Pubdate: Sun, 03 Jun 2001 Source: Vancouver Sun (CN BC) Section: Pg B3 Copyright: 2001 The Vancouver Sun Contact: http://www.vancouversun.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/477 Author: Daphne Bramham OUR WAR AGAINST INTERNATIONAL CRIME WILL BE EXPENSIVE Before governments, economists and other institutions were promoting globalization, organized criminals were networking and moving their illicit goods rapidly across borders. Experience has made them superb at diversifying quickly to meet demand and ferreting out locations where the cost of doing business is the lowest. They're involved in drugs, money-laundering, weapons sales, people smuggling, prostitution, reselling stolen vehicles, counterfeiting money and credit cards, even toxic-waste. American security agencies said in a report released last December that the rapid rise in international crime due to the end of the Cold War, technological advances and globalization pose a significant threat to democratic governments and free-market economies. The International Monetary Fund estimates of the size of their illegal businesses could be somewhere between $1 trillion and $3 trillion US each year. That's the equivalent of two to five per cent of the value of all goods and services legally produced throughout the world each year. So serious is the concern about transnational crime that in December, Canada, along with 122 member states of the United Nations plus the European Community, signed the Palermo Convention that will increase cooperation on investigating and prosecuting organized, transnational criminals. Since then, Canada and 79 other states plus the European Community have signed a protocol on investigating and prosecuting groups that traffic in people, and Canada and 76 others have signed the protocol on gangs involved in transporting illegal migrants. You might not think that organized crime affects you -- a recent survey showed that most Canadians don't think that it does. But consider that a third of all vehicles stolen in Canada are shipped out of the country. Think about the Fujian migrants who washed up on our coast in the last couple of years having paid up to $50,000 US per person to be smuggled into North America or the thousands of Mexican migrants who pay "coyotes" to get them across the U.S. border. Think about the drug-related crimes and the heroin and crack cocaine addicts on the Downtown Eastside. Until now, combatting transnational criminals has been virtually impossible, says Dimitri Vlassis, a crime prevention officer with the United Nations Centre for International Crime Prevention in Vienna. Vlassis, who spoke here at a weekend conference on international criminal law, says it's only because of globalization -- legitimate globalization -- that the Palermo Convention is possible. And, he says, Canada has been one of the countries pushing for this. At this point, however, it's only fair to point out Canada's important role in getting this convention signed is not so much out of altruism as it is preservation of its own relationship with other countries. Canada is seen by some countries and by some within the country as having a pretty dismal record at dealing with organized crime. A White House report on transnational crime released in December, singled out Canada as a key venue for gangs -- particularly Chinese gangs -- engaged in credit card fraud, heroin trafficking, illegal migration and software piracy. One reason for that is a 1999 ruling by the Supreme Court of Canada that determined police officers have no authority to breach laws in the line of duty. This has resulted in cases thrown out of court because evidence is inadmissible and many undercover operations into people smuggling, hate crimes, gun trafficking and terrorism halted because it was impossible to carry on. On Tuesday, members of Parliament are expected to vote on a bill to remedy that. It's a bill that senior justice department officials view as a possible template for developing countries that sign the UN convention. It's the bill that would give undercover police the right to act as criminals. Richard Mosley, the assistant deputy minister of the federal justice department, assures me there are safeguards in place. The RCMP would have to get permission from the federal solicitor-general to designate specific officers for undercover work. In Vancouver, the chief constable would have to get permission from the provincial solicitor-general. What those designated officers do with that immunity would only be reviewed annually by the responsible minister. There's another catch. Senior officers would be able to designate without getting permission if there's an emergency. And they would be able to give permission to police officers from other countries -- for example, an FBI agent investigating gang activity in Washington that crosses into B.C. -- to break Canadian laws. Should we trust all senior officers to make a decision like that without oversight? And more importantly, should we trust police at all with immunity from prosecution for crimes committed even if it means a bigger crime might be stopped? Designated officers would be allowed to break a whole slew of laws from what Mosley calls "banal ones" such as registering under a false name at a hotel to being able to deal illegal drugs or traffic in contraband, whether it's guns or people. The bill does put some limits on the crimes designated officers can commit. They couldn't, for example, blow up buildings. But they could damage property as long as the owner of the property is notified that she or he can sue the police for damages. Designated officers are also specifically forbidden from doing anything that would cause bodily harm -- this includes sexual assault. On the surface, limits seem to be a good thing. But Gerry Ferguson -- a University of Victoria criminal law professor who has serious reservations about the bill -- points out what those limitations would do is put undercover cops at even more at risk. When crime bosses test the loyalty of new recruits, Ferguson figures they'll be smart enough to ask them to do something that cops are specifically forbidden to do. Mosley agrees it's a problem that could make undercover work more dangerous, but says spelling out the limits are "a matter of public policy" - -- a policy he says most senior police officers support. Stephen Owen -- Liberal MP for Vancouver Quadra, justice committee member, human rights defender, civil libertarian, former ombudsman, former deputy attorney general -- says organized crime is such a problem that countries need "extraordinary tools" to fight it. Owen defends the bill as "a cautious, deliberate approach" that has "lots of accountabilities," including a total review of the bill in three years. I want police and the courts to stop the monstrous gangs who annually abduct, trade and enslave an estimated 400 million people -- two million of whom are children headed for prostitution or for the harvesting of their organs. I want the illegal trade in weapons stopped. I want cars not to be stolen here for shipment and sale abroad. But, I'm uncomfortable with giving blanket immunity to police officers to commit criminal acts even if it appears to be for the right reasons. I'm uncomfortable with the notion of, 'We're the police, so trust us,' even though I know that all cops aren't criminals in waiting and that most police officers are committed to serving the public good. But police go bad. The current This Magazine notes that between 1996 and 2000, 29 police in Quebec alone were convicted of criminal offences -- 11 of those were cases where the cops were tied to gangs. It seems certain that this bill will become law given the Liberal government's majority. In which case, we can only hope that Stephen Owen is right that these are extraordinary circumstances and the safeguards are sufficient. But there's also more at stake here. Canadian government officials want to offer this as a template for developing countries to investigate and prosecute transnational gangs. And if you have doubts about how the law will be (ab)used in Canada, just imagine what could happen in corruption-ridden or gang-infested countries like India, China, Malaysia, Russia and Albania if bad cops have the chance to make their activities legal. - --- MAP posted-by: Beth