Canada’s justice system is bringing itself into disrepute
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Summary
Five former Hockey Canada players were acquitted of sexual assault charges in a London, Ontario court on Thursday. A jury found that the accuser had consented to sex with the men in a hotel room and that she had consent to have sex with them.
Transcript
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There's been no end of stories of ridiculous judgments coming out of our court system over
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the past few weeks, and we wanted to talk about that today on the Full Comment Podcast. Hello,
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welcome to the podcast. My name's Brian Lilly, your host. But before we got to getting to this
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podcast about the ridiculousness of our court system, of course, we had the big verdict in the
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trial in London, Ontario, of five former Hockey Canada players and a young woman accusing them
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of sexual assault. So, to help us unpack all of this, to look at the good, the bad, and the ugly
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of our judicial system, two National Post columnists, Chris Selle and Jamie Sarkanak, join me now.
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Welcome. I wasn't planning on talking about the Hockey Canada verdict, but I'm not sure if people
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should have been shocked. It appears many were that it was a not guilty verdict. Jamie, I know you're
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writing on this, so let me start with you. Yeah, I mean, it seems like justice was done. That was my
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first impression. Closely reading the facts, it seems like a regretful night for everyone who was in the
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room, to be honest. And I can see why the complainant felt shame afterwards. The guys didn't emerge
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unscathed either from their side of the story. It was awkward. It was something they especially
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regretted after when they started considering the consequences. Even though they felt, they appeared
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based on the facts and the evidence submitted that they were confident they had had consent. But
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still, it was not a fun event looking back for them. But ultimately, what happened was the judge
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found that the complainant, the girl, had consented. So, it's not that she just couldn't prove that
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sexual assault happened. She actually found that consent had occurred. So, good.
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Well, this is Superior Court Justice Maria Caroccia. So, it was a woman hearing the case, a woman
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rendering the verdict. And reading from my son colleague Michelle Mandel's piece, she talks about
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how Justice Caroccia said that she just didn't buy the testimony of EM. And she points to testimony that
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the woman was acting in a sexually forward manner when she was masturbating in this room full of men and
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asking them to have sex with her. Like you say, this is a regretful night for everyone. But it
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doesn't necessarily mean that a law was broken. Morally, it's all repugnant. But was there a criminal
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code violation? That's something different. And I am hearing a lot of voices saying women were let
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Yeah, that's not my take. My take is that this is good for women. Because when you have decisions
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like this, when consent is so clear, and the judge finds that, you know, I truly think justice was done
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here. This helps maintain integrity in the cases of sexual assault that are serious, that are just
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horrific. I mean, there's plenty of sexual assault that goes on that is just terrible. And, you know,
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either doesn't get prosecuted, or, or the guy gets prosecuted, and gets something like conditional
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just discharge, which I've, I've written on a case like that before, you know, that's terrible. So
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yeah, when when judges correctly draw lines, like this, it's, it's good for women.
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Chris, it appears that the London Police Service who investigated this case years ago, this goes back
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to 2018. It looks like they got it right when they closed the case and said, we don't see
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enough evidence to warrant charges. And of course, it had to be opened back up after reporting that
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Hockey Canada had paid the woman to, you know, settle a dispute. Apparently, the players were
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not informed of that. Hockey Canada did it themselves. There was a lot of outcry and police
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had dropped the ball and prosecutors weren't being strong enough. Well, looks like the public outcry
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may have been incorrect. Yeah, I mean, it certainly looks to me and it looked all along that the fact
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that they were prosecuting this so many years down the line, um, after initially deciding there,
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there wasn't sufficient, uh, cause to go to court was the right decision. I mean, I, I don't think
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anything really changed. Um, you know, the, the, the, the, the judge's ruling was so emphatic,
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as Jamie said, not, it wasn't just reasonable doubt. I mean, I, I always expected that there would at
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least be reasonable doubt, uh, but an, an affirmative finding that she consented. I mean,
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that's, that's as close to innocent as you can really get, um, with a, not, with a not guilty plea.
