New Democrat Libby Davies repeatedly grilled Mr. Nicholson on whether he has any evidence that minimum mandatory jail terms reduce crime. Ms. Davies cited studies prepared for the Justice Department several years ago showing that automatically jailing drug criminals does nothing to deter crime, as has been shown in the United States.
"Many States are repealing their mandatory minimums," Ms. Davies said.
Mr. Nicholson declined to supply any evidence to the contrary, but he insisted that "we are absolutely convinced in our consultation with Canadians that this is welcomed across the country." More...
April 22, 2009
Conservative Justice Minister, Rob Nicholson, defending Bill C-15 at committee. In this clip, Mr. Nicholson refuses to answer whether or not he spoke to Senate Report chair Senator Pierre-Claude Nolin and stonewalls NDP committee member, Libby Davies, when asked to present evidence that mandatory minimum sentences work.
Department of Justice
Canada Justice Department Study on Mandatory Minimums
Department of Justice Canada -
Research and Statistics Division
January 2002
"MANDATORY MINIMUM PENALTIES: Their Effects on Crime, Sentencing Disparities, and Justice System Expenditures" Download the Report (PDF, 1.6M)
[excerpts:]
9.5 Mandatory Sentences for Drug Offences (page 30)
"Severe [Mandatory Minimum Sentences] seem to be least effective in relation to drug offences. Studies using a variety of methodologies seriously question the value of the 'drug war' approach."
"Drug consumption and drug-related crime seem to be unaffected, in any measurable way, by severe [Mandatory Minimum Sentences]."
2007
Crown agents bill record tab for drug prosecutions The Lawyers Weekly -
Vol. 27, No. 18
September 2007
Drug prosecution costs soared to their highest level in history during the Conservative government’s first year in office – comprising more than half the $50-million tab billed by private-sector law firms who represented the federal Crown in criminal and civil litigation in 2006-2007.
...
In all, the total prosecutions tab for the war on drugs rose to a record $60 million in 2006-2007, including the billings of some 800 prosecutors in 250 law firms across the country, plus about $34 million for prosecutions handled in-house by staff prosecutors at the new Public Prosecutions Service of Canada.
...
The top Crown agent amongst federal prosecutors, Murchison, Thomson & Clarke of Surrey and White Rock, B.C. (#4 overall), billed $1.2 million, the same as the year before, for its team of seven full-time federal Crowns who prosecute marijuana grow operations and drug trafficking in and around the second largest city in B.C. Read the full article
Judges are the most powerful protection Canadians have from the abuse of power by police and government, former prime minister Brian Mulroney said on the weekend.
... Prime Minister Stephen Harper wants to add police to the committees, an addition critics say politicizes the selection process and chips away at judicial independence.
Harper has also said he wants to select judges who share Conservative goals of getting tough on crime.More...
Harper, speaking at an annual appreciation dinner for York Regional Police, said the Conservatives have introduced 11 crime bills last year but nine have yet to be passed by the House of Commons.
... "I would suggest that you not hesitate to pressure … all parties to get on with passing this legislation," Harper said.
Police officers across Canada should politely decline Prime Minister Stephen Harper's invitation to become active political allies in his quest to toughen an array of criminal laws. In a speech Thursday, Harper urged police officers to use their considerable numbers and position in society to lobby opposition parties. But such a call to arms, metaphoricaly speaking, is both inappropriate and dangerous. It could fuel speculation that the prime minister has far too cosy a relationship with the top brass of the RCMP and other police forces.
The Canadian public deserves to feel confident that their police forces keep to their assigned role as objective, apolitical peace officers who respect the rule and the spirit of the law.
The appointment of Rob Sampson, former solicitor general and minister responsible for privatization in the government of Mike Harris, could serve as fodder for speculation the Harper Conservatives are warm to the idea of privatizing federal prisons.
...
"Putting that kind of person on the panel is a clear signal that they [the Conservatives] don't believe that [prisons] are a public responsibility and that they can be farmed out to the private system," said Neil Boyd, a criminologist at Simon Fraser University and a fierce critic of the government’s law-and-order agenda.More...
Conservative policymakers have long arugued that minimum sentences are effective deterrents. But the harshness of the penalty is not what deters someone from committing a crime; rather, it's the likelihood of getting caught, says Barry Beyerstein, a member of the Canadian Centre for Drug Policy.
And mandatory minimum sentences are a bad idea on principle. In western legal systems, part of the reason everyone gets their own trial is that the circumstances of individual cases are always unique.
Politicians have no business making pre-ordained decisions on the future of people brought before the courts. A judge who has heard the case from start to finish should be the only person to decide what penalties are appropriate.
Simply put, it's too draconian to pass a law that ignores mitigating circumstances. More...
It is, therefore, very interesting that in Canada, what the study found to be the fifth and ninth most harmful drugs are perfectly legal while marijuana, which didn’t even make it into the top 10, at least by the design of this study, is illegal.
So while anyone selling, growing or possessing pot can look forward to appearing in front of a judge and possibly spending some time behind bars, the agency responsible for controlling the distribution and sale of liquor in this province, for example, spends millions advertising its potentially dangerous product to the buying public.More...
