grant Obst: It affects morale in a negative way. Again, the police officers in this country I believe are extremely professional and go about their duties to the best of their ability with whatever tools were granted, but in your heart and in your soul when you're dealing with that kind of thing, it's pretty hard to express a great deal of confidence. I am confident that the men and women of law enforcement in this country do the best they can do, but they also send us here to try to make things better, and we wouldn't be here if they didn't think there was a problem.

Mr. Jim Abbott: In summary, then, you—

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Abbott, you'll have to come back in round two.

Mr. Marceau.

[Translation]

Mr. Richard Marceau (Charlesbourg, BQ): Mr. Obst, Mr. Ross and Mr. Lindsay, I'm pleased to see you here again today.

I tend to be very direct in what I think and what I say. I have never hidden my opinions. I must admit that, at the outset, I have not formed an opinion on Ms. Guarnieri's bill. I have not decided whether to support it or oppose it, so I'm very interested in the questions that I shall ask you and which, in my opinion, must be asked.

Mr. Obst, what is the exact purpose of the bill, and does my colleague's bill actually achieve this objective?

[English]

Cst Grant Obst: We believe, Monsieur Marceau, that the bill makes an offender accountable for each and every offence. Multiple murders or multiple sexual assaults aren't lumped into a pile preventing victims from the closure they deserve. In the case of murder, it obviously would extend the period of time in jail, but in the case of sexual assault what it would do is cause a sentencing judge to really think about how much time this individual is going to serve for each and every sentence. If he wants to reduce the time served for each offence, he can still do that, but each and every offence is addressed rather than the lumping together.

As for the purpose of this bill, there are a number of principles here, but the bottom line is that it holds the criminal responsible for each and every offence. That's a principle the rank-and-file police officers, and after hearing Chief Lindsay I think the chiefs also, were pretty much united in supporting.

[Translation]

Mr. Richard Marceau: So, you are satisfied with the bill as it presently stands?

[English]

Cst Grant Obst: Except for the two areas I mentioned. I'm not sure it addresses aggravated sexual assault, or sexual assault with a weapon, or sexual assault causing bodily harm, and I can tell you the rank and file would like to see that in there.

[Translation]

Mr. Richard Marceau: I agree. We politicians, often hear when we are in our ridings or when we travel across the country, that Ottawa is far away and tends to interfere a little too much in the lives of Canadians and Quebeckers.

• 0935

Here is my point. At the present time, judges have a great deal of discretionary power. In my opinion, judges are often in a better position than we are here, in our own little bubble in Ottawa, to understand and analyze specific cases. But by adopting a bill like the one before us, with its blanket provisions, are we not predetermining sentences here, in Ottawa, when they should be decided by the judge in the location concerned, who heard the case and is aware of all the consequences of the offence? Is it not somewhat presumptuous of us here in Ottawa to tell the judges what the sentence shall be?

[English]

Chief John Lindsay: If I might respond, Mr. Marceau, I think Ottawa sometimes is a long way away, but the point at issue is that justice is very local and it's felt very acutely by people who pay attention on a local level. I think that's a given. I think it's also a given that judges deserve and must have the ability to appropriately respond in terms of their sentence, having heard the evidence. None of that's an issue.

I think what is an issue is that we've seen a number of things emerge in Canada over a number of years, particularly as it relates to these most serious offences for which life sentences are given. We know that as a matter of fact life sentences are not served in Canada. However, the legal fiction that's arisen over the last 30 years, arising out of the first seminal case in Sinclair out of the Ontario Court of Appeal, created the fiction of course that you can't have consecutive life sentences. No one disputes that, because clearly you can't have more than one life, but the issue that has arisen from it is that with respect to the time that's ineligible for parole it's been brought together, so that you have multiple offences being dealt with as one.

All we're saying is that the issue of justice and fairness requires that these be viewed separately because they are in fact separate offences. I think this deals adequately with the justice issue in terms of being local, and it preserves the ability of the justice who hears the case to apply whatever sentence is appropriate in the case that he or she hears. The reality of parole is a major issue of concern, and I think this bill reflects the fact that they ought to be issues that are separate and apart and dealt with separately.

[Translation]

Mr. Richard Marceau: I have the bad habit, as some would say, or the good habit, according to others, to do a little research before I come to a committee. When I listen to you, I have the feeling that your premise is that judges' discretionary power will necessarily favour the accused. It seems to me that there is a Supreme Court decision—that I will have to check—of 1995-96, which states that a judge has the discretionary power to impose a cumulative sentence of 25 years. Therefore, the court's discretionary power does not favour the accused. I am asking you this question, without any ulterior motive, because I would like to know your opinion: Does the judges' discretionary power necessarily favour the accused, or can it sometimes go against him, as occurred in the Supreme Court's decision of 1996?

[English]

Cst Grant Obst: If I could answer the question, Mr. Marceau, I'm not sure I caught the first part of your question, but I'm under the impression that judges don't have the power in the case of multiple murders to order consecutive parole and eligibility periods.

[Translation]

Mr. Richard Marceau: According to the notes that I took a while ago, he was a pedophile who had committed sexual assault and had been found guilty on several charges, including sexual assault with a weapon.

• 0940

The 25-year cumulative prison sentence was challenged before the Supreme Court. Counsel for the accused submitted that a 25-year cumulative sentence could not be imposed on their client, since a cumulative sentence could not exceed or be equal to a life sentence. The Supreme Court said: I'm sorry, but these sorts of assaults on children are so revolting and disgusting that consecutive sentences adding up to 25 years are acceptable, even if this is more than a life sentence.

[English]

Chief John Lindsay: Mr. Marceau, in response to that, I'm not sure I'm aware of or agree with that advice. Certainly my position would be that we need to preserve the point and principle you're making, and that we can do that best by amending the Criminal Code so that in fact it's very clear that the justices who hear cases have a discretionary authority to impose consecutive parole ineligibility periods. I think that would be the clearest expression of the creation of that authority. I think that would be a very sound exercise in public policy.

[Translation]

Mr. Richard Marceau: Each one of us, in our own way, is involved in politics. In your work, the politics are a little bit different; however, you are still involved in politics. Mr. Obst, you are aware of my positions on a number of subjects since we have already met. You told me that Clifford Olson's face appeared before you when you spoke of this bill. I seem to recall an English phrase—English is not my first language—that goes something like, "hard cases make bad law". Doesn't using an example as horrible as Clifford Olson's distort the debate somewhat? He is, after all, an exception. At least I hope so.

[English]

Cst Grant Obst: He's not an exception when it comes to talking about serial murderers. He's probably the best-known serial murderer, and that's why I use him. But there are a number of other cases in Canada I could refer to, and I will do that in the future.

[Translation]

Mr. Richard Marceau: Thank you very much.

[English]

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Marceau.

Mr. MacKay, should we go to the colleagues on my right and come back to you?

Mr. Peter MacKay (Pictou—Antigonish—Guysborough, PC): That's fine. Thank you.

The Chair: Mr. DeVillers.

Mr. Paul DeVillers (Simcoe North, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, gentlemen.

Chief Lindsay, you didn't have a written brief. There's just the one brief from the Canadian Police Association. Is that right?

Cst Grant Obst: That's correct.

Mr. Paul DeVillers: I was just looking at the brief and the section where the myths and realities are outlined. With regard to the myth that life already means life, I have difficulty in understanding your difficulty with that concept. When a person is sentenced to life, that's the sentence. The person is under the system for the remainder of their natural life. So really the issue here is incarceration. We're not talking about sentencing; we're talking about whether that person is under sentence in incarceration. Is that your point?

Cst Grant Obst: I wouldn't argue with that, sir. When you read the myth there, we talk about the ineligibility period for parole, so obviously it's geared at incarceration.

Mr. Paul DeVillers: So basically we're talking about the parole system and whether or not there should be parole in certain cases. Is that your objection with the system as it is?

Cst Grant Obst: I think that's part of it. But I think the principle we've discussed at length here, the fact that an individual be held accountable for each and every offence, also has repercussions on the other side for the victim who's involved, that the victim sees the system address each and every victim. I think that's an important component as well.

Mr. Paul DeVillers: But once a person is in the system as being convicted of one of the crimes that would caught by this bill or by other sections of the Criminal Code, then that person is in the system for the rest of their natural life. That's not in dispute.

• 0945

My concern is the effectiveness of our parole system, and that's what I'd like to ask some questions about. In your experience as a chief and front-line officer, are you encountering difficulties with people who have been through the system, have served their 25 years or whatever incarceration, and are back on the street under conditions of parole? Are you encountering difficulties with those people?

Chief John Lindsay: I think it's fair to say that every time you deal with an offender the second time, you are dealing with a problem that might not have occurred at all if that individual had been incarcerated. That is not always an argument to say that people should be locked up and the key thrown away.

But there are some practical issues that arise. The first, of course, with regard to a sentencing regime that does not allow for consecutive sentences in the types of situations dealt with in this bill, is that every time a new investigation for the second or third or other offence is commenced, it requires the expenditure of resources that, frankly, are being used for a purpose that isn't always clear, except to validate the rule of law. Of course, that is one, if not the most obvious, role of the police, and I think it's clearly a very responsible one.

But if I might, I think the scenario could be exemplified by an analogy. If we were to accept that there's individual responsibility for crimes and that takes place for the first and multiple offences, it ought to be evident practically in the consequences. So, for example, if you were to buy a property—and I'm using maybe a facetious example—and take out a mortgage and then shortly thereafter buy a second property, ordinarily you would take out a second mortgage. The system we have with regard to sentencing for these types of crimes, in the example I've given, would only increase the length of your mortgage, if you will, in terms of interest payments, rather than creating a second mortgage. We're saying that fair is fair, and these offences need to be dealt with and sentenced separately.

Mr. Paul DeVillers: But the parole system does take into account second offences for eligibility of parole, etc. Those issues are taken into account in the current system.