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Um, you know, I hope that they learned some lessons. I mean, they're older now. Um, but you
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would hope that the younger hockey players would learn a lesson from this, uh, which is that that
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kind of stuff, um, is why I think you use the word repugnant and it is, uh, it was repugnant
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behavior. And, uh, if you're acting worse than a character in white Lotus, rethink your actions.
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Yeah. And, and, and some guys walked out, right. Some guys went in and were like, Whoa,
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I don't want anything to do with this. So it wasn't like everyone was, um, you know, party to this, um,
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crazy scene, but, uh, you know, I, I think, you know, the, the, the interesting theory or the
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interesting issue going forward now, I suppose is, is what does hockey learn from this? I mean,
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the, the players were still, uh, suspended by the NHL. They're still ineligible for playing
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for them had their contracts. Um, I guess they just weren't renewed after they were charged
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and, and they're all banned from playing. Yeah. Um, I think, I think officially they're banned
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from playing pending the appeal period. So if the crown decides, um, not to appeal, then they
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might be, uh, allowed back, but I mean, you know, I, I, um, I don't have a lot of sympathy,
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uh, for them on that. I mean, you're allowed to not sign players who you think are morally
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repugnant, not just who are criminals. Yeah, no, the, the NHL is well within their rights to do that.
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Um, I, I'm not sure that I would, uh, want my daughters around any young men acting like this,
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but I also know that I wouldn't want my daughters acting in the way that EM did in this. As Jamie
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said at, at the beginning, uh, a regretful night for all, uh, what does this do for the, the reputation
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of the justice system though? Uh, Jamie, you said that they got it right, but there's still going to
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be an outcry and we are hearing it that women just aren't believed, uh, justice. Actually,
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let me read this. Um, because justice Croce did, um, address that issue of you've got to believe
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women, you've got to believe the victim. And she wrote in approaching this task, I am mindful of
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the words of Molly J in RV Nitsnick at paragraph 17 quote, although the slogan believe the victim has
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become popularized of late. It has no place in criminal, in a criminal trial to approach a trial
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with the assumption that the complainant is telling the truth is the equivalent of imposing
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a presumption of guilt on the person accused of sexual assault, and then placing a burden on him
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to prove his innocence. That is antithetical to the fundamental principles of justice enshrined in
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our constitution and the values underlying our free and democratic society. Your thoughts, Jamie?
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Um, I agree. It's, she states the, she states how it is very clearly. I think when you have this
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movement of like, there's a movement of EM supporters and that's, that's fine. I think
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solidarity with, with a complainant is okay, but they were, they were yelling at the players as they
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were leaving the court was the report. And also there was one of them while one of the defense lawyers
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was giving a statement. She was kind of standing behind her with a sign that said, uh, it was some
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message of support to EM. She was event, this woman was eventually moved out by security, but
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there was, I understand feeling sympathy for EM.
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I do too. It's the conduct of, of this group. And I think it reflects poorly on them. I'm not sure
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that they fully understand how justice works in Canada. And I think their expectations
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for how a justice system is supposed to work in one, with one particular crime, because they don't
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want these, they, they don't want these kinds of standards that they, that they want for sexual
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assault to apply to any other crime. It's just purely sexual assault. Um, and it's a total corruption
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of, of the Canadian justice system. This, this, this idea that we need to sort of put our thumbs on the
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scale to make it much harder for a sexual assault accused person to defend themself.
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You know, there was, there was some talk when I was watching the CBC feed, I believe it was one of
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the advocates on the so-called EM side talking about how she was, she was never not believed like this
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before. And it shouldn't, there was some sort of injustice in that she had to go up and testify to
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her side of the story. And that's, that's absurd to me. It's an, if it's an assault case, the, the,
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the victim should have to go up and make her case. And yeah, yeah, you, it doesn't, it doesn't feel
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good to be cross-examined, but that's kind of what you have to go through if you're going to throw a man
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in jail for, for your story. I understand that there's been, have been years of, uh, you know,
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women not being treated fairly in the court system, but you know, you, you need to testify.
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Someone has the right to face their accuser in court and to, to do away with that would be a
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miscarriage of justice. It appears that we're all in, in, uh, agreement on this case. So let me turn
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to one of the cases that I wanted to bring this together to talk about. And I think we've all
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taken a stab at this in various columns and that's the Supreme court decision of just over a week ago
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where they have made it virtually impossible to convict a young offender of an adult crime.
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So I'm going to read to you the details from the case that I had in my column. Um, the case revolves
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around a young man identified in the judgment only as I am in January of 2011. I am, and at least
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three other men approached a 17 year old identified as ST while he was shoveling snow outside his family
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home. They attacked ST strike a stabbing and striking him repeatedly and leaving him to bleed
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out with 12 stab wounds and 10 blunt force injuries. They, uh, then burst into the home where according
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to the Ontario appeals court, they attacked the victim's mother. Here's the quote from the Ontario
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Appeals Court decision that upheld his, uh, adult sentence. The first man to enter ST's, uh, enter hit
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ST's mother in the head twice with a gun. The second man, uh, to enter punched her and forced her to sit
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on a chair in the interior porch with her head between her knees. The men left the home when the victim's
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father and brother arrived. They, they, they had planned this attack on ST to try and get a gun.
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And I am, who was eventually convicted after returning to the country after two years away,
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because he fled the country. Um, he was 17 years, five months old when he did this. He bragged about
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his role in this to his friends. He disposed of evidence. And the Supreme Court said that the, the
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current legislation, which says a just must be a judge must be satisfied. That is the language
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satisfied that the crown has shown them, uh, the young offender to have the moral culpability of an
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adult. They said, no, you you've got to prove that beyond a reasonable doubt, even though it's just as
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Cote put in her dissenting decision. Uh, parliament had considered this idea at least twice in the past
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bunch of years and rejected it. Um, this is the Supreme court at its worst, Chris, in my view,
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this is liberal judges putting liberal interpretations of the law into place. And there's
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no recourse unless we use the notwithstanding clause. Well, yeah, I mean, I would agree with
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you that it's, it's just a terrible decision and that the dissent, um, just tears it to shreds
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politely, but nevertheless tears it to shreds. And I can't imagine being one of the other
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seven judges and reading that dissent and thinking, nah, you know, you would have to basically reject
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the whole idea of parliamentary supremacy. Now, I suppose maybe that, maybe that ship has sailed,
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but you know, this was a particularly glaring example of the Supreme court, just not caring
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what parliament's intent was. And the intent was, uh, you know, this is, this is sometimes not true
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in some cases where it's not that easy to find out, to figure out what parliament's intent was.
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But in this case, it was debated over and over and over again. There were committee transcripts,
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you know, all of the points had been discussed and debated back and forth. And they came up with this,
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uh, standard of being satisfied. And, and the Supreme court just said, nah, no, it's not good
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enough. Now I'll point out, uh, Jamie, that it was justice Nicholas, uh, Casarer who wrote for the
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majority and he's a Trudeau appointee, but there were Harper appointees that agreed with this as well.
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Um, so, but you know, I, I had a different post that just criticized Stephen Harper's horrible,
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uh, record on judicial appointments, but that's another story. But they, um, you know,
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we clearly have an issue with the court just deciding that parliament doesn't matter.