The study says Canadians have an exaggerated view of the harms associated with illegal drugs, possibly fueled by vivid media reports, and the emphasis given the subject by police organizations, political leaders and policy-makers.More...
The U.S. drug czar, John Walters, is in Ottawa today, trying his best to put a positive spin on one of the greatest disasters in U.S. foreign and domestic policy. Part of his agenda is to persuade Canada to follow in U.S. footsteps, which can only happen if Canadians ignore science, compassion, health and human rights. More...
Many Conservative voters see drug legalization as another left-wing cause that would erode Canada’s social fabric — and Harper’s unequivocal position no doubt reflects that thinking.
Legalization, however, does not mean condoning drug use. It means, first of all, striking the hardest blow possible against organized crime.
Isn’t that the theme of Harper’s “law and order” stance?More...
Stephen Harper is frankly admitting that he's looking for judges who will back his law-and-order agenda - and provoking cries from his opponents that he's trying to subvert the judiciary for political ends.
"We are bringing forward laws to make sure that we crack down on crime - that we make our streets and communities safer," the prime minister declared in the Commons on Wednesday. "We want to make sure our selection of judges is in correspondence with those objectives."More...
Conservative ministers and their aides are consulting with "keen" U.S. government officials on a new national drug strategy, according to internal documents obtained by CanWest.
"There have been various senior-level meetings between U.S. officials and ministers/minister's offices," states a summary of a June 16, 2006, meeting on the Tory drug initiative involving top federal bureaucrats at nine federal departments and agencies.
"U.S. officials have been keen to discuss drug issues with the current government." More...
The law-and-order agenda of the Harper Conservative government has made police one of the most powerful and influential lobby groups on Parliament Hill.
After years of being bystanders in Parliament's corridors of power, police meet with cabinet ministers while they are crafting law-and-order legislation; they often stand at the government's side when announcements are made; and they enjoy generous access to senior politicians who frequently accept invitations to speak at police events.
"There's obviously a tendency on the part of this government to pander to police interests," laments Louise Botham, president of the Criminal Lawyers Association, which defends the rights of the accused. More...
Legalizing part of the drug trade would see it treated as are tobacco and alcohol, the report says.
Drug addictions would become health problems, rather than criminal justice issues.
"The trade would be subject to reasonable taxes that could be directed to the health-care system," ensuring the problems drugs create would be cared for by revenue the trade would also generate. More...
Canada's cops are about to get a say over who can be a federal judge under changes Justice Minister Vic Toews is set to unveil soon.
The latest part of the Tories' law-and-order agenda will see police representatives added to the judicial advisory committees operating in each province that assess the qualifications of potential judges.
But given the way Toews has previously railed against activist judges with Liberal ties, his plan to reform the system is also raising suspicions his real goal is to make it easier to put a Tory stamp on the country's judiciary. More...
The paper states: "credible research shows that longer sentences do not contribute to public safety" and "there is little or no empirical evidence to support the premise that hiring more police, as proposed in the platform, will have the result of reducing rates of crime and victimization." more...
RCMP media relations officers in B.C. should consider being less helpful to
reporters in an effort to reduce the number of crime stories in the media,
an internal RCMP report obtained by The Vancouver Sun recommends.
The report, prepared last year by the Mounties' B.C. communications section,
argues the public has an irrational fear of crime -- mainly due to the large
number of crime stories in newspapers and newscasts.
Those stories, the report found, are often sparked by RCMP news releases or
comments from officers. more...
Ottawa CitizenThe Tories apparently ignored the advice from Justice Department lawyers, which was contained in a briefing book for Justice Minister Vic Toews released yesterday through an Access to Information request.
"Research into the effectiveness of mandatory minimum sentences has established that they do not have any obvious special deterrent or educative effect and are no more effective than less serious sanctions in preventing crime," said the briefing book.more...
"The United States puts more people behind bars than any other western democracy. So why is the Conservative government looking to the U.S. as a model in its war on crime? It is a phoney war because crime has declined in Canada." more...
[Sen. Pierre Claude Nolin] argued that current drug laws discriminate unfairly against young people, who are more likely to look suspicious to police and lack a private place to use drugs.
"We shouldn't try to ban the substance. We should try to prevent problematic use of it," Nolin said.
If government controlled the sale of marijuana, it would take the pot trade out of the hands of organized criminals and ensure the drug is not laced with other drugs or harmful chemicals, he said.
Simple decriminalization of pot possession addresses neither of these issues, Nolin added.more...
North Shore News (CN BC)Is it not the legitimate role of government, which got us into this mess in the first place by creating the hysteria over drugs, to undo that and properly prepare and equip Canadians - in other words, to lead?more...
"My advice to Canada is stay as completely far away from U.S. drug law policy as possible," said David Soares, the district attorney for Albany County in the state of New York.more...
"My fear is that we're going to fall more and more into the pocket of the American war-on-drugs approach," says Eugene Oscapella of the Canadian Foundation for Drug Policy.
"We're doing a bad enough job on our own but we don't need to go ahead and make it worse by getting more deeply involved in that punitive criminal justice approach, which doesn't work."more...