I know that one of your other myths is that the National Parole Board is an independent decision-maker dedicated to public safety. From my perspective, I think your issue is that you don't accept that the National Parole Board and the system are functioning in a way—unless it's just the principle of having additional parole ineligibility periods put on for each conviction. If a person is in the system and the system is functioning properly, the system takes into account additional offences, etc. The number one goal of the system is the protection of society. I know Mr. Abbott was complaining about being given statistics and percentages. I'm not sure what the point was there. But there's not a lot of evidence that the system is malfunctioning. I have difficulty understanding where the need for this type of bill is given.

Given the amendments that have been made to section 745, the amendments that have recently been made for long-term offenders, and the dangerous offender provisions that are in the code, why is this bill necessary, in spite of the provisions that are there to deal with the Olson types, the Bernardo types, etc.? Why is this type of legislation necessary, given those provisions that are in the code now?

Chief John Lindsay: If I might respond, Mr. Chairman, I think the adequacy of the National Parole Board and its systems isn't the issue I'd like to debate, frankly, with all due respect. There certainly are frustrations with respect to parole. The point I'm supporting with respect to this bill is that rather than treating a second offence as a qualifier or as an aggravating circumstance with respect to a first offence for that matter, it ought to be dealt with for what it is, which is a separate offence. That ought to be the approach. With all due respect, it is the approach we're supporting with respect to this bill.

• 0950

Perhaps I might just leave my comments there.

Mr. Paul DeVillers: What about the last question, though, about the provisions that are in the code now for dangerous offenders, long-term offenders, and the amendments to section 745? In light of those three enactments—and I think you people were here giving support on those, or most of those—why is this legislation necessary, given those provisions of the code?

Chief John Lindsay: This particular bill provides for very specific treatment concerning some of the most serious offences that we deal with. In relation to some of the other matters you've brought up, one response I have is that as good as some of the provisions might be, they have created tremendous amounts of work for police agencies with respect to serious and dangerous offenders. The fact is that unlike several years ago, many police agencies today require the sending of police officers across the country to attend parole hearings in order to make representations. It's a very significant undertaking on behalf of the police.

Again, with all due respect, I might suggest that this can be dealt with more effectively and more expediently up front, by dealing with the issue as a separate issue of sentencing when the evidence is heard in the first place.

The Chair: Mr. Peter MacKay, are you ready?

Mr. Peter MacKay: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I apologize for arriving late.

Thank you for your presentation.

What I would like to hear from you, or what I suggest we may hear from you, in response to this question is that as front-line police officers and those working in the community...there is still a great deal of frustration amongst the population at large. Sometimes perception is not reality, but I get the distinct impression that there is a strong impression out there that we're not doing all we can as legislators to protect people.

It seems to me that when it comes to the issue of murder, and to some extent even the high-end sexual assault cases, in terms of the adequacy of the sentencing provisions, we're talking about the most blatant example of recognizing the sanctity of human life through our sentencing provisions. As you've said, if the impression in a sentence is that the additional taking of a life is seen as only an aggravating circumstance at a sentencing hearing, this seems to be a blatant slap in the face from our justice system.

This particular proposed change to the Criminal Code attaches a specific significance to every murder that has occurred, and that is recognized in the sentence itself that's handed down from the court. Now, whether the judge decides to attach a sentence of fourteen years to each murder, or ten or fifteen years, or whatever the numeric value is in years, if it's served consecutively, I would suggest that this would give the victims the sense that the loss of their loved one has at least been recognized by the court in some small way. I'd be interested in your response to that.

Cst Grant Obst: Exactly. I think we alluded to that earlier and in the presentation, Mr. MacKay, in regard to the victims involved in these kinds of things, and I think this may tie into the previous question. The police in this country don't look at the parole system as a bad thing. The parole system is a necessary component in regard to integration or reintegration of offenders. In many cases, that's a very important and integral part of the justice system.

What you have to keep in mind with regard to this bill is that we're focused on the most heinous and reprehensible crimes that can be purported against humankind. I think that's where the justice system could go a long way in establishing itself in terms of regaining the confidence that sometimes the blatant slaps in the face create, or the lack of confidence that they create. We'd go a long way to regaining some of that if we were to take these offences that are at the top of the list and maybe remove the parole element to a certain extent, treating them the way they should be treated by providing each victim of each offence with the closure that's needed to get on with life. In many cases right now, that's not there.

• 0955

Mr. Peter MacKay: But from your interpretation, is it not fair to say parole is still going to apply to the sentences? Obviously we're going to see an increase in the number of years that would be served. I don't know if you've had the benefit of seeing some of the statistics that we were provided with yesterday by the department, but there was reference to the fact that there would essentially be a 5.4-year overall increase in certain convictions in terms of actual time served. There would be a reduction in the number of people actually released. Isn't it fair to say that the end result is that there is less opportunity for a person who has killed or raped to be back on the street sooner and to potentially perpetrate the same act?

Cst Grant Obst: And public safety is our business, which is why we're here. What you say is exactly the way it is.

Again, we don't think the answer in all cases is to lock somebody up and throw away the key. But there does come a time and an offence for which the pendulum swings to the other side, so to speak. Locking those people up, keeping them off the street and preventing them from creating more criminal carnage, becomes the more paramount concern of the police and, I think, of the constituents that the ladies and gentlemen here represent.

Mr. Peter MacKay: We have been provided with significant numerical statistics. If the overall goal is to in fact accomplish just that, in fairness these statistics show that there has been a decline in recidivism in certain instances. There is an indication that perhaps change is afoot, but there's always a lag time that follows legislative change. But if we can make those numbers even smaller, and if we can reduce recidivism and the release of prisoners.... If there's one person out on parole for murder who commits murder again, if that can somehow be prevented, isn't that ultimately what we should be trying to do?

Cst Grant Obst: We were here not long ago to discuss impaired driving. Yes, we've seen a decrease in the number of impaired drivers on our streets and highways, but there is still one person every five hours being killed by an impaired driver. I don't suggest that we just leave what we have in place and expect it to go away. You have to keep working, and that's what we're here about. If we can make more improvements, let's make them.

Mr. Peter MacKay: I assume you're speaking for a large constituency when you appear here on behalf of police officers across the country. You have no difficulty saying that your general feeling is that this legislated change would be embraced by your community.

Cst Grant Obst: Without a doubt.

Chief John Lindsay: On behalf of the chiefs of police, I would concur with that, without a doubt.

Mr. Peter MacKay: And the chiefs of police and CPA generally have worked very closely with the Department of Justice on a number of initiatives.

Cst Grant Obst: We may not always agree, but on this particular case, as I said earlier—you might have missed it—Chief Lindsay made a presentation that I would just like to put my initials on. I would say thank you very much, because we're right together on it.

Mr. Peter MacKay: So there's no hesitation whatsoever to embrace this change.

Cst Grant Obst: None.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Abbott, for a three-minute round.

Mr. Jim Abbott: Thank you.

I think it's really interesting when the supporters of Bill C-68 say that if only one victim is saved, it's worth it. It's okay to spend $200 million, do whatever we need to do, let's save a life, if even only one victim is saved. Yet it seems that the same supporters of Bill C-68 are now saying we have to watch out here. That seems a little bit incongruous to me.

For the benefit of my Liberal colleague, the reason I was speaking in statistics goes to a question to our witnesses. I was somewhat critical of the fact that the numbers were presented to us in isolation, in statistics as opposed to years, and I ask for your comment in return.

• 1000

I'm postulating something here, I'm making something up. We have a sexual predator who has unfortunately created absolute havoc. At the end of the day, this sexual predator has been convicted of four violent sexual offences, so he gets five years, for the sake of argument.

I take you to the CPA discussion, with which I concur totally. It says:

Canadians are acutely aware that current sentencing and parole practices are inconsistent with public expectations, undermining public confidence in law enforcement and, more particularly, our entire justice system. Bill C-251 is an important first step to restore public trust and to introduce the principle of Truth in Sentencing.

I couldn't agree with you more. To answer the question that was posed by my Liberal colleague, we come back to this case in which this individual is now convicted of four violent offences, but he receives five years. People are assuming that they will be protected, that society will be protected from this individual for five years. They're rather outraged that he got five years for each offence, but that they will be served concurrently. But in actual fact, even according to the percentage statistics that were presented to us by the department—which were 45.83%, 48% and 48%, so we'll say 50%—that predator will be back on the street in two and a half years. That's according to the department's statistics themselves.

If we now take this individual and say there were a lot more offences committed—instead of four, the conviction rate got up to eight—I would suggest that the judge, in all likelihood, would still apply the five-year term, in which case it's a volume discount. That is where the term “volume discount” comes from.

I know I've asked this before, but I'd like you to just expand on it, if you will. This offender has been convicted of four or has been convicted of eight offences. The public is assuming that it is going to be kept safe from this offender. What does it mean to the morale of the people in your department? What does it mean to your resources? Undoubtedly you've run into this in actual fact. What does it mean to your department when this predator ends up on the street again within, according to department statistics, two and a half years?

Cst Grant Obst: It undermines the efforts of the police. It causes a great deal of frustration for the police officer. The amount of money it costs to reinvestigate, put the whole case back together, and take this individual off the street again, only to see him released as a result of the volume discounts, becomes very expensive. I'm sure the chief would concur with that.

It undermines what we do, what our life profession is. That becomes pretty disheartening for a police officer who dedicates 25 or 30 years of his or her life to trying to keep the public safe and keep the streets safe from these types of people, keep them from picking up your son or daughter next. It's an undermining of all our efforts, and that creates much dissension within the ranks.

Mr. Jim Abbott: Chief Lindsay, I'd like to take advantage of your Queen's Counsel designation if I may. Take a look at Bill C-251. I'll read proposed subsection 271(2):

A sentence imposed on a person for an offence under subsection (1) shall be served consecutively

And it goes on.

Is it your understanding that this particular amendment proposed by Bill C-251 eliminates the discretion of the judge? In other words, it eliminates whether he or she may choose. In fact the judge has no choice; if there are multiple offences, they shall be served consecutively. Are you familiar enough with section 271 of the code to be able to tell us if that's the case?

May I ask this question? If it was altered to say “may”, so that it then reads:

A sentence imposed on a person for an offence under subsection (1) may be served consecutively

that would then leave the discretion to the judge as to whether the sentences would be pronounced as being concurrent or consecutive.

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Chief John Lindsay: Thank you, Mr. Abbott. You are correct, I am a QC. I do tell people, however, that this is “quite a cop” as opposed to Queen's Counsel.

As for the use of the language that's contained in the bill—and I did say I wasn't going to comment on the technical components of it—the language is mandatory language, so “shall”, of course, directs that there shall be no exercise in discretion, and “may” allows for that.

I might bring this back to the position of the CACP, which is that we believe discretion ought not to be there; with respect to consecutive offences they should be sentenced and dealt with consecutively, and that ought to be expressed as a matter of public policy in the law as requiring a separate and consecutive sentence.

Mr. Jim Abbott: Okay, thank you.

Mr. Jacques Saada (Brossard—La Prairie, Lib.): Thank you very much for your presentations. More than the bill itself, I think the issue it's trying to tackle is a very difficult issue because of the emotions that it brings to the surface.

I will not get into the technical debate on the contents. I think you will find no one around this table, for that matter no one in all parties representing the House, who is going to not agree with you that the Olsons of this earth have to remain locked in forever. You said that you took the Olson case because it's the most known. Of course you could have also talked about Legere and Bernardo and a number of others.

I'm not talking about the emotional judgment but the analytical judgment. Do you have the feeling that what exists presently in the law is not sufficient for the Olsons and Bernardos and the like to be locked in forever?

Chief John Lindsay: You know, it might be easier to comment on Olson, because there would be such an outcry if he is ever to be released on parole. But that is a reality the parole board will obviously consider.

But the question of serial offences as it relates to both murder and sexual assault is a much more common occurrence, I say with regret, than we might like to accept. As a matter of a systemic approach, it would be far more advisable to deal with the issue with certainty as set forth in this bill, I would submit, than leaving that to a matter of discretion as it relates to the compounding of the original offence. Again, I return to the question of fairness in sentencing, which is that these issues ought to be addressed consecutively on a systemic basis so as to ensure not only the best protection of the public but at the same time proportionality in the sentencing.

Mr. Jacques Saada: My second question is going to be very difficult to put, and I would hope not to be misinterpreted in the question.

You have expressed the frustration that some victims have when they see that the criminal has got a life sentence for something else than the crime that affected them and therefore they have the feeling that they have nothing for them, that there is no recognition of their own pain. Yesterday on a question relating to that I understood that there might be—not that dramatic, but there might be....

Let me rephrase that. If somebody is sentenced to life with the understanding that life is life, and if it's not completely life it could be made completely life, in terms of the accessibility to parole and so on and the dangerous offender sections, is it going to be less frustrating? Honestly, I don't have the answer, because I'm lucky enough to not be in the circles of victims. But I would like to ask this question. I'm going to ask this question of victims also.

• 1010

Is it going to be less frustrating to have only a part of this life in retribution for the crime I'm suffering from, as opposed to making sure the person who has committed this crime along with other crimes is out forever? What gain would it give me if I were in the victims' circle to know that I have given to me part of the criminal's life, as opposed to having collectively the feeling that this person is out forever? Is it less frustrating or more frustrating or does it not change anything?

Chief John Lindsay: We hear constantly of the pain of victims, and that's part of a police officer's world. One of the great pains they express is that they need to be heard personally. In that sense the crime they've been victimized by needs to be dealt with as a unique event. The position my association takes is that this bill, with respect to the types of offences it deals with, allows for victims to see that their situations are heard and dealt with independently. In that sense I think they would find a great deal of consolation knowing they've been dealt with as a unique victim and the offender has been sentenced for that separately, as opposed to being, if you will, an add-on to the first offence.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Saada.

Mr. Peter MacKay.

Mr. Peter MacKay: This is on that same point, the flip side of that. Mr. Saada is asking, I believe, what solace a victim gets from knowing that an offender is doing time in relation to the victimization that has been inflicted upon them or their family. What pain do they get knowing that the justice system hasn't recognized the crime that's been perpetrated, or that the time that has been allotted—and this puts it in very sterile terms, as the court and the justice system always does. It talks about calibration of sentence and it talks about calculation and concurrent and consecutive. It does try, at least, to take the human element out of it, which is impossible for the victims.

What level of frustration is there, and I guess as a further extension of that, what tendency toward vigilantism is there, if a victim sees that the court does not recognize or does not truly calculate into the final mix, into the final disposition, a recognition that there is time being served for what has happened to them, when it's being served consecutively? If two people are killed in close proximity or simultaneously and a 25-year sentence or less is to be served and it's being served concurrently, what sense is there amongst victims that they're not being truly recognized in the sentencing process? You're more than familiar, I'm sure, with the term “totality”, and this is the way it's justified in the judiciary, that on balance, taking into consideration the principle of totality, you can't go beyond 25 years.

Chief John Lindsay: Mr. Chairman, to Mr. MacKay, I can't obviously profess to be an expert or a spokesperson for victims. However, what we do here in the communities we serve is that the administration of justice is to a certain extent brought into disrepute and there's a lack of confidence in the system when the current sentencing processes are followed with respect to these most serious of offences.

So maybe the best response I can give to the question or the observation is that an approach that conforms to Bill C-251 would tend to restore that confidence that these most serious of crimes are being dealt with separately and independently. That would give the confidence that people are being heard and that the response of the system is unique with respect to each one of those separate offences.

Mr. Peter MacKay: I have a very short follow-up question. Cost has been brought into this. I think it would be offensive to some victims when you talk about the cost, but do you see there being a preventive cost associated with this, as opposed to the costs that would attach to keeping somebody in prison longer?

• 1015

Chief John Lindsay: One issue of resource that I did mention was that certainly with respect to multiple offences, typically every time a new offence occurs it requires and obliges the police to allocate resources to investigate that and bring it to a conclusion. Clearly it's very difficult to count those things that don't happen, but one has to presume that if an offender who is serving consecutive periods of incarceration is not available, those demands on police resources will not be made.

But it's a secondary issue to our obligation to enforce the rule of law. With all due respect, I might suggest this is about an issue of fairness.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Thank you very much.

The Chair: Thank you.

Colleagues on my right, Mr. John McKay.

Mr. John McKay (Scarborough East, Lib.): Thank you. I apologize as well for not being here to hear your presentation. We all seem to be caught between a variety of committees and obligations.

I wanted to go to your conclusion, which is that murderers and rapists should not be entitled to a volume discount. That certainly has a certain element of attractiveness to it. It's a statement that resonates and seems to encapsulate your position rather well.

Yesterday we were given statistics by the department that said in the case of sentencing repeat offenders in the area of sexual assault, the median custodial sentence is about 50% longer in multiple-charge cases than in single-charge cases. Also, on the murder side of the equation, paragraph 745(b) says that in respect of a person who has been convicted of a culpable homicide murder, the person is sentenced to imprisonment for life without eligibility for parole until that person has served 25 years of their sentence.

Both the statistics and the section of the act seem to cut against the very essence of the notion, the essence of this bill, that people are getting volume discounts for murder and for sexual assault. I'm curious about your response to (a) the section, and (b) the actual statistical facts, that people aren't in fact getting volume discounts, that it doesn't work this way.

Cst Grant Obst: I'm not quite sure if I understand the question completely but—

Mr. John McKay: The median custodial sentence is 50% longer for mutliple-charge cases in sexual assault.

Cst Grant Obst: Right.

Mr. John McKay: So how is that a volume discount?

Cst Grant Obst: They may in fact, if the judge sees there are multiple offences, increase the sentence somewhat. But he doesn't address, in our estimation, each and every offence. It certainly doesn't prevent a judge from adjusting his sentencing on each particular offence to encompass the totality of sentencing, but he would have to justify why that offence was only six months versus the five years that it should have been.

Mr. John McKay: If you lock a judicial officer into a position of consecutive sentencing.... Say there are four incidents that would require two years, can you imagine a situation where four incidents times two years gets you eight, and that is grossly disproportionate to the incidents? On a concurrent sentencing regime, the four incidents may well get you five, four, or something of that nature, which bears some greater proportion to the sense of outrage on the part of the community. Can you imagine a situation like that?

Cst Grant Obst: I'm trying to imagine it. Again, I think the judge at sentencing, even if bound by this bill, decides that x amount of months is the appropriate sentence for this offence. He has the ability to level that.

The Chair: This is the last question, Mr. McKay.

Mr. John McKay: Aren't you putting the judicial officer in a particularly difficult situation? What you're going to end up doing is discounting the first offence down to a lower number of years, and then because he's bound by that you're going to add it up. So it's going to end up in the same situation.

• 1020

Cst Grant Obst: That comes right down to the basic premise of truth in sentencing. We think the truth has to come out in what each offence is worth. All it does, in our estimation, is hold the sentencing judge to a degree of accountability to justify why that sentence is applied to that particular offence. I guess it's for everyone to decide whether it's appropriate or not.

Mr. John McKay: A judge does have to speak publicly about why he sentenced this individual for this length of time.

Cst Grant Obst: If you were to go back to your constituency, you would find that most of your constituents—at least in my area anyway—aren't happy with a lot of the sentences.

Mr. John McKay: The first question I asked was how many times—

The Chair: Mr. McKay, I think we'll have to cut it off here, sir.

Do you want a quick response, Constable Obst?

Cst Grant Obst: No that's fine.

The Chair: We've come to the end of our time. I appreciate—

Mr. Jim Abbott: Mr. Chair, if you take a look at your watch or the clock behind you, we have about 10 minutes left.

The Chair: We have a logistical problem. Chief Lindsay has to be at another meeting at 10.30 a.m., so that's why we're cutting it off short.

Mr. Jim Abbott: I just wanted to give the Liberals the advantage of a little bit of a math lesson in sentencing.

The Chair: Thank you very much for being with us this morning.

Perhaps we could take a five-minute break, and then we'll have Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Rosenfeldt come forward.

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• 1027

The Chair: I'd like to welcome this morning Gary Rosenfeldt, who is the executive director of the Victims of Violence Centre for Missing Children; and Steve Sullivan, who is the executive director of the Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of Crime.

Welcome back, gentlemen. We will have a presentation of roughly 10 minutes for each of you and then we'll go to questions and answers.

Mr. Steve Sullivan (Executive Director, Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of Crime): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will begin and then pass it on to my friend Mr. Rosenfeldt.

I didn't prepare a brief today because I felt, just to be blunt, that this was a fairly simple issue. There are obviously technical considerations that you as a committee will deal with, but as far as the principles behind the bill are concerned, it's either one that you accept or one that you don't.

I listened to the previous presentation and I thought what I might do is address some of the criticisms or concerns that members have with this bill. I also have a copy of the brief presented by the Department of Justice yesterday and I thought I would also briefly address some of the concerns they raised.

One concern, and it actually is not all that far off from one that I had as well, is that this bill may go too far with the sexual assault provisions. It relates to consecutive sentences for sexual assault and any other sentence that's imposed. It could be a conviction for anything. Certainly the intent of our organization, and I suspect it might be the intent of the sponsor of the bill as well, is to target repeat sex offenders. So you may want to consider an amendment to this bill that makes it consecutive sentences for sexual offences, not just any other offence that's in place.

The other concern raised by the Department of Justice was that this bill may not go far enough, and the police association referred to this as well. It does not refer to aggravated sexual assault and sexual assault with a weapon or causing bodily harm, which are the two most serious types of sexual assault. So we would also put forward for your consideration an amendment to include those clauses in the bill.

We've heard a lot about judicial discretion and how this bill might limit that. I would certainly argue that it doesn't really limit that and I suspect we'll get into that in more detail later.

• 1030

I would refer you to the fact that in Bill C-68, which was a bill we supported because we thought if it cost $200 million to save one life then that's a good thing, you limited judicial discretion. You said that if someone uses a firearm in the commission of an offence, they get an automatic four-year sentence. That is limiting judicial discretion. Arguments could be made that in your upcoming youth justice act, in which you expand the ages for those who are being transferred automatically to adult court, you are limiting judicial discretion. This committee has been asked to consider the conditional sentencing provisions of the Criminal Code because the minister is concerned with judicial discretion and how those sentences are being used.

So when you talk about judicial discretion it's important to remember that this government and previous governments have been concerned about that. Certainly Canadians are concerned about judicial discretion. So I think that's important.

The point I would make about this bill, though, is that there is nothing in this bill that requires minimum mandatory sentences for sexual assault. What it says is, if there are repeat offences, a judge must consider each offence when he is giving the sentence. It doesn't mean that it's going to be a longer sentence. It might be, but it doesn't mean it's going to be a longer sentence.

When it comes to first-degree murder, judges currently have no discretion. They have to impose a life sentence without parole for 25 years. They do have discretion when it comes to second-degree murder as far as the parole and the eligibility period are concerned, but when we're talking about judicial discretion it's important to realize that we do place limits on that, and justifiable limits as well.

When we're talking about clauses relating to murder, this bill to me is not about the adequacy of our parole system. I think we have one of the best parole systems in the world. I will look forward to appearing before your subcommittee in a couple of months to help you improve that parole system. It's not about how well our parole system works because it doesn't talk about the parole board. It simply sets parole dates. It talks about when someone can apply for parole.

I think this bill is about principles and sentencing. I think this bill is about recognizing that when you have multiple murders there are multiple victims. It's not about whether the parole board will consider an additional murder as an aggravating factor or an additional piece of information. It's more than that. We're talking about a life. Simply leaving it to the parole board for their consideration doesn't reflect the seriousness of the type of offence we're talking about.

I'm sure Mr. Rosenfeldt will talk about that a little bit more in his presentation as to what that means to him, certainly as a victim.

As for the other criticisms or concerns raised with the bill, we've heard the phrase that life already means life. A life sentence is a life sentence. Someone's on parole for life. And there are mechanisms right now to keep the Clifford Olsons in jail forever. That's not debatable. I suspect he will be kept there forever. What the system is not able to do is recognize, for example, the fact that Mr. Rosenfeldt's son was the third victim. In essence, Daryn meant nothing as far as the sentence goes, and our current system, while it could keep him there forever, couldn't recognize any victim after the first one.

Another criticism that's been raised is that this is simply an American philosophy, that this is relying too much on incarceration. I would point to a poll that Ms. Guarnieri did, and I'm not sure if this committee has a copy of that. It says that 90% of Canadians support consecutive sentences for killers. I don't think that holding an offender accountable for each offence is an American philosophy. It's one that Canadians support, and obviously from the poll, it's one that we see they support wholeheartedly.

With reference to the consecutive sentencing for sex offenders and how a judge would deal with that in open court and how it might put him or her under pressure to impose higher sentences because they have to defend the sentence with regard to each victim, I think that honesty in our system is a good thing.

One of the complaints about section 745, above and beyond that it exists, is that when a judge sentences someone to life without parole for 25 years, he or she is not required to say that you can apply for judicial review after 15 years. Mr. Rosenfeldt can attest to this fact, that as a victim he felt he was lied to. And certainly Canadians would feel they were lied to. So truth in sentencing and openness and requiring judges to explain their sentencing is not a bad thing. We pay them a lot of money, and if they take heat for that, this goes part and parcel with the job.

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There is a concern when people begin to lose faith in our justice system. We've heard recently, and we hear a lot, that the complaints for sexual assault, for example, are down. There are probably a lot of reasons for that. I think one of them, though, is that a lot of victims, a lot of complainants are losing faith in our system to deal with that and simply don't call the police.

That is a very serious thing. It's one thing that our government and our police forces and everyone else across the country have to be concerned with. We need people to believe in our justice system. I think we have a pretty good justice system, but we need to make sure they understand that their crimes count and that their crimes will matter.

We've heard reference to Olson—certainly I've made reference to Clifford Olson—but I could give you a dozen names of other multiple killers whose victims I think would describe the same sentiments as Mr. Rosenfeldt will explain to you later. It's not about Clifford Olson, it's not about Paul Bernardo, it's about the principles of recognizing each and every victim and that they matter.

I think at this point I will simply turn it over the Mr. Rosenfeldt. I look forward to any of your questions later.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Sullivan.

Mr. Rosenfeldt.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt (Executive Director, Victims of Violence Centre for Missing Children): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, first of all I would like to express my appreciation to Ms. Guarnieri for presenting this bill before the House. And I appreciate the time that's being taken today to discuss this bill at the justice committee.

I appreciate the fact that a number of questions were put to the members of the police departments, to the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police and the Canadian Police Association with regard to victims. It's encouraging to see questions coming from members of the justice committee with regard to the situation of victims and their concern for victims. Believe me, we appreciate that. It's only in the last few years that we've had those sorts of concerns expressed, I think, by so many members of our elected representatives.

The last witness prior to us stated that he could not speak on behalf of victims. He wasn't a victim and obviously he was not capable of speaking on their behalf, but he comes into contact with many victims. I would suggest that he's probably quite capable, with the nature of his work, of speaking on behalf of many victims anyway in this country.

I won't sit here today and purport to speak on behalf of all victims of crime in Canada, believe me. I come in contact on a regular basis, and have since 1984 when we formed the organization Victims of Violence, with literally hundreds of murder victims across Canada over the years. I see them on a regular basis. We talk to murder victims in the U.S. that we deal with on a regular daily basis.

I came into this as a result, as Steve has mentioned, of a victimization in our family. Our son, as I'm sure you are aware, was one of 11 children abducted, raped, and murdered by Clifford Robert Olson on April 21, 1981. I won't go into all the details of the trauma, the pain, the suffering that our family has gone through. I can simply tell you that it has been immense over the years and it simply does not go away. It hasn't gone away in 17 years and I doubt that it'll go away until the day we die.

But one thing that adds to the trauma and adds to the pain and suffering that we, as families, as Daryn's family, have had to go through throughout these years, is knowing that the man who perpetrated this crime against him, the man who smashed his head in with a hammer prior to having sex with him, will never serve one day in prison as a result of what he did to our son. The reality is that our son was number 3 on the list of 11.

Clifford Robert Olson was sentenced to life imprisonment, and we were told at the time—and this is the part we never, ever understood and still don't understand today—that he only has one life to serve and it would be preposterous to sentence a person to 11 life sentences in prison because he only has one life.

Well, I question whether life imprisonment in Canada really means life. Every piece of material I've seen coming out of Corrections Canada suggests that we have to rehabilitate. The effort is toward the rehabilitation of Clifford Robert Olson so that we can put him back into the community. I've heard the Minister of Justice of Canada, maybe not the current one but the current Solicitor General of Canada and prior solicitors general, continually say that the object of our present system is to rehabilitate these individuals so we're able to put them back into the community.

• 1040

The other statement that has been so commonly heard from solicitors general throughout the years we've been working with victims is that nobody stays in prison for a lifetime, that eventually they all get out. We've been told that, and I have seen numerous reports on Olson, as a matter of fact, where the reports are prepared for his eventual release into the community.

So the point is that I do not believe, sitting here today, that Clifford Robert Olson will die in prison; I do not believe that. This is part of the difficulty of trying to cope and deal with the murder of our son. It's very difficult.

I listened to a tape last night with Donny Edwards. I'm sure many of you are aware of who he is and how his life was torn apart by the murder of his parents a few years ago. The one thing he was talking about was the difficulty of dealing with the fact that here's an individual who murdered both his parents and was convicted of attempted murder; we have three very, very serious crimes that this individual was convicted of, and in reality he's only going to be serving one sentence.

I remember a few years ago in Winnipeg, to explain what a charade this concurrent sentencing really is, there was a case where a person who murdered a woman in his apartment block was being sentenced before the courts for that crime. He apparently raised his hand and said, “Excuse me, your honour, I have another murder I'd like to confess to”, and he confessed to another murder that he committed a few years prior to that because he wanted to get concurrent sentencing for both the murders.

In other words, there is no penalty for that other crime. They throw them in together, and it makes the sentencing part of it for me, as a victim, and for the many victims we deal with, a charade. It really does.

I remember another case back in Edmonton, that of Larry Takahashi. I remember the headlines in the newspaper, which said “Canada's worst rapist”. At the time of sentencing I got to know quite a number of his victims in the courthouse. We had a victim witness service in the courts at the time. The one thing they simply could not understand, so many of these women—he was accused of raping over 100 women in the city of Edmonton. They only carried through with a few of the charges, the ones they felt they had the most evidence on, the easiest ones to put through the system, I guess, and they quit at that point. Many of the victims came to me and said, “What is going on? Was I raped or was I not raped?” And the answer basically from the crown prosecutor at the time was, “Well, what's the point? We could be here for months, conviction, conviction, conviction. It's only one sentence anyway; it all runs concurrently.”

As I was driving to work after the sentencing one morning, I was listening to CHED radio. The announcer said, “They didn't only throw the book at Larry Takahashi today, they threw the whole library at him. They gave him like a total of three life sentences, a total of 86 years”, or something like that, and it went on and on and on. And what the announcer said is, “That man will never, ever be released from prison, obviously.” Well, it's not so obvious.

Six years later, if many remember—it's just a few years ago—prior to Larry Takahashi's release into the community, he was a registered member of the Hope Golf & Country Club, and the media found out about it. They went there and they took pictures of him out on the golf course. Six years, with three life sentences, and umpteen number of years to be served in prison: I ask you, from a victim's point of view, on behalf of the victims I have to deal with on a regular daily basis, does that sound like justice to you? It sure as hell doesn't to me.

• 1045

We have in the audience here a woman whose family has been totally destroyed, torn asunder by the abduction, the torture and murder of her grandson. She sat through two years in a courtroom here in Ottawa listening to evidence being presented. When it's all said and done....

I would just like to take about two minutes of your time here. Just imagine yourself in that courtroom when the judge begins to hand down the sentence. I'll just read you a brief excerpt from the judge's sentence:

KURTON EDWARDS:

Mr. Edwards, in addition to life imprisonment on count one, for kidnapping Sylvain Leduc I sentence you to 12 years imprisonment concurrent.

I stay the finding of guilty in count three for confining because it's subsumed in the kidnapping.

I convict you for aggravated sexual assault against Natalie Brindamour and because of the particularly brutal savagery of that offence I impose a sentence of 15 years concurrent to the life imprisonment and to the other sentences.

For kidnapping Natalie Brindamour you are convicted and sentenced concurrently to 12 years.

Count six is stayed.

For assault causing bodily harm for your complicity in that as against Daniel Chartrand I convict you and sentence you to five years concurrent.

For kidnapping Daniel Chartrand you are also convicted and sentenced to 12 years concurrent.

Count nine for confinement is stayed.

For kidnapping Melanie Rainville, count ten, you are convicted and sentenced to 12 years concurrent.

Count eleven is stayed.

For your use of a firearm, a twelve gauge shotgun, sawed-off, which has no place in civilized society, a crime which should draw particular extra deterrent punishment in my view, you are convicted and sentenced to five years concurrent to the life imprisonment sentence, but consecutive to all other sentences.

Count thirteen 13 is stayed...

It goes on and on and on.

You talked about insanity in sentencing. That really comes down to the fact that he got a life sentence, but 15 years from now he'll be eligible for a judicial review of his sentence. All the other sentences will have been served. If he can convince a judge and a jury he is reformed, he'll be back on the streets. Two of the young offenders who were sentenced in that case are already back on the streets. This is the insanity victims have to deal with on a regular daily basis in our courts.

The pain simply does not go away. Punishing the offender is not really what victims are looking for. They're looking for some recognition for the harm that was done to them and their families. Adding sentence after sentence and running them all concurrently simply means nothing for the victims. Forget about it. There's no point in running through all these. Simply give the person a life sentence because that's really all it is.

On the other hand, when you have consecutive sentencing, it takes into account.... Of course we're told it's ludicrous to give an 86-year sentence. Well, I beg to question that. If a person deserves 86 years in prison, maybe he should get 86 years in prison. That's the way it should be. When he reaches that 86th year, when it's all said and done, if he's released from prison that's fine too.

That may sound ludicrous, but on what do we base our justice system? Do we look at an individual and say we can allow 75-year-old people out there to commit murder because they'll never live long enough to spend 25 years in prison, so we can only give them one year because the average life expectancy in Canada is 76 years? The whole thing is ludicrous.

But I say it is not ludicrous to sentence a person for the crime they committed. If I leave here today, start driving to Toronto, and get stopped for speeding, to me it's very simple: I'm given a ticket. That doesn't mean the rest of the tickets I get all the way to Toronto are freebies because I can combine them when I get to Toronto, walk up to the judge and say “Here, I got 15 today. It was a bad day; I got stopped 14 more times. But concurrently I'd like you to wrap them all together and I'll give you one hundred bucks.” It doesn't work that way, and it shouldn't with violent crime—the most heinous of crimes, violent crime.

Thank you very much.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Rosenfeldt.

Mr. Abbott, for seven minutes.

Mr. Jim Abbott: Thank you.

Both of you have stated your cases very eloquently, particularly in talking about deterrence and retribution.

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I was interested, Mr. Sullivan, in the extra element of Bill C-68 you brought in, the removal of discretion, which some of my colleagues on the other side of the room seem to have some difficulty with. It was done under Bill C-68, but they're having difficulty with it in this bill.

Because you have so eloquently stated the case vis-à-vis retribution, I would like to get into the issue of safety, and particularly the fear of victims, rather than continue to canvass retribution.

At 6 feet, 5 inches, and 200 and some pounds, being a male, I can walk virtually anywhere in this country without fear. It seems to me this bill is about the protection of the most vulnerable in society. As a person of that size and gender, it bothers me so very much that I can do that, yet my wife and other people in our society can't.

On the issue of safety, if we take the case of this mythical sexual predator I raised in the last session—I think both of you were here when I did—the person gets five years for four convictions. In fact the person had committed twenty, but they managed to convict on four and he gets five years. According to the statistics, he will be on the street within two and half years for four convictions.

Let's assume we managed to get eight convictions and he got five years. The difference is that he'll be on the street in two and a half years for eight convictions. Isn't that really what we're saying here in terms of the volume discount—the analogy that you used about the tickets?

What about the issues of safety and fear? Could both of you perhaps address those additional elements? You've done it so eloquently with respect to justice and retribution, but could you also address those issues with respect to people in society, particularly victims of these crimes?

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: Many victims of crime who I have come to know over the years live in constant fear for their lives. I talk to people regularly all across Canada. I have a very good friend in Lloydminster. Her mother and her aunt—sisters—were murdered by an individual. He's in the process of getting temporary absences now from Matsqui prison. She is actually going into hiding. The sister of Donny Edwards—I mentioned him—has gone into hiding.

It is not unusual in Canada that people have to live this way. It's frustrating. I think the most difficult part for victims to really understand, though, is that throughout the process there are so many changes to the sentence—like concurrent, consecutive or whatever—and they're totally confused. You have to remember most victims don't really understand the justice system when they are thrown into it.

We publish little booklets to try to explain it. The National Parole Board has published a little booklet in the last year trying to explain it. But when I read it and break it down, you have to be a mathematician, honestly, to figure it out. It's very difficult.

So victims are normally asking for some truth in sentencing, so they can go to bed at night and be relatively certain the offender, who promised to get out of prison some day and kill them.... We've had the odd murderer escape too, like Kinsella a few years ago, which caused panic in the community. He even made threats against John Nunziata and one of his victims, but they weren't carried out. But victims would like some truth in sentencing.

Then, if it's not too much effort, you should get victims' input at the time of parole or early release. It's important to victims that they have some say. I can remember very clearly a case where a convicted murderer was being released into an Ontario community. After a few phone calls from the victim, I talked to the National Parole Board. They weren't aware that the victim's family lived in that town. They weren't aware of all the circumstances and the fear the family lived with. On a Sunday afternoon we were actually able to work out a deal with the National Parole Board where that city was put off limits, but he was still allowed parole in Toronto.

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Things like that can be done if there is enough knowledge and information throughout the system. Believe me, we've come a long way, Mr. Abbott, in the last number of years in that regard.

But on the actual sentence and fear, when you're talking about the number of years served, most individuals, as the National Parole Board and Correctional Services of Canada regularly state, will be released some day.

I guess from a victim's point of view, if you feel the offender actually did time in prison for the crime against you, you may feel there was some sort of retribution by society, that society and the justice system helped to make things right. You might have less fear if there were an actual punishment for the crime against you.

But you lose all faith in the justice system when you know that if you are the fourth rape victim, there will be no real sentence for the crime against you. The justice system tells you they're going to let him out, “But don't worry, things will be all right. He won't bother you again. Those threats he made against you were idle threats. His case worker says he's reformed. He doesn't rape people any more and he doesn't harm people.”

Those are hollow words to you as a victim when there's been no sentence served, no punishment for the crime against you as an individual.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: I guess there's not much to add to that. I would say your imaginary sexual predator probably has another 100 offences he's never even been investigated for because those victims didn't come forward. Those victims who watched how the system worked for those who went to the justice system, I think you will agree, would probably say “It's a good thing I didn't bother going because it wouldn't have mattered anyway.”

When we get situations like that, the level of fear goes up because people don't believe in the system. They're not going to report crimes. Those crimes will go unsolved and those predators will be on the street longer.

Mr. Jim Abbott: Thank you, Mr. Maloney.

The Chair: Mr. Marceau, are you ready?

[Translation]

Mr. Richard Marceau: Yes.

Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Rosenfeldt, excuse me for having missed most of your presentation. I had to go to the House to table a document. Mr. Sullivan, you and I have already spoken, and, Mr. Rosenfeldt, I would appreciate receiving a copy of your speaking notes, if you have not tabled a brief.

Mr. Sullivan, you were here a while ago, and Mr. Rosenfeldt was not, when I said that I was trying to decide whether I should support or oppose this bill. During the time that I have been listening to you, Mr. Rosenfeldt, it seems to me that you are somewhat mixing up—and I may be wrong, and you can tell me so—all sorts of things. You said the victims would like to be informed when someone is released, etc.. Are these concerns not rather related to the discussions that the justice committee had on victims' rights? You were there at the round table, last summer, here in Ottawa. Are you not confusing consecutive sentences and victims' rights, somewhat?

[English]

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: I didn't mean to do that, Mr. Marceau.

What I'm talking about is victims' rights. The question was put to me about the safety of victims and their concerns with regard to safety, and I was responding to that. In essence, we are saying that if victims are accorded certain rights, there may be less concern with regard to their personal safety when a person is released. That question was put to me after my presentation.

[Translation]

Mr. Richard Marceau: I had the opportunity to go to British Columbia and Alberta last week in the context of a review of the Corrections and Conditional Release Act by a subcommittee of the justice committee. I was not an expert in the field before going, and I still am not.

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However, we dealt with the following question, and I would like to hear your opinion on this. Is it not better for victims that an offender who has spent some time behind bars be rehabilitated—even though that word has been cheapened, and go through the entire process? He is incarcerated in a maximum security institution, goes to a lower level, works in the community under the supervision of a parole officer and has the possibility of becoming a good citizen. From the point of view of the victims, isn't it preferable for an offender to go this route rather than spending years and years in prison, without any incentive to strive to improve himself because he tells himself that, in any case, he will never get out or he will be too old then? Someone who spends many years in prison becomes embittered and hard, and when he gets out, he will tell himself that society has never given him anything and he will start doing what he did before.

[English]

Mr. Steve Sullivan: Even if you were to extend the parole ineligibility periods, I would argue that our current system does encourage people to change. First of all, it's a personal decision. Whether you're serving 5 years, 20 years, or 100 years, if you want to change your behaviour or your attitude, you're going to do that. We can offer you the programs and the help, but you make that decision.

The other thing is that I think our system does encourage that. You mentioned cascading down to minimum- and medium-security prisons. You can go on work release programs whether or not you're a lifer. You can apply for escorted temporary absence passes as soon as you walk into a prison. You can take treatment programs. You can take education. There are things in our system that encourage people to change and make themselves better, and I think that if someone really wants to do that, regardless of their sentence, they'll do that.

[Translation]

Mr. Richard Marceau: Human psychology being what it is, most people will tell themselves that they want to improve because they want to gain greater freedom by going through the steps from maximum to medium and minimum security and then to conditional release. People tell themselves that this is the normal path. They tell themselves that if I am a good boy or a good girl and make an honest effort to improve, I will be able to get out sooner. That's the carrot. If we eliminate the carrot, even if someone wants to change he will say to himself: Even if I improve, will that help me to get out sooner?

Secondly, we have seen some of those prisons, and we know that there are areas, particularly in maximum security, where the atmosphere provides absolutely no incentive to change. if you try to get better, or if you are perceived as being weak... I won't use the words that we heard. It's always a matter of attitude in prison; the guys support each other in that, they have to behave like that and they have to protect their turf. We saw a difference not only in attitudes, but also in physical appearance. I believe that my colleagues Mr. Grose and Mr. DeVillers will agree with me that the physical attitude of the people in maximum security is quite different from that of those in minimum. The people in minimum security, in some cases, have turned their lives around. I am not saying that the system is perfect, but some people have really tried.

So, I'll get back to my question. What happens if we eliminate the carrot that gives them hope of getting out sooner, and they know that they are going to be in prison for a long time? Would removing this big carrot not destroy the balance that exists in the system at the present time?

[English]

Mr. Steve Sullivan: I guess it's the size of the carrot, really. For someone who's locked up for 50 years, for example—and that's when they can start applying for parole—the incentive might be getting themselves down to a minimum-security prison where they can go to work every day and live a semi-ordinary life. There's no question that maximum-security prisons are not a very good place to change someone's behaviour. I've been to some as well, and they're not nice places. The incentive, I think, would be to cascade yourself down and learn a trade and go out in the community and work.

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So I think there are incentives. Obviously it's not as big as freedom, but I think the incentives are there, and we can maybe build them even greater into our system.

[Translation]

Mr. Richard Marceau: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[English]

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Marceau.

We'll now turn to the government side, Mr. Grose.

Mr. Ivan Grose (Oshawa, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I'd like to take a little different tack here. I've had a theory for quite some time that we're having a problem with this bill because of something we fail to do. I think the person who murders or rapes serially or repeatedly simply because they enjoy either murdering or raping is a very sick person, and I believe they should be taken out of the mainstream. I think they should be confined under the mental health act rather than the Criminal Code. We do that now with some people at the pleasure of the lieutenant-governor, and they stay there forever in most cases. But for some reason, unless a person exhibits irrational behaviour in a court room, we don't treat them under this procedure.

If we were to do that, if we were to separate these people out—and, incidentally, Mr. Rosenfeldt, under my rule your perpetrator would be separated out—that leaves you with the people who have murdered probably through greed or desperation, even multiply. Maybe they were robbing a bank and killed someone and in a pursuit weeks later also killed someone. This is a person who is simply greedy and got caught in this situation. I think this is a person who could possibly—note possibly—be reformed. Not everyone can be reformed. Some people have to stay in prison forever, even the ones who commit my type of crime, which would not be treated under the mental health act. But I think if we separated these people out, we'd have far fewer difficulties even with this bill.

It's not something we're going to solve here today. But I don't get to talk to you every day, and I'd like the reaction of both of you gentlemen.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: It's a very difficult situation, Mr. Grose, because I do know, as you well know, that a large number of inmates in our federal institutions are mentally ill.

Mr. Ivan Grose: Exactly.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: There's no question about that. We agree with you wholeheartedly. I have been inside those prisons, not as an inmate but as a visitor, and it's really sad in a sense that we are locking up mentally ill people. I agree with you there.

The difficulty, though, is that there's a very major effort, supposedly on behalf of the mentally ill, from another group of people who are fighting to get them out of the mental hospitals too. So you get it both ways.

What I find tragic today is that when I drive around the streets of Ottawa or Toronto I see mentally ill people on our streets, and I say to myself—and this is a bit off the subject—what are we really doing here? If a person is physically ill we treat them in this country, but if they're mentally ill we allow them to freeze to death on our streets. I agree with you wholeheartedly on that.

But the difficulty lies, for instance, with the Joseph Fredericks. There was a person who had been in and out of the system for God knows how many years—and again, you're talking about provincial legislation with regard to the mentally ill—and we don't have the legislation on a provincial basis that can keep a number of these people within the institution. Joseph Fredericks was released to Operation Springboard in Toronto. He walked away and abducted, raped, and murdered young Christopher Stephenson.

The sad part is that nobody wins in a situation like that. He was treated by the mental health act prior to this, but now we get angry with him and we convict him of first-degree murder, we send him off to Kingston Penitentiary, where he's released at his request into the general population, and we allow people to kill him out in the yard. Now, you tell me who the hell won out of all that. Nobody won, especially the Stephenson family. I'm not here for the benefit of offenders, but Joseph Fredericks didn't win either. He's a mentally ill person whom we allowed in the end to be murdered in a prison system.

So your point is well taken. The difficult part, though, is that this falls under provincial legislation. The federal government is not in a position to impose the rules and regulations on a provincial basis, so we're going to continue doing this until such a time as the provinces come together and enact a standard for treating the mentally ill in this country.

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Mr. Ivan Grose: Mr. Sullivan, do you have any comments?

Mr. Steve Sullivan: I agree with Mr. Rosenfeldt. I don't object to your premise. It's a major shift, as you recognize, in the philosophy. The practical problem with people like Fredericks—and maybe we could discuss this in more detail at a different time—is that we don't yet know how to treat them. So whether you put him in a prison or a mental hospital, we're just not there yet. I think Canada leads the way in research into those types of things, and our parole and correction systems do a good job. There are some people we don't know yet how to treat. So that's another practical problem. But certainly regarding the premise that we have people in our system who are mentally ill, you can't debate that.

Mr. Ivan Grose: I have just one comment, and then I'm finished. I'm afraid I won't lean on the issue of it being a provincial responsibility. We're supposed to be able to work that kind of thing out—I'm talking about parliamentarians—so I don't lean on that. I realize the difficulties, but we should do something about it.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: I agree with you.

Mr. Ivan Grose: Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The Chair: Mr. Peter MacKay.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I thank the witnesses.

This subject area, I'm sure, has been covered, but I hearken back to comments we've heard in relation to this legislation about a clear recognition in sentencing when it comes to murder and rape and the need for victims to have it tangibly recognized in the calculation of the sentence. I know that both of you have worked extensively with victims, particularly you, Mr. Rosenfeldt, and what you've been through, you and your family. That leads to the intangible feeling of frustration or lack of confidence on the part of those who have been through it when there isn't a clear indication in the calculation of a sentence for a murder, and the sentence is running simultaneously. I've seen judges try to do that within the existing sentencing parameters, where they try to allot what then appears to be very insignificant sentence attachments to each particular crime.

But when it comes to the crime of murder and these high-end heinous sexual assaults, isn't that what this boils down to in the final analysis, the ability of the judiciary? We would be giving the judiciary legislative change that would allow them to attach the significance of the crime when calculating their sentence.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: That's very well put, Peter. Actually, one of the most major complaints of all victims I've dealt with in the years we've been dealing with families of homicide victims, in multiple murder cases anyway, is the fact that there's no recognition for the loss of their loved one. It can be said that they're doing double, triple or 11 times the time while they're in there for these 15 years. It just doesn't make sense to any victim that he could serve 11 sentences all at once. Does the day last 11 times longer for Clifford Olson than it does for someone else to let him recount what he did to 11 children? I don't think so. There are still only 24 hours in a day. You can't multiply that.

That goes against the argument the other way, which is that you can't give a person 100 years in prison. I differ with that, because in my estimation Clifford Olson, for instance, should have been eligible for a section 745 hearing in 275 years. I don't have a problem with that, because it gives some recognition in there for 15 years, the time he's going to actually do in prison. Whether the 15 years for the murder of our son was the third one down the line or the first one being served is rather irrelevant. But it's really the recognition of the actual victim himself or herself that we're missing today.

There was a case in Calgary where an individual committed a very heinous murder. He was allowed out to get married to his case worker. A year after his conviction they were having Chinese food in a restaurant in MacLeod Trail South in Calgary. His case worker helped him to escape. The two of them took off up to Rocky Mountain House. She got six years in prison, I think, for aiding and abetting a convicted murderer to escape. He got five years in prison, to run concurrently with the current sentence for murder. What's the point?

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But, you're right, victims are looking for some sort of recognition for the crime that was committed against them. I think the best example of that, Peter, is in sexual assault cases. I don't know how many victims have said to me, “Was I not raped? Why is it not being carried through the courts?” I have to tell them the prosecutor decided there was no point in carrying a hundred and some cases through the court. “What we're going to do is convict this guy on 12 counts, and he'll get a number of life sentences for the aggravated sexual assaults”, etc., and that's it. You're done, you're finished, you go home. That's hard for a woman, or any victim, to have to live with. That's the pain we have to live with today, knowing that the murderer in our case is not serving one day in jail for the murder of our son.

Mr. Peter MacKay: To take it one step further, I think there's an importance in the significance of that calculation. And as they do in the United States, when you hear somebody has received a sentence of 144 years, that person's not going to see the light of day.

But let's flip it back to the other side, to the offender, where so often we focus too much of our attention. What is the signal to somebody who's in jail and using this...? This is a very minute example—and I'm not taking the alarmist tack—but there are the Allan Legeres, those who have escaped and who know that the most that is going to happen to them is that their sentence calculation is going to start from the time they're convicted; however, it's going to run concurrently to the time they are now serving. If they're doing 15 years, and two years into their sentence they escape or they kill another prisoner or a guard, their sentence is then going to start to run two years into the sentence. They're still only going to do the maximum amount of time in this country, which is 25 years. And very, very few make it to that date—very few.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: That's right. I would venture to say, Peter, that Wanda Lee Woodward might be alive today if we had consecutive sentencing. And there's a guy, Daniel Gingras, who escaped from prison and murdered a young man from Montreal. He was already doing life imprisonment for murder, he was given a day pass to West Edmonton Mall, and he escaped. He murdered this young man from Quebec, and then he was stealing a car from Wanda Lee Woodward. Why should he leave her alive at this point, because all the sentences run concurrently with his first life sentences for murder? It's always life, so what's the point?

Mr. Peter MacKay: And many of the hard-core criminals, as you know, have intricate knowledge, sometimes better than a law degree, about how sentence calculation works.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: Much better than I do.

Mr. Peter MacKay: They can tell you before the judge does what they're going to get.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: I'd like to jump in, Peter.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Sure.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: That's one point, that the maximum sentence is life without parole for 25 years. But to me the danger with the current system is that if you have someone the police are hunting, for example for suspicion of murder, that person has nothing to lose by killing the police officers who come after him.

Mr. Peter MacKay: Right.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: Life without parole for 25 years is still going to be life without parole for 25 years if you kill the police officers coming after you. From a policing perspective, I think that's a major concern.

Mr. Peter MacKay: If somebody has escaped and they're on the run, and they're in a hold-out situation where they're in a house and they have a hostage, they know they're going back. If they're serving a life sentence already, there's no disincentive for them to kill again—no disincentive.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: Yes. There's another case that comes to mind, Gary McKorkle, who's presently doing time down in Tennessee. He raped and murdered two young boys in Toronto quite a number of years ago. He was released on parole. He abducted, raped, and threw over a bridge his two latest victims. He escaped down to Tennessee. He was already doing a life sentence. Down in Tennessee he was picked up on numerous sex offences against children, and the judge, in sentencing him down there, sentenced him to a life term, meaning actually 99 years in prison.

What the judge stated is that he would not release him to Canadian authorities because of his concern with regard to our sentencing procedures in Canada. He said he had already been convicted of two murders, he was up on two attempted murder and rape charges now—two more boys—and if he released him to Canadian authorities, he was afraid that with our system up here he'd end up back in the community raping and murdering children again.

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Why does it take a Tennessee judge to figure this out? It's something this committee should be able to figure out. We're doing something wrong here. I keep hearing that these people are going to spend the rest of their lives in prison. Why wasn't Gary McKorkle in prison? Why was he allowed to be on the streets to abduct and rape, and throw over a bridge, two more victims? There's something seriously wrong here.

Mr. Peter MacKay: If it's only a small amount—

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. MacKay. We'll have to come back to you.

Mr. Abbott.

Mr. Jim Abbott: I canvassed the issue of retribution, which you did so well. We also talked about safety. I would like your opinion about the third element of putting a person in prison, which is deterrence. In your judgment, of these three, retribution, safety and deterrence, which of those three is served best with the proposals in this bill to see multiple offenders in the most violent of cases put away for a longer period of time?

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: It's hard to differentiate, Mr. Abbott. I believe in all three of those principles, and that there should be retribution for the crimes committed. From a victim's perspective, I think the victim expects to see retribution for their particular crime, which is not being addressed today. They don't see it today.

As far as safety is concerned, I think we would obviously address safety because it may keep the Gary McKorkles in prison for a longer period of time. There's no question about it, it would save lives. I believe that.

As far as the retribution is concerned, I believe in retribution. I believe society has a right to respond to offences that are committed against its people.

Mr. Jim Abbott: Is it the opinion of either of you that this would actually act as a deterrent, and in what situation?

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: I don't think there's any question in my mind that it would act as a deterrent. I'm not so sure people would commit some of the second and third crimes that they're known to commit. The bottom line is that if you walk into a Toronto-Dominion bank and shoot a guard and as you're leaving the police are coming after you, if you're going to get another sentence added on top of that after you maybe mistakenly—the gun went off—shot a guard, you're going to try to kill the police officer. You'll do anything at that point to get away. One more murder doesn't matter at that point.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: The point also is that this is not going to stop multiple killers. It's not going to stop serial killers, but it might make someone think twice. If we can save one life, like the philosophy of the gun control registry, which we supported, then this bill is worth it.

Mr. Jim Abbott: In your opening remarks, Mr. Sullivan, you said the issue is simple: whether this committee accepts the principles or not. What's interesting is that I believe the vast majority of MPs representing their constituents in the House of Commons do, and what will be very challenging will be to see if this ever sees the light of day in the House of Commons again.

Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you. Mr. Saada is next.

Mr. Jacques Saada: The point I was trying to make, and my apologies, was not to go against what you were saying but just to understand properly the system, because there is a misunderstanding here.

Mr. MacKay, you said that there is no possibility for having consecutive sentences or consecutive eligibility periods in case of multiple murders. You gave the example of police. My understanding is that when you are sentenced for a second murder offence occurring after, your ineligibility period starts running at the time of the second murder, notwithstanding what you did before. Am I correct?

Mr. Peter MacKay: Right.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: Can I address that question?

Mr. Jacques Saada: Sure.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: I believe that change was made in Bill C-45 a couple of years ago.

Mr. Jacques Saada: Yes, that's correct.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: What it doesn't do, though, from my understanding, is if you were to kill three children today, your sentence would be life without parole for 25 years. There would be no consecutive parole and eligibility. If you were to get out and then kill someone, yes, it is consecutive, but not for the original.

Mr. Jacques Saada: I wasn't trying to make a substantial argument here, I just wanted to make sure we were on the same wavelength.

Mr. Peter MacKay: But you can never do more than 25 years. It's not going to be tacked on. It starts at 25. Your parole eligibility may be delayed but you're not going to do more than 25 years. That will be your maximum.

Mr. Jacques Saada: Why do you say that? I'm sorry, I don't want to—

The Chair: Can we address the questions to the witness instead of having a discussion across the table.

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Mr. Jacques Saada: My apologies, Mr. Chair. I should have known.

I really have very little to say. What you have alluded to and the number of examples you gave and so on are examples that force us to think. There has to be something wrong somewhere along the line for these things to happen.

I'm not convinced at the present time that we don't have the tools to correct the situations. But I know one thing. Whatever we do, whatever legislation we have, we are not going to change the fact that those who have been taken away have been taken away. Whatever we do, we will not be able to overcome the suffering.

My concern is that we have a system and the system suffers from two illnesses, I feel. One is that it is very little known. The second one is that exceptions are always at the forefront and therefore the public has very limited knowledge of what it can do and can offer.

I asked this question yesterday: Are the tools, including consecutive sentencing, including the addition of ineligibility periods and so on, already in the code as it stands now? The answer I got was yes. Is it applied? Is it applied systematically? I'm not sure. But before changing the rules, I would like to know if the rules are applied properly.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: It's sort of like the victim fine surcharge. The rules were there, but nobody was doing it. The Honourable Ms. McLellan just brought in firm legislation to enact the carrying out of the victim fine surcharge with fines. Maybe we have to change the actual Criminal Code to make sure these sentences are carried out, if it allows for it at this time.

I've been told many times that consecutive sentencing is allowed according to the Criminal Code. But the point is, why is it not being done? Because the direction of the justice ministry, I'm sure, is for concurrent sentencing. That's all we see today, concurrent sentencing. From a victim's point of view, it just doesn't make sense. It's a charade. It's a farce.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Saada.

Mr. Sullivan.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: I have two points. Some of the tools are there. As you know, judges do have the discretion to impose consecutive sentences for sexual assault. This bill would obviously limit that discretion. As we discussed, there is no discretion for people like Clifford Olson. It's a life sentence without parole for 25 years. So yes, some of the tools are there. But I think others aren't.

Regarding your comment about extreme—I don't know the word used—or rare cases like Olson's, those kinds of cases have led to a lot of positive change in this country. Earlier Bill C-55, the high-risk offender bill, was mentioned, which your government passed. One of the leading factors in that case was the Christopher Stephenson murder, the Joseph Fredericks case. Someone could look at that and say that's an extreme case. Well, yes, it is, but it's led to legislation that's going to save lives.

So I think highlighting those types of cases is an important thing for us to do because it can lead to positive changes. It's not just that we like to talk about cases that embarrass judges or governments. It's that we believe they're going to lead to constructive change.

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Jacques Saada: Did I use the word “extreme” cases?

Mr. Steve Sullivan: I'm sorry. I wasn't sure of the word you used.

Mr. Jacques Saada: Okay.

The Chair: Mr. Marceau.

[Translation]

Mr. Richard Marceau: No, that's fine, Mr. Chairman.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. MacKay.

Mr. Peter MacKay: I guess in the final analysis what it comes down to, as you've said, is ensuring that in certain cases...and we're talking here about the very high-end cases that have the most devastating effect. I think the evidence we've heard today makes a very strong case for limiting the discretion or taking away the discretion not to apply consecutive sentences where that effect has taken place.

Regardless of how few and far between these serial murders are, I just think it's incumbent upon us as legislators to do everything, everything in our power, to ensure that if we can save a life by preventing somebody from being released sooner than they should because of the mandatory eligibility dates, that's exactly what we should be doing.

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The Chair: Is there any comment on Mr. MacKay's comment?

Mr. Peter MacKay: That's fine, thank you.

The Chair: Okay. Mr. DeVillers.

Mr. Paul DeVillers: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

We were talking about the difference between the American and Canadian systems. The statistics were given to us yesterday from the Solicitor General's office on the American experience. A person sentenced to life without parole serves on average 29 years. In the Canadian system, even with the application of section 745, the average is 28.4 years. So it appears to be a difference of approximately half a year in the actual practical application of those sentences that people end up serving.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: Are the American statistics for multiple and serial killers or just for—

Mr. Paul DeVillers: I think it is for all lifers without parole in the American system.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: What we do in many cases, Mr. DeVillers, is comparing apples and oranges. I don't think you can compare, for instance, the nature and type of crime we have in Canada with the gang-related violence you're talking about in the American system, where they have a lot of organized crime. We know there are as many murders committed in a month in Chicago as there are in all of Canada in a year. So you can't compare. You have different socio-economic factors. There are too many differences, and I think you'd have to have a case-by-case breakdown to draw a comparison.

For instance, with Japan it shows here 21.5 years. But again, what type of crimes are they dealing with? Every crime is different and you can't just lump them all together in Canada and say that they do so many years in Canada compared with 21 years in Japan and 18.5 years in the United States. That's not a fair comparison. I don't believe that.

Mr. Paul DeVillers: Part of the motivation for this bill and these measures would be that the Canadian system is soft. The Canadian system isn't doing its job in protecting society. When you compare it internationally the numbers seem to add up. That's where I'm having difficulty.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: This doesn't give a true picture either, because it doesn't say how many of these people get back out and commit more crimes in each of these countries. And it doesn't say how many in Canada do.

I do know there are murders being committed on a regular basis by murderers in Canada who have gone to prison and who have been given a life sentence. We just had a woman murdered here in Ottawa about two years ago by a man who murdered his first wife. Why is this happening? Perhaps we should look at our own problems here and try to deal with them.

Mr. Paul DeVillers: Those statistics are here too. Something in the order of 11 people who have murdered were former murderers.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: Could I just respond to the American analogy? I'm not here because I think our system with regard to first-degree murders is necessarily too soft. I mentioned earlier that the tools are there to keep the Olsons and Bernardos in prison forever, for life. What our system can't do, and I mentioned this earlier, is recognize the second, third and fourth victims. It's not about being too soft. I think it's where our system falls down, because it can't do that.

Mr. Paul DeVillers: In the system as it is now, a person is under the control of this system for their natural lifetime, and in these statistics, as indicated here, the person serves on average 28.4 years and then either dies or is in the community under supervision, etc. How is the enactment of this bill going to contribute to public safety over that?

Mr. Steve Sullivan: The statistics with regard to murderers in general skews what multiple killers in America, for example, might serve. If you look at just multiple killers, you might find they serve an average of 50 years in the States. We're talking about a relatively small number of people. I don't know how many there are in Canada. I would guess a couple of hundred. So I don't think this is a very strong argument when you're dealing with that small number of people.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: Mr. DeVillers, you have obviously more faith in Canada's parole system than I do.

Mr. Paul DeVillers: Mr. Sullivan said he thought it was fairly good, and I'm anxious to receive his testimony at our subcommittee.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: I think the parole board does a relatively good job in some areas, but the chairman of the National Parole Board also admitted before this committee just a few years ago to 130 murders being committed in a period of 11 years by people out on parole in this country. So we're not really doing that good a job with regard to murders being committed by people out on parole.

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The Chair: Thank you, Mr. DeVillers.

We have one last question from Mr. John McKay.

Mr. John McKay: This is directed to you, Mr. Sullivan. My concern is with respect to amending the code, which is what we're being invited to do. For better or for worse, this is really all the Government of Canada gets to play with. How it's administered and that sort of stuff gets a little bit beyond our ability.

Looking at the purpose and principles of sentencing, section 718 says “to denounce”, “to deter”, “assist in rehabilitating”, etc. In section 718.2, it then says:

...aggravating...circumstances...where a consecutive sentence are imposed, the combined sentence should not be unduly long or harsh

We've talked about multiple offences of four, of fifty, of a hundred, of that sort of thing. If this bill proceeds, and certainly if the first proposed section of the bill proceeds, and you have a situation in which someone has fifty outstanding charges, first of all, doesn't that bring the administration of justice into disrepute? Second of all, doesn't it create a perverse effect, that being that an individual will be unwilling to confess to this, this and this? You may have suspicion of, or you may feel this person has been the.... The irony will be that out of, say, fifty cases, you'll get convictions on four but you will leave unsolved something in the order of forty or fifty, which would have a perverse effect on those victims.

I'd be interested in your comments on how that might play through the system.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: On the second part, we have plea bargaining now under which cases are left unsolved, I guess you would say.

Mr. John McKay: But there is a resolution, though.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: There is and there isn't. You referred to fifty. There might be cases in which the crown, without this bill, might decide to charge someone with ten if that person pleads guilty, and will leave the other forty aside. Those cases are never really resolved for the victim. That's not going to change. The bill is not going to change the plea bargaining, and our system depends on that.

As for your earlier comment that the fifty charges might bring the system into disrepute, I'm not quite sure I understood what you meant by that.

Mr. John McKay: We heard about some perverse consequences in yesterday's testimony. The argument was put to us that what's going to happen is that it's going to get downloaded from a judicial authority onto more plea bargaining between the crown and the defence attorney. That is going to go on regardless, and you will then have the perverse irony that you will even have less truth in sentencing than what you're presently obtaining. As I understand it, that's the essence of the argument of those who are proponents of the bill. They just don't feel there's enough truth in the sentencing in this situation. When you create an environment for more plea bargaining, you're going to get less truth in sentencing.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: I've thought of it. Certainly it's one of those things you really can't predict. We know there's plea bargaining now, and we know there's going to be plea bargaining if the bill is passed. To be honest, I don't have the answer for you. It's a challenge, and this bill is not going to change plea bargaining. As for whether it's going to encourage plea bargaining, I'm not convinced that it will. Plea bargaining is always going to be a part of our system.

I guess my point is that the system isn't there to make the victims happy, because victims—at least, some of them, anyway—are always going to walk away from the system unsatisfied, whether this bill passes or not.

Mr. John McKay: Yes, I agree.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: I think part of the principle of sentencing, whether it's in the code or not, is to address the harm done to the community and to the victims. You're going to introduce some legislation in a short time that addresses this committee's review of victims, so that we recognize them.

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I know I'm getting off topic, but to be honest, I don't have a pat answer for your question.

Mr. John McKay: But that goes to Mr. Marceau's question about mixing the two issues. Mr. Rosenfeldt's testimony is very compelling with respect to how he was treated by the system and how his son was not recognized in that process. That's a powerful piece of testimony, but I don't know how this bill....

Mr. Steve Sullivan: I guess the thing you could do is separate the two. For example, if you don't think the sexual assault provisions are drafted correctly, or if there are problems that you're not convinced of, obviously you could separate them with the permission of the sponsor of the bill. Just have the provisions regarding to murder, for which I don't think you'd have those same problems.

I think the purpose of the committee is to hear witnesses, decide on things, and make the bill better if you can, so take advantage of that. You have a number of lawyers on this committee. You have access to 1,200 or so at the Department of Justice. You have the tools to make this bill work.

The Chair: Mr. Abbott has one quick question, and I'll ask for a quick response, please.

Mr. Jim Abbott: Do you think changing the word “shall” to the word “may” in the first proposed section of this bill, which would allow for more discretion for the judge, would be beneficial or detrimental to the intent of the bill?

Mr. Steve Sullivan: In the first clause with regard to sexual assault?

Mr. Jim Abbott: Yes, the proposed section that says the judge “shall” impose consecutive sentences. If that “shall” were to be amended to read “may”, would that have a positive or negative impact in your judgment? I'm assuming the net result would be that it would give one more tool to the judges but would not compel the judges. What I got from the chief of police was that he wanted the “shall” to remain, and I'm now asking you for your opinion.

Mr. Steve Sullivan: With regard to the sexual assault provisions, they currently have that discretion. They don't with regard to murder. If you're asking which one I'd prefer, I would prefer the mandatory, but.... Certainly “shall” is better than the current process.

Mr. Gary Rosenfeldt: We'd prefer the mandatory, “shall”.

Mr. Jim Abbott: Okay, thank you.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Rosenfeldt, Mr. Sullivan. I appreciate your comments of this morning.

The meeting is adjourned.