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Yeah. I mean, I, and, and I don't know what we do, but as you say, um, I'm not sure
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was this, I guess it must've been a charter case. Um, so yeah, I mean, you can't use this,
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this, this, the notwithstanding clause on everything, but, uh, you know, I, I think it's long past time
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that we remove the taboo about it. Um, because they're just, they're completely off the rails
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and it, and, you know, I, I, it's really disturbing. Um, what do you, what do you do when your Supreme
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court has just completely usurped, um, authority? And, and, and suddenly the chief justice is,
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has, has a giant bust of himself in the lobby where, and he says, he doesn't know who paid
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for it. I mean, it's just, they're, they're behaving so oddly. Like they're always going
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out on these junkets, you know, they're, they're, they're traveling all around the world. They're,
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they're hearing fewer and fewer and fewer cases every year. Meanwhile, um, I mean, they, they just
00:17:07.740
seem to be drunk on their own splendor. Well, look, I don't know about you, Chris, but I know that
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I've got a giant bust of myself in my front hall done up to make me look like Caesar. And I don't
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know who paid for it. It just showed up one day. So I don't know why you wouldn't believe
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chief justice, Richard Wagner. Yeah. Well, I mean, the, the, the funny thing about that
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is, well, the whole thing's funny, but I mean, he's, he wasn't interested. He'd want to know
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someone sending me a, a bust or a statue of myself. I'm asking who? Yeah. Is there a return
00:17:53.780
address on that? Like, can we get a, get some info here? I mean, it's just, I mean,
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Wagner was obviously a terrible, terrible appointment by Harper.
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So one of the first cases that was heard after he was appointed, not as chief justice, but to the court
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was a case called Loyola where Loyola college in Montreal, a Catholic, uh, school, which had been
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told by the, uh, the Quebec government that it could only teach Catholicism as if it weren't true.
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And from a secular point of view, they challenged that. And Wagner actually wrote the decision that
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said, no, the Quebec government's right. Well, the Supreme court hears the case and he obviously had to
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recuse himself from it, but every single one of his colleagues signed on in a unanimous decision
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denouncing him. And that happened shortly after he was appointed. I, I was furious when Harper
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appointed him, but I mean, beyond Wagner, there, there is a disturbing trend that the Supreme court
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has taken on where they're knocking down laws, not based on the case in front of them, but on a
00:19:04.560
hypothetical. And it's a disturbing trend for me because, you know, one of them was a guy who stoned out
00:19:12.600
of his gourd is in Alberta stoned out of his gourd and starts firing a gun into a home where, uh, a
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husband and wife and their two young children are sleeping. And I believe he also shot at a car
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driving by. And, and so he was facing all these charges. He was facing a mandatory minimum for,
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you know, shooting into a dwelling. And the Supreme court looked at it and said, yes, but if this had
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been, I believe the hypothetical they used was, uh, someone with an airsoft gun or like it was an
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absolutely ridiculous, hypothetical. And they used it to strike down the law.
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I think it was a young person too. They painted a picture of a, just a kid with a BB gun.
00:19:51.680
Yeah. I mean, Jamie, I mean, this brings the system of justice into disrepute. I also think that
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the decision last week did, but I mean, they are literally changing the law based on a made up case
00:20:07.000
Yes. And it also, I mean, just, just to go back to that, you know, kid with a BB gun situation,
00:20:13.520
imagining that he actually gets charged, which that's questionable. Um, there's, there's a lot
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of filtering that goes on the crown side before it makes it into a courtroom. There's a lot of
00:20:27.080
diversion. There's a lot of like crowns are a lot more likely for that kind of first time just kid
00:20:32.660
doing something stupid situation to divert it, to not take it all the way. And considering that's a
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hypothetical and it never made it all the way. We're in Canada. I'm sure a kid has hit a house
00:20:45.580
with a BB gun before. Seems that the system was working as intended, you know, crowns with common
00:20:51.280
sense, applying their duty to their, to their job correctly, aren't going to put that little kid
00:20:58.360
in or that, that child probably through, I mean, not child, young adult, but you know, that kind of
00:21:05.440
dumb 20 year old situation probably isn't going to find its way up. Um, so yeah, we're going to have
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the court then imagine the scenario and then recreate Canadian law to suit their morals. Meanwhile,
00:21:17.420
the rest of the population is like, are you kidding me? This is absolutely absurd.
00:21:23.760
It's like the bail situation. Um, uh, we've been reporting on it for years and I remember,
00:21:29.080
uh, being told, Oh no, it doesn't happen. It doesn't happen. We'd show them the stories from
00:21:33.300
the sun based on, you know, the local Toronto courts. Oh yeah, I guess that's a problem. Uh,
00:21:39.020
we'll take a quick break. When we come back, I want to get reaction from both of you
00:21:42.420
on Ottawa crown attorney, Dallas Mack. Let's make that name famous. Uh, he's the guy who's behind
00:21:49.340
the office that decided seven years and eight years for convictions of mischief was appropriate
00:21:56.400
back in moments. This is Tristan Hopper, the host of Canada did what, where we unpack the biggest,
00:22:02.400
weirdest, and wildest political moments in Canadian history. You thought you knew
00:22:06.360
and tell you what really happened. Stick around at the end of the episode to hear a sample of one
00:22:11.680
of our favorite episodes. If you don't want to stick around, make sure you subscribe to Canada
00:22:16.740
did what everywhere you get podcasts. Dallas Mack is a name most people outside of Ottawa's courthouse
00:22:22.960
haven't heard, but everyone should know it. He is the crown attorney that decided that
00:22:27.380
a sentencing recommendation for freedom convoy organizers, Tamara Litch and Chris Barber of
00:22:33.540
seven and eight years was wholly appropriate. Now, uh, I get that this is a highly charged
00:22:40.800
political case. Um, a lot of emotions at play and I've watched the online reaction to me calling
00:22:46.680
this ridiculous, but to me, this isn't just incredibly political, but first off Mack, who is
00:22:55.600
the lead crown attorney for the city of Ottawa is not the lead prosecutor on this case, but there's
00:23:01.280
no way that his prosecutors would be asking for a seven and eight year sentence without his
00:23:05.640
direction and or approval. And to me, Jamie, this just shows that this is a completely political
00:23:12.920
prosecution. You don't have to like the convoy. You can hate the convoy, but you can also look at
00:23:19.220
this and say, that is beyond ridiculous. Even Paul Champ, the lawyer for people trying to soothe
00:23:30.060
Of course. I mean, the fact that I could, uh, kill someone at a LRT stop in Edmonton and get fewer
00:23:36.060
years in prison is just compared to, to a mischief charge.
00:23:41.480
And that happened if you want to fill people in.
00:23:43.180
Oh yeah. Yeah. That happened. And, um, what I would say is a more sketchy individual who has the
00:23:49.560
benefit of a court system that hears out his so-called background circumstances and then
00:23:54.780
decides on a incredibly soft sentence. Um, and then of course there's things like statutory
00:24:01.240
release, which ensure that you don't spend that whole time period in jail. Um, yeah. Versus a
00:24:09.460
mischief charge where, first of all, no one was killed. That's a very low bar, but I think that's
00:24:15.080
a significant one. And, and it was more of a protest. So it's, it just, it seems on its face
00:24:23.380
utterly unfair. And it's, you kind of wonder what are the priorities of these people in
00:24:34.280
I don't think that, uh, justice, uh, uh, what I believe her full name is Heather, uh,
00:24:40.760
Pickford McVeigh. Um, I may have gotten the middle name wrong. I don't think that she's going
00:24:47.080
to go for this, but we won't know until October 7th, Chris. And, you know, I can't think of a
00:24:52.860
more ridiculous prosecution that has cost so much money. And I know that, you know, opponents will
00:24:59.040
say yes, but they cost the city of Ottawa a lot of money. Okay. Well, we're spending tens of
00:25:04.240
millions of dollars to prosecute them on, uh, mischief and, and we're justifying that by how
00:25:12.020
much money it costs. Well, there's also a civil case trying to get that money out of them.
00:25:18.060
Yeah. I mean, it's, it is at the very least baffling. I mean, in isolation, I mean, even if you
00:25:26.180
wanted to look at it as sort of fomenting treason or something, that's not the charge. It's, it's
00:25:33.320
mischief. Um, and, but a lot of people don't get that and still think they tried to overthrow the
00:25:40.920
government. Well, that's yeah, I guess that's right. But the, if that was the charge, that would
00:25:48.820
be the charge. You don't get charged with mischief for trying to plan an insurrection. Um, well,
00:25:56.400
maybe you do, maybe you do in Canada. I don't know. A memorandum of understanding saying the
00:26:00.480
government should be replaced, uh, is misguided as that document was and is illiterate of how our
00:26:06.720
society and democracy works as it was. It is not an insurrection to say, I think we should change the
00:26:12.700
government and here's how. Yeah. No. And, and I think that, um, it's impossible. I agree to, to think
00:26:21.080
of an explanation other than that it's political because what, like, and then, and then if the
00:26:29.260
judge doesn't go for it, I mean, that's going to be really interesting because you see, um, you
00:26:36.820
constantly see the crown and defense agreeing on sentencing recommendations, some of them absurdly
00:26:43.540
lenient, including that one day in jail for the terrorist who just came back from, um,
00:26:50.040
Syria. Um, and, and, and you, you know, usually, and, and I've never understood that, right? Like,
00:26:59.880
I don't understand, like, isn't this supposed to be an adversarial system? Shouldn't you, like,
00:27:03.580
when there's a plea bargain, obviously they'll, they'll agree on, uh, agree on terms, but even when
00:27:08.360
there's not a plea bargain, sometimes they'll have joint sentencing recommendations. And it's like,
00:27:12.880
I don't know, maybe I've been watching too much law and order, but aren't they supposed to be,
00:27:16.720
you know, going at each other, trying to get the longest sentence and, and, and the defense trying
00:27:23.980
to get the shortest sentence. I mean, I think all of these things really
00:27:28.400
bring into question exactly how this all works. And I don't think Canadians understand it. And I'm
00:27:38.620
not sure that we'd like the answer if we got it. The, you know, I, I believe it was you, Jamie,
00:27:46.300
posting on X, a whole bunch of different examples of people getting lighter sentences or, or in
00:27:53.180
several cases that we've seen recently of people getting their sentences suspended or downgraded
00:28:00.840
to ensure that their immigration status is not affected. I, that's an outrageous situation.
00:28:10.360
Yeah. And we can, I think, thank, uh, chief justice Wagner for that because he authored
00:28:16.980
the leading decision at the Supreme court on using immigration status as a, as a discount factor.
00:28:26.600
Okay. I didn't know that. Can you, can you tell us a little bit more there?
00:28:31.000
Uh, Oh, the case is called RV fam, P H a M. Um, I believe it's from 2016. And in that case,
00:28:40.460
they were interpreting the criminal code because the criminal code says, you know, you can take the,
00:28:44.960
or you must take the accused background factors into, into, um, consideration when you're coming up
00:28:52.980
with a fair sentence. And in this case, immigration, his, his immigration status was going to
00:29:00.000
eventually, or it was going to be in jeopardy. I suppose if he, if he was sentenced a certain way,
00:29:06.400
uh, over a certain amount where there's all these ways that the immigration system works and there's
00:29:12.840
thresholds for your sentence. And he was going to be over threshold, which was going to make his
00:29:16.580
prospect for staying in Canada a lot worse. And the judge didn't consider that as part of those
00:29:22.320
background factors. And the court, the Supreme court said that was an error and that it must be
00:29:29.900
considered. I mean, it did say that if, if it's outraged, if, if the discount you would have to
00:29:36.020
give is outrageous to keep this person in Canada, then don't go that far. Um, but, but for it, but
00:29:43.300
it's like, you know, if they're more borderline, it says, you know, if they're closer to that, um,
00:29:47.200
where it'd be reasonable to not do that, then, then you should take that into consideration,
00:29:53.620
meaning you should give them that discount. So you have a situation, it was in, it was in Calgary,
00:29:58.420
uh, I think a couple of years ago, there was a girl at a club and a, um, guy from India kind of
00:30:05.880
came up to her and he just put his hand on her skirt and he groped her in her genital area.
00:30:11.260
And that is a sexual assault is literally a sexual assault. But in Calgary, the judge gave this guy
00:30:17.160
a conditional discharge because, you know, he's like, well, you're temporarily here and you could
00:30:22.460
be deported automatically. So we want to give you, yeah, we want to give you a chance. And to that,
00:30:30.020
I think, well, you know, talking about, um, how women, uh, the, the impact of the hockey Canada
00:30:35.420
decision on women, you know, I think ultimately that was fine, but a case like this, where the guy
00:30:40.160
actually walked up, it was just, it was, it was plain as day. It wasn't in question that she wanted
00:30:45.000
her genitals to be groped in the club by a random guy who just walked up to her. Um, we're giving him
00:30:51.500
a second chance to stay in Canada to do it again now. So great.
00:30:55.600
This takes us back to Wagner is Stephen Harper's worst appointment ever and a horrible Supreme Court
00:31:01.920
judge. Uh, but you know, on, on the, the, the issue of deportation or not, I say deport them.
00:31:09.480
Um, I say this as the child of immigrants. Um, you know, I'm, I'm sorry. If you aren't willing
00:31:16.440
to live by our societal rules, why are we letting you stay?
00:31:21.620
Well, exactly. Um, and it's good for the immigration system too, to be able to say that
00:31:26.160
we can with swiftness reject your stay in Canada. If you violate these important moral
00:31:33.120
standards that we have, you know, these are important to us. Don't walk up and sexual assault,
00:31:37.940
sexually assault a woman in public. I think that's a very low bar. And if you cross it,
00:31:46.320
Sorry, you haven't been approved to stay yet. You're gone.
00:31:50.060
Exactly. I don't think that this is, this is even controversial remotely, but
00:31:54.600
well, except in judicial circles. Exactly. Yeah. They, I don't know if it's the bubble effect,
00:32:00.600
you know, you're in a certain milieu and everyone thinks a certain way. And, you know, maybe it's
00:32:09.020
just this self radicalizing effect, but it seems to be normal to them to give, to pull out all the
00:32:17.880
Chris, should we be deporting people that break the law when they're not citizens yet?
00:32:24.120
There's two things that, that stand out to me about these cases. The first is that the judges
00:32:32.140
completely ignore why we have the rule. I mean, we made this rule. We presumably had some reason for
00:32:41.580
making the rule, but they just, you know, that, that if your sentence is over, I think it's three
00:32:46.300
years. Um, or if it's long enough to go to a federal, whatever it is, if, if you're, if, uh, you
00:32:56.800
get a, get a sentence over a certain threshold and your subject's deportation. Well, we made that rule.
00:33:03.140
So it's not up to judges or shouldn't be up to judges to just pretend it doesn't exist, but they do
00:33:07.980
pretend it doesn't exist. The second thing that strikes me is that what you're going to find is
00:33:13.640
that Canadian citizens get harsher sentences for the same crime than non-citizens, which is,
00:33:23.540
you know, a ludicrous prospect. Um, in the same, it's, it's sort of a little of, of the same
00:33:31.100
genre, I guess, as, you know, the Gladue reports where, you know, I don't have a problem with,
00:33:37.980
taking it into account. If someone was born with fetal alcohol syndrome and, and, you know,
00:33:44.500
had a horrible upbringing and had no chance really to, um, make it to, to, to make good,
00:33:52.980
then at least for the first few, first two offenses say, I can, I can see taking that into account,
00:33:59.680
but not, but, but everyone, like lots of people, it's not just indigenous Canadians who, who grew
00:34:08.560
up in those circumstances. There's no reason to make it race specific. And, but our, our, our
00:34:14.400
justice system is just larded with these weird things that I can't remember who said it earlier,
00:34:21.360
but, but like, it's not controversial. Any, like they're only the people in the Supreme
00:34:29.000
Court's bubble think these are good ideas. I mean, my favorite decision, I can't, I'm not
00:34:34.140
going to be remember, remember which one it is, but the Supreme Court wrote one. Oh, it was
00:34:39.720
the, um, it was the, uh, Alexander Bissonnette, the guy who shot, uh, up the mosque in, um,
00:34:49.120
Quebec City. Yeah. A few years ago. And the Supreme Court, um, quashed, uh, the consecutive
00:34:57.540
sentences that he had. They said, um, I can't remember how many years it was without parole,
00:35:05.140
40 maybe. And they said that to, to maintain this rule, um, would, uh, it would, uh, bring
00:35:12.880
the system of justice into disrepute. It's like, well, no, that's, that's completely the
00:35:18.660
opposite of the truth. Like what planet are you living on? Uh, and, and so, you know, you
00:35:27.320
have the Supreme Court making decisions based on pure fantasy and they're writing it down.
00:35:32.260
Well, pure fantasy and their own political viewpoint.
00:35:38.120
I suppose. Yeah. Although, I mean, you know, one of the problems with the Canadian
00:35:43.760
legal profession is that it's just not as diverse politically and ideologically as, as it is in
00:35:53.260
If I can add a third factor, there's a problem too, with, with parliament just completely, um,
00:36:00.720
bending like a wet noodle when the Supreme Court makes rulings like this, like an IM or like
00:36:09.400
in, um, RV fam or the queen and fam, which is the immigration case. Um, we, we have a parliament
00:36:19.300
that, that could enact the notwithstanding clause. You know, the prime minister could have
00:36:25.060
said something about the IM case that just came out that pretty much through adult sentences
00:36:31.920
for youth in the garbage. Uh, but we have complete silence and a very, it seems to be like a, a lack
00:36:41.520
of interest in sticking up for the principles that parliament decides to govern the country
00:36:47.800
with, you know, so if they're just going to accept everything the Supreme Court says without pushing
00:36:53.380
back ever, of course, the Supreme Court's going to get a bit, maybe power hungry and walking out of
00:37:02.480
We've got a, a government that is, uh, you know, basically molded by the Laurentian elite,
00:37:09.380
uh, and that the Laurentian elite in this country believes that it is morally wrong to use the
00:37:15.460
notwithstanding clause, that it is unconstitutional despite being part of the constitution, unless of
00:37:21.300
course it is, uh, invoked by Quebec, in which case crickets. So that's the reality of the situation.
00:37:28.160
Um, since we're doing a hodgepodge of, um, criminal and justice insanity, uh, let me bring up this story
00:37:35.700
from, uh, Toronto, uh, just over, uh, a week or so ago, the murder of 71 year old grandmother,
00:37:44.020
Shanaz Pestangy, uh, Pestangy, uh, she's just loading her groceries into her car when a 14 year old
00:37:51.960
walks up, demands the car keys. She refuses to give them to her or to the, the, the young man.
00:38:00.380
And so as he puts it, he yoked her. Um, she died and we knew the name of the 14 year old and where his
00:38:11.060
face was plastered everywhere for several days. And now he has been arrested and we can't, uh,
00:38:17.340
mention his name or show us, uh, his image anymore. The guy was out on bail for carjackings
00:38:26.300
when this happened. And this is the reason that we need bail reform. It's one of it's example,
00:38:34.080
you know, 8,948, um, bail reform is needed. Now this guy should have been behind bars. We will get
00:38:44.380
to the full story one day of what the system did to let him back out. But your thoughts on that,
00:38:51.640
Clearly we need bail reform, but I, I often think that one of the things that would really help is
00:38:57.920
if we could light a fire under the justice system to make it work faster. Now, in the case of a young
00:39:04.200
offender, they're probably not going to go to jail for that long anyways. Um, unless we,
00:39:10.700
unless we do something about that, but there's so many cases where, you know, people are out on bail
00:39:17.160
for sort of eight months or nine months. Right. And it's one thing to keep someone locked up
00:39:23.660
for two months awaiting trial. To me, it's a totally other thing to have them locked up for a
00:39:31.980
year. Um, public safety should come first. And in extreme cases that that's going to have to happen.
00:39:37.500
And it does happen. Uh, although again, probably not with young offenders. