Now that politicians and the public have finally started to discuss guns, gangs and murder, countless explanations have been offered. It's about fatherless families, weak immigration rules and a soft-touch criminal justice system, one side says. No, it's about racism and poverty, the other side counters, and too many guns. All these points are important and worthy of discussion, but there's something missing. Most gang-related murders have one thing in common, one motivation, and yet scarcely a word has been said about this missing piece. But it is the key. Take it out of the equation and most of the killing stops. [continues 719 words]
OTTAWA - Now that politicians and the public have finally started to discuss guns, gangs and murder, countless explanations have been offered. It's about fatherless families, weak immigration rules and a soft-touch criminal justice system, one side says. No, it's about racism and poverty, the other side counters, and too many guns. All these points are important and worthy of discussion, but there's something missing. Most gang-related murders have one thing in common, one motivation, and yet scarcely a word has been said about this missing piece. But it is the key. Take it out of the equation and most of the killing stops. [continues 635 words]
A Quick Reading of History Should Convince Stephen Harper That Get-Tough Attitudes to Drugs in Canada Just Makes the Problem Worse "Our values are under attack," Stephen Harper declared last week in Vancouver. The enemies are drugs, he said, and a federal government that has been far too soft in battling the scourge on the streets. "Some people want to deal with the problem by simply surrendering," Harper fumed, but a Conservative government would wage war. To be precise, it appears from newspaper accounts that Harper didn't actually use the phrase "war on drugs." Too strong a whiff of Ronald Reagan about it, presumably. But his policies are exactly in line with those of the [continues 1044 words]
"Our values are under attack," Stephen Harper declared last weekend in Vancouver. The enemies are drugs, he said, and a federal government that has been far too soft in battling the scourge on the streets. "Some people want to deal with the problem by simply surrendering," Harper fumed, but a Conservative government would wage war. To be precise, it appears from newspaper accounts that Harper didn't actually use the phrase "war on drugs." Too strong a whiff of Ronald Reagan about it, presumably. But his policies are exactly in line with those of the U.S. president who made the phrase famous, as well as the other president, Richard Nixon, who coined it. [continues 1004 words]
The Conservative Leader's New Ideas For Fighting Drugs Are In Fact Very Old, And Still Badly Flawed 'Our values are under attack," Stephen Harper declared Saturday in Vancouver. The enemies are drugs, he said, and a federal government that has been far too soft in battling the scourge on the streets. "Some people want to deal with the problem by simply surrendering," Mr. Harper fumed, but a Conservative government would wage war. To be precise, it appears from newspaper accounts that Mr. Harper didn't actually use the phrase "war on drugs." Too strong a whiff of Ronald Reagan about it, presumably. But his policies are exactly in line with those of the U.S. president who made the phrase famous, as well as the other president, Richard Nixon, who coined it. [continues 1033 words]
Same Stew, Different Spoons When the city's health committee passed a motion Thursday calling for a new approach on illegal drugs, and the motion was reported in this newspaper under the headline "Councillors seek new approach on illegal drugs," Ottawans might have reasonably concluded that the city intends to take a new approach on illegal drugs. But that depends on one's definition of the word "new." If by "new" one means something that has not been done in countless places at various times, then the city's new approach is not likely to qualify. [continues 1322 words]
With the Resurgence of the Marijuana Debate, Supporters of the Status Quo Have Made Several, Related Claims: Marijuana Is Far More Potent Today; More Potent Marijuana Is More Dangerous; and Recent Research Conclusively Proves That Marijuana Can Damage Intelligence and Cause Mental Illness. In This First of Two Parts, Citizen Senior Writer Daniel Gardner Tackles the Questions. Pot today is "as much as seven times stronger than the 'grass' available four years ago," warned an article in Newsweek. That was in 1980. It was already a well-worn theme. [continues 2189 words]
Reports That the Drug Causes Psychosis Have Been Exaggerated, Writes Dan Gardner in the Last of a Two-Part Series Aside from unverifiable conjecture, supporters of the status quo on marijuana rely on a few claims that can be checked against the facts. Most commonly, they argue marijuana is far more potent today than ever before and therefore more dangerous. They say recent research proves that marijuana causes psychosis, and to liberalize the law would risk, as Margret Kopala wrote recently in this newspaper, "turning young users into a psychological underclass." [continues 1727 words]
In the eight years that I have been studying and critiquing the war on marijuana, I've occasionally been asked why I spend so much time on an issue many people think is, at best, trivial. I answered by citing the involvement of major organized crime networks, the billions of dollars spent on enforcement and the criminalization of hundreds of thousands of otherwise lawful citizens for consuming a substance that is, by any fair measure, less dangerous than alcohol or tobacco. [continues 1223 words]
Four police officers murdered over a common plant. That, put simply, is why the legalization of marijuana must be treated as an urgent issue of public policy, writes Dan Gardner, who has spent years studying the war on the drug. In the eight years that I have been studying and critiquing the war on marijuana, I've occasionally been asked why I spend so much time on an issue many people think is, at best, trivial. I answered by citing the involvement of major organized crime networks, the billions of dollars spent on enforcement, and the criminalization of hundreds of thousands of otherwise lawful citizens for consuming a substance that is, by any fair measure, less dangerous than alcohol or tobacco. [continues 1211 words]
That's What's Wrong With Using Prisons To Fight Crime OTTAWA - When Anne McLellan, the minister of public safety, agreed to speak to the annual conference of the Canadian Professional Police Association, she had to know what she would hear. For years, the CPPA has complained to any politician or journalist who would listen that sentences are too light, prisons too soft and parole too easily granted. But the CPPA's predictable complaints were given poignancy by a recent murder allegedly committed by a resident of a halfway house in Vernon -- which would be the third homicide committed by a resident of that facility. [continues 1016 words]
The U.S. Incarceration Binge Has Created the Hangover That Experts Predicted When Anne McLellan, the minister of public safety, agreed to speak to the annual conference of the Canadian Professional Police Association, she had to know what she would hear. For years, the CPPA has complained to any politician or journalist who would listen that sentences are too light, prisons too soft and paroles too easily granted. But the CPPA's predictable complaints were given poignancy by a recent murder allegedly committed by a resident of a halfway house in Vernon, B.C. - -- which would be the third homicide committed by a resident of that facility. After meeting the CPPA last week, the minister had a measured response. No, McLellan said, Canada's prisons are not "Club Feds," as the CPPA likes to say. But "we need to take a serious look at some part of our parole system, how our corrections system operates and whether or not the commitment to public safety is always there." [continues 1019 words]
If We Are Going To Hell In A Handbasket, It's Been A Very Long Ride For the most part, cultural pessimists -- the uber-conservatives who gravely declare that Western civilization has slipped into decadence and will shortly collapse before the barbarian hordes if the stalwart paladin who occupies the White House loses the coming election -- like to talk in terms of high abstraction that does not sully itself with mere evidence. But press them for empirical proof that we are going to hell in a handbasket, and they're likely to mention crime trends. [continues 783 words]
For the most part, cultural pessimists -- the uber-conservatives who gravely declare that Western civilization has slipped into decadence and will shortly collapse before the barbarian hordes if the stalwart paladin who occupies the White House loses the coming election -- like to talk in terms of high abstraction that does not sully itself with mere evidence. But press them for empirical proof that we are going to hell in a handbasket, and they're likely to mention crime trends. Not recent trends, mind you. Cultural pessimists like to think in grander historical terms than that. And besides, crime has fallen in the last 12 years, which is a real downer for doomsayers. [continues 757 words]
Everyone remembers the tale of Al Capone, the ruthless gangster who ruled Chicago in the 1920s. A courageous G-man named Eliot Ness formed "the Untouchables," a tough and incorruptible team that smashed the mobster's rackets one by one. Then, in an ingenious move, Internal Revenue Service accountants nailed Capone for tax evasion and sent him to the Big House for 11 years. Law and order were restored. Children laughed in the sunny streets of Chicago, the music played and the credits rolled. [continues 1002 words]
Instead Of More Resources For Police, We Really Need Fewer Laws To Enforce Everyone remembers the tale of Al Capone, the ruthless gangster who ruled Chicago in the 1920s. A courageous G-man named Eliot Ness formed "the Untouchables," a tough and incorruptible team that smashed the mobster's rackets one by one. Then, in an ingenious move, Internal Revenue Service accountants nailed Capone for tax evasion and sent him to the Big House for 11 years. Law and order were restored. Children laughed in the sunny streets of Chicago, the music played and the credits rolled. [continues 1007 words]
Let's find an economic solution to what is, in reality, an economic problem Everyone remembers the tale of Al Capone, the ruthless gangster who ruled Chicago in the 1920s. A courageous G-man named Eliot Ness formed "the Untouchables," a tough and incorruptible team that smashed the mobster's rackets one by one. Then, in an ingenious move, Internal Revenue Service accountants nailed Capone for tax evasion and sent him to the Big House for 11 years. Law and order were restored. Children laughed in the sunny streets of Chicago, the music played and the credits rolled. [continues 867 words]
With Paul Martin's announcement that the government will reintroduce legislation decriminalizing the possession of marijuana, the old debate has resumed. On one side are the hardliners who say that any softening of the marijuana laws puts the nation at risk of becoming the world's biggest hippie commune. On the other side are those who think it's absurd that a 16 year old caught with a joint should be saddled with a criminal record -- or that an adult should be threatened with jail simply because he chooses to relax on a Friday night with a puff of marijuana instead of a belt of scotch. [continues 861 words]
Instead of more resources for law enforcement agencies, what we really need are fewer laws to enforce Everyone remembers the tale of Al Capone, the ruthless gangster who ruled Chicago in the 1920s. A courageous G-man named Eliot Ness formed "the Untouchables," a tough and incorruptible team that smashed the mobster's rackets one by one. Then, in an ingenious move, Internal Revenue Service accountants nailed Capone for tax evasion and sent him to the Big House for 11 years. Law and order were restored. Children laughed in the sunny streets of Chicago, the music played and the credits rolled. [continues 1002 words]
THE LIBERALS' BILL TO DECRIMINALIZE MARIJUANA WAS BAD POLICY AND DESERVES TO DIE ON THE ORDER PAPER. Barring unforeseen plot twists, a federal election will soon be called and a bill decriminalizing marijuana will go up in flames. As a supporter of marijuana reform, I say, goodbye and good riddance. Decriminalization was not only bad public policy, the bill's production and presentation were deceptive, even fraudulent -- as demonstrated by documents obtained under the Access to Information Act. From the beginning, Martin Cauchon, the justice minister who promoted decriminalization, promised an open discussion, a theme repeated by the throne speech of Sept. 30, 2002, which said the government would "act on the results of parliamentary consultations with Canadians on options for change in our drug laws, including the possibility of the decriminalization of marijuana possession." [continues 838 words]
Critics of Judges and Their 'Lenient' Sentences Don't Understand How Our Courts Operate. a Little Knowledge Would Go a Long Way. Judge David Cole knows that many people, perhaps most, think he and his colleagues are, in his words, "liberal wusses." But he wants those people to know they are wrong -- wrong about judges being criminal-coddlers and wrong about many other things they think they know about the justice system. Critics, insists Judge Cole of the Ontario Court of Justice, "have very little understanding of what goes on in our courts on a daily basis." [continues 1030 words]
The political left, right, and centre all have an unjustified belief that criminal law can fix social ills. I've interviewed Irwin Cotler -- lawyer, human-rights activist, now justice minister -- and I know him to be an intelligent and thoughtful person. But nonsense is nonsense, and last week the minister spoke nonsense. There's no need for stronger hate crime laws, Cotler told reporters, because the Criminal Code already directs judges to make sentences tougher if a crime is motivated by hate. That provision effectively prevents crimes, Cotler added. "It is not only those that have been apprehended, it is also those that have been deterred from the commission of these crimes because these laws are on the books." [continues 901 words]
The political left, right and centre all have an unjustified belief that criminal law can fix social ills. I've interviewed Irwin Cotler -- lawyer, human-rights activist, now justice minister -- and I know him to be an intelligent and thoughtful person. But nonsense is nonsense, and last week the minister spoke nonsense. There's no need for stronger hate crime laws, Mr. Cotler told reporters, because the Criminal Code already directs judges to make sentences tougher if a crime is motivated by hate. That provision effectively prevents crimes, Mr. Cotler added. "It is not only those that have been apprehended, it is also those that have been deterred from the commission of these crimes because these laws are on the books." [continues 1083 words]
Research on Illicit Substances Is As Biased As Its Funding Source "One night's ecstasy use can cause brain damage," shouted a newspaper headline in September 2002, after the journal Science published a study that found a single dose of the drug ecstasy injected into monkeys and baboons caused terrible brain damage. Two of the 10 primates in the study had even died. The media trumpeted the news around the world and drug enforcement officials held it up as definitive proof of the vileness of ecstasy. [continues 801 words]
One night's ecstasy use can cause brain damage, shouted a headline after the journal Science published a study that found a single dose of the drug injected into monkeys and baboons caused severe brain damage. The media trumpeted the news and drug enforcement officials held it up as definitive proof of the vileness of ecstasy. A year later, the author admitted his team had mistakenly injected the primates with massive doses of methamphetamine, not ecstasy. Science retracted the story. Obscure as this incident may sound, it demonstrates something vitally important about illicit drug research. It's a politicized field, says Peter Cohen, professor at the University of Amsterdam's Centre for Drug Research. [continues 445 words]
Research on Illicit Substances Is As Biased As Its Funding Source "One night's ecstasy use can cause brain damage," shouted a newspaper headline in September 2002, after the journal Science published a study that found a single dose of the drug ecstasy injected into monkeys and baboons caused terrible brain damage. Two of the 10 primates in the study had even died. The media trumpeted the news around the world and drug enforcement officials held it up as definitive proof of the vileness of ecstasy. [continues 798 words]
'One night's ecstasy use can cause brain damage," shouted a newspaper headline in September 2002, after the journal Science published a study that found a single dose of the drug ecstasy injected into monkeys and baboons caused terrible brain damage. Two of the 10 primates in the study had even died. The media trumpeted the news around the world and drug enforcement officials held it up as definitive proof of the vileness of ecstasy. But a year later, an odd thing happened. The author of the study, George Ricaurte, admitted his team had mistakenly injected the baboons and monkeys with massive doses of methamphetamine, not ecstasy, and Science formally retracted the article. [continues 770 words]
Claims that gangsters are setting up grow-ops at an alarming pace are often unproven, exaggerated or misleading From coast to coast, the police are telling Canadians to lock up the kids and be afraid. The quiet streets of suburban neighbourhoods across the country are being stalked, the police say, by a tall leafy plant known as marijuana (or "marihuana," as the police and the criminal law still spell it out, as if determined to demonstrate that their thinking on the subject has not changed since the 1930s.) [continues 1313 words]
Don't You Believe It On Thursday, a fraud will be committed in Toronto, but there's no point in calling the police to stop it. The police are the perps. The scene of the "crime" will be a high-profile "summit" organized by the Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police (OACP) and Ontario's Ministry of Community Safety to discuss ways to fight marijuana grow-ops. The summit follows the release last December of an OACP report that goes by the paperback-thriller title of Green Tide. [continues 800 words]
Everyone knows that the United States has gotten "tough on crime." It is the only western country with the death penalty. And over the last 25 years, American federal and state governments imposed brutal sentences, built harsh prisons and cut parole. Its incarceration rate, which was double Canada's in 1980, is now six times higher: There are more prisoners in the United States than there are people in the Maritimes. Something else that distinguishes Canada and the U.S. is the homicide rate. In Canada, it is 1.85 per 100,000 people. In the U.S., it is 5.6 - -- a little more than triple the Canadian rate. [continues 761 words]
A fix or folly?: Canada plans to follow the lead of other countries and start giving free heroin to the most desperate addicts. While the experiment seems outrageous to some, it actually revives a very old medical practice that met its demise early last century when law enforcement wrestled the issue of drugs away from doctors AMSTERDAM - "I have a little bit more money now and it's fun to buy a pair of shoes or buy a sweater or a book. I love reading. Very soon I'm going to get a computer." [continues 4185 words]
In What May Seem Like a Bizarre Notion, Canada Is Getting Ready to Prescribe Heroin to Addicts In Three Major Cities "I have a little bit more money now and it's fun to buy a pair of shoes or buy a sweater or a book. I love reading. Very soon I'm going to get a computer." Marion claps her hands and bounces in her seat, looking less like the thoughtful 44-year-old she is than a kid at Christmas. [continues 6818 words]
A cutting-edge plan - if this was 1968: Replacing the criminal charge for possession with a fine will change little, or nothing at all. Marijuana reform has been debated on and off for 30 years, Justice Minister Martin Cauchon said at a press conference yesterday. The research is in. The reports are in. "Now is the time to act," the minister boldly declared. Or at least it sounded bold. Certainly the minister would like Canadians to think the government's plan is bold. And it would have been -- in 1968. [continues 1017 words]
Is Canada A Drug Haven, Or Is Our Bad Rap All Smoke And Mirrors? Canada has become a major marijuana producer and exporter. Canadian marijuana is super-potent and dangerous. Canada's laws are too soft to deter growers and traffickers. Major organized crime syndicates control the production and trafficking of Canadian pot. These "facts" have been repeated over and over by officials, politicians and police officers in Canada and the United States. With the federal government promising the decriminalization of marijuana possession, these claims are playing key roles. They are part of what "everybody knows." Supporters and opponents of decriminalization alike usually accept and cite them to suit their arguments. [continues 2726 words]
While I respect Jack Granatstein's opinions in other matters, he clearly needs to learn more about drug policy (Potheads in Power, Dec. 17). In Canada, three-quarters of all drug offences involve marijuana. A little more than half of all drug offences involve possession of pot. By one estimate, Canada spends $1-billion a year on drug-law enforcement and yet, according to the auditor-general and many other informed sources, the government has little evidence to show what all that spending is accomplishing. Imagine setting up one gun registry a year, every year, for decades, and you have some idea of the folly of the status quo. [continues 167 words]
While doing some research in the Netherlands recently, I was told a curious story by an Amsterdam city councillor. This councillor is also the owner of a "coffee shop" - a pub that sells marijuana - and so he often plays host to the foreign officials who constantly tour Holland and marvel at how the country's liberal justice policies have somehow managed to fail to spawn depravity, misery and chaos of biblical proportions. One day, he told me, he showed a foreign politician around his pleasant little shop. He pointed to the second floor and told the visitor he had another room upstairs. "That's where they inject hashish," he said with a straight face. [continues 698 words]
While doing some research in the Netherlands recently, I was told a curious story by an Amsterdam city councillor. This councillor is also the owner of a "coffee shop" - a pub that sells marijuana - and so he often plays host to the foreign officials who constantly tour Holland and marvel at how the country's liberal justice policies have somehow managed to fail to spawn depravity, misery and chaos of biblical proportions. One day, he told me, he showed a foreign politician around his pleasant little shop. He pointed to the second floor and told the visitor he had another room upstairs. "That's where they inject hashish," he said with a straight face. [continues 693 words]
Anti-Drug Programs Makes Adults Feel Good, But All They're Doing Is Digging A Giant Credibility Hole Marsha Rosenbaum says it was "a nice Jewish girl, just like me" who showed her what's wrong with trying to scare kids away from illegal drugs. At the time, 25 years ago, Rosenbaum was interviewing women addicted to heroin for her doctoral dissertation. She met the nice Jewish girl in jail. "She was just the straightest-looking, middle-class woman," Rosenbaum recalls. "But our lives had taken such different turns." [continues 2667 words]
It is rational, rigorous, comprehensive, lucid, thoughtful and scientifically sound. And unless there are cabinet ministers with more vision and courage than their predecessors, the Senate's magnificent report on marijuana will quickly disappear into the Parliamentary Library and be forgotten. I wish I were more optimistic. I wish I could believe that the four-volume, 650-page report -- the product of 39 meetings with 234 witnesses in eight cities -- might have lasting effect. I wish I could believe federal ministers will sit down and really read it, consider its evidence and arguments, and act on their judgment about what's best for Canada. [continues 1486 words]
Haunted By Painful Pasts, Vancouver's Addicts Work The Downtown Eastside's Hooker Stroll Looking For Their Next Fix "I get yelled at a lot by people driving by," says Jason, staring into his coffee cup. They "come down here from the suburbs and from their houses and they treat the people down here as subhuman." "Down here" is Vancouver's notorious downtown eastside. Years ago, the neighbourhood was known as Skid Row but things have gotten much worse since then. Today, the downtown eastside is infamous for its drug addicts, prostitutes and despair. From these streets 50 women have vanished since the 1980s, and the neighbourhood is Ground Zero for one of the biggest police investigations in Canadian history that has already seen six charges of first-degree murder laid against Robert William Pickton, 52, a Port Coquitlam pig farmer. [continues 2785 words]
Part 1: Law And Disorder http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v02/n536/a11.html Part 2: Behind Bars http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v02/n537/a02.html Part 3: Bars And Stripes http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v02/n537/a01.html Part 4: Jailbreak http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v02/n557/a08.html Part 5: More Enforcement, Not Harsher Penalties http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v02/n537/a03.html Part 6: Why Finland Is Soft On Crime http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v02/n500/a04.html [continues 110 words]
Guy Ritchie is articulate and thoughtful, his sport coat and sweater the natural choice of a soft-spoken professor. No one would think this slight, middle-aged man is a convicted second-degree murderer. Three years have passed since his release after 22 years in prison. He lives in Ottawa in the quasi-freedom of parole, required to report to officials who will forever monitor where he goes and what he does. "I'm a lifer," he shrugs. In 1981, he was 21 years old and a bit of a punk. Like so many young men, he was a petty troublemaker, convicted once for a minor assault. That changed one day in September. "My situation started as a push," he says, clearly uneasy, but direct nonetheless. "It escalated into a fight for my life, and the victim's life, within seconds. [continues 2187 words]
What is the recidivism rate? It seems like a simple question to answer. It certainly is important. We want the justice system to rehabilitate or deter offenders from committing new crimes after they are released. So knowing the rate at which offenders commit new crimes after being released is crucial. And yet, the recidivism rate in Canada is unknown. There are many reason for this, but the most basic one is the constitution. The federal government handles offenders sentenced to more than two years, while the provinces deal with offenders serving less than two years, and young offenders. (Some provinces further subdivide young offenders by age group.) As a result, there isn't one correctional system in Canada -- there are many. [continues 422 words]
After 70 Years, Russia Is Ready To Concede Its Tough-on-crime Experiment Is A Costly, Merciless Failure Maxim Maslov stands on the bank of St. Petersburg's famous River Neva, but his back is turned to the water and the grand historical buildings that line the far shore. Instead, he stares intently across a busy four-lane highway to a tiny window in the massive prison known as Kresty. A pole pokes through the window -- a blowgun made from rolled newspapers and tape. A dart sails 40 metres, landing at the highway's edge. Maslov lunges into the roaring traffic, snatches up the dart and jumps back to the curb. The dart, also made of coiled newspaper, has a hollow shaft from which Maslov plucks a tightly curled piece of paper. He eagerly reads the tiny note. [continues 3151 words]
From Superjails To Boot Camps, The Tories Have Imported U.S.-Style Justice To Ontario, And Are Pushing Hard For The Rest Of Canada To Follow Suit. Just as the Empire State building stands as a pure expression of Art Deco, so the Maplehurst Correctional Complex embodies the ideals of the new American school of prison architecture. Maplehurst is not, however, an American prison. Located just west of Toronto, it was built under the direction of the Conservative government of Ontario. And it is more than just an embodiment of the latest American theories of imprisonment: It is also a symbol of the rise of American-style "tough-on-crime" policies in this country. [continues 2861 words]
The Liberals' inconsistency on crime and punishment is, in an odd sense, quite democratic: The feelings of the Canadian public are far from consistent. That may not be immediately apparent in quick-hit public opinion surveys. These consistently show, as they do in the United States, that most Canadians think the criminal justice system is soft and should adopt a harder line on sentences, parole and prison conditions. But more detailed questioning yields very different responses. Julian Roberts cites research he conducted that asked Canadians whether they favoured a flat-time system -- a three-year sentence is three years, six is six -- or the status quo, in which an offender will probably serve the last half or two-thirds of a sentence under parole supervision in the community. "And (Canadians) went three-for-one in favour of the parole system. So they don't trust parole boards very much, but there is a very strong bedrock of support even for something many people would say the public don't like." [continues 842 words]
Lawn Chairs And Razor Wire, Barbecues And Armed Guards: Bath Institution Sums Up The Canadian Struggle To Choose Between U.S.-Style Hard Time And European-Style Rehab. Sunshine pours down on a cluster of modest townhouses, drawing the residents outside to engage in the rituals that typically greet the first warm day of spring. A man fills a charcoal barbecue. Another strolls with his shirt off, his pale skin shining. Neighbours talk at a picnic table. A man sits on a plastic lawn chair, stroking a plump black-and-white cat. In the distance, a ribbon of Lake Ontario can be seen glistening in the sun. [continues 2908 words]
The Provincial Government Says The Corrections System Needs To Be Overhauled Because Many Offenders Commit Crimes After Being Released. There's Just One Problem: They Don't Really Know. Ontario's Conservative government has repeatedly claimed the provincial corrections system must be completely overhauled because it does not work. The central piece of evidence cited by provincial ministers in support of this claim is the rate at which provincial offenders commit new crimes after being released: the recidivism rate. "Sadly, 70 per cent to 80 per cent of inmates re-offend after completing their sentence," said a government press release issued in 2001 to announce the opening of the first of Ontario's new superjails. [continues 769 words]
The case against an American style justice system; Across the world, politicians have heard that the U.S. has found the solution to crime, but the American illusion of safety through punishment has been bought at an awful expense. One evening last spring I took a walk on the famous streets of San Francisco, looking for a little solace. It had been an exhausting week of travel and research -- not just physically exhausting, but morally. A day's drive north of San Francisco, I had toured Pelican Bay state prison, one of the new breed of "supermax" lockups -- tiny, alien worlds where prisoners spend virtually every waking moment in concrete cells, stripped of almost all human contact, as days, weeks, months and years creep by. [continues 1779 words]
For at least the last 20 years, drunk driving in Canada has been attacked with a combination of public education, spot checks, and increased criminal punishments, including imprisonment. Over the same period, drunk driving has substantially decreased. It's probable most Canadians assume tougher punishments were crucial to that happy result, and even tougher punishments will reduce drunk driving even further. Finland's experience with drunk driving strongly suggests that assumption is wrong. Like all the Nordic countries, Finland has long had serious problems with alcohol abuse. The traditional Finnish response relied heavily on criminal law. Drunk driving, in particular, was severely punished: In the late 1960s, more than 80 per cent of convicted drunk drivers were given prison sentences. [continues 441 words]
