Pubdate: Sun, 23 Mar 2008
Source: London Free Press (CN ON)
Copyright: 2008 The London Free Press
Contact: http://www.lfpress.com/cgi-bin/comments.cgi?c=letters_editor
Website: http://www.lfpress.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/243
Author: Greg Weston

PRISONER HOPES TO SEE ENLIGHTENMENT OF DAY

The federal public safety minister is tough on  Canadians in foreign
jails.

If the tragic plight of Brenda Martin follows the  expected course,
the fate of this desperate Canadian  trapped in a Mexican prison
without trial for more than  two years will likely come to rest in the
hands of  Stockwell Day.

Hold the applause.

Canada's public safety minister has the singular power  to decide if
Martin would be allowed to return home to  serve any sentence she
might receive in our penal and  parole system.

Generally speaking, Day's involvement in repatriating  Canadians from
foreign prisons does not call for  champagne.

Over the decades, Canada has negotiated international  prisoner
transfer treaties with 70 countries around the  world, including
Mexico, as an essential component of a  foreign policy rooted in the
federal government's  caring for its citizens abroad.

In the past 30 years, prisoner transfers have been the  final lifeline
for over 1,350 Canadians imprisoned in  foreign hellholes.

It is likely Martin's only hope.

Now the subject of a 24-hour suicide watch, Martin  could roll the
dice with Mexican justice and continue  her already long and likely
futile quest to be  exonerated on fraud charges.

Alternatively, the Mexicans are apparently ready to  convict her
without a trial or let her plead guilty to  a relatively minor
offence, just to get rid of her and  all the diplomatic kerfuffle her
case is causing.

Theoretically, a conviction could put her on a plane  back to Canada
as soon as the two governments could  shuffle the paperwork for a
prisoner transfer.

With the more than two years she has already spent  behind bars in
Mexico, and the understanding of parole  officials here, Martin would
likely never see the  inside of a Canadian jail.

At least, that's how it would all work if Stockwell Day  decided this
particular Canadian is worthy of his  grace.

Until recently and with relatively few exceptions, most  Canadians
imprisoned abroad who have applied to  transfer back to their home and
native lockup have been  automatically accepted where the countries
holding them  agreed to let them go.

Ministerial approval in Canada, by and large, has been  a rubber
stamp.

But all that quietly changed after the current  Conservative
government came to power in 2006 -- more  precisely, after Day became
public safety minister and  resident salesman of all things supposedly
tough on  crime.

As supreme arbiter of the prisoner transfer program,  Day seems to
have a philosophy perhaps best described  as: Screw them.

An internal government report obtained by Sun Media  indicates that in
Day's first year in office, transfer  requests from desperate
Canadians in foreign prisons  simply piled up in his in-basket,
delayed sometimes  months at a time.

Those that did clear the minister's desk were rejected  in record
numbers.

The report shows that in the four years prior to the  Conservatives
coming to office, for instance, 362  Canadians successfully
transferred from foreign prisons  to Canadian lockups.

During the first year Day took over approvals, the  total number of
transfers dropped by almost half.

This was apparently no statistical anomaly.

In fact, Day has taken to boasting about letting  convicted Canadians
rot wherever they happen to be  arrested.

In 2006, the minister wrote in a British Columbia  community
newspaper: "B.C. dope dealers busted in the  U.S. are demanding to be
transferred back to cosier  Canadian jails and reduced prison times.

"Memo to drug dealers: I'm no dope. . . . Enjoy the
U.S."

Aside from the political morality of Day's using his  authority under
the prisoner exchange program to impose  his personal views, what's
the point of it all?

Most of the prisoner transfers turned down by Day are  being rejected
on grounds they "would jeopardize the  safety of Canadians and the
security of Canada."

But those considerations were meant to apply to  terrorists and
organized crime.

For all others, the whole point of the prisoner  transfer program, as
explained by Day's own department,  is to facilitate rehabilitation in
a Canadian  institution and ensure supervised release on parole.

The alternative is serious felons being deported back  to Canada at
the end of their foreign sentences, and  dumped straight onto our streets.

Perhaps faced with a growing threat of lawsuits and  public protest
from families of Canadians jailed  abroad, Day has apparently been
allowing prisoner  transfers at more normal rates recently.

As Brenda Martin reaches for what may be her only  lifeline out of
Mexican hell, she can only pray for the  amazing grace of Stockwell
Day.
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MAP posted-by: Derek