Mandatory Sentencing Debate
The main argument against mandatory sentencing in Canada seems to be that it won’t deter crime. It will mean locking up drug offenders at great cost, while at the same time allow drug trade to flourish.
The Liberal’s gun registry boondoggle is a good example of how we look at fighting crime. We pass all sorts of laws to restrict the rights of Canadians believing that criminals will pay attention and obey them. We already have extremely tough gun laws, but our prosecutors typically drop the gun charges to spare the criminal additional jail time.
We need to force our justice system to enforce our laws – by forcing mandatory sentencing.
Which probably means that when judges or prosecutors have to actually jail some poor soul, they’ll drop the charges to avoid the work.
Out here in Vancouver, it has gotten so out of control, they decided it’s time to have a sit down with the Hells Angels and ask them to play nice. The Hells Angels are the top of the food chain and maybe they could get the other gangs to quit shooting each other.
Our present catch-and-release justice system has helped the gangsters to stay out on the street, and in some cases even afforded them with around the clock protection from our RCMP.
We have gangsters that have been charged with serious crimes – restricted weapons, discharging a firearm, attempted murder, large quantities of drugs, etc., out on the street in days, allowing them to stay in business and leisurely gun down their rivals. If you look through the cases where they have actually caught an assassin, you’ll find that they have been charged many times with serious offenses in the past. And allowed to walk.
Here’s a common example:
Sundeep (Sunny) Ahuja, an associate of the Bacon brothers and the Red Scorpion gang was targeted in a drive-by shooting Wednesday night in Abbotsford. He was charged a while back with Bacon brother Jarrod with attempted murder using a firearm, discharging a firearm and possession of a weapon after two men were wounded in a shooting outside a liquor store. The charges were stayed.
The opponents of mandatory sentencing use the argument that there are a number of reasons why people get involved in drug use and trafficking, including poverty, discrimination, mental illness, depression, chronic pain, sexual abuse, and general desperation.
In other words, the criminal is the victim. The poor Bacon brothers. They had a tough childhood in that awful ghetto called Abbotsford.
Michael Savage, Liberal MP for Dartmouth-Cole Harbour:
…we should be doing more to look at the causes of crime, addiction and what one might call the social ills of society… specifically about the impact that early learning and child care could have in making sure that kids get off to a better start so that they do not find themselves in trouble with the law..
…what kind of impact it would have if Canada had a real early learning and child care program that was based on quality, that was universally available, accessible to all and developmentally based. Canada is at the very bottom of the OECD nations in terms of how much we invest in early learning and child care.
Am I the only one that notices that the solution always comes back to free day care???
It’s too bad that legalizing marijuana in small quantities wasn’t part of the strategy – it would pull the smoke screen from the debate.
Plus, the solution to overcrowded jails is easy… convert the soon-to-be abandoned Chrysler and GM plants as jails and make the inmates build cars. Or solar panels.
Mandatory Minimum Sentencing. Green Jobs. Now there’s a stimulus you can believe in.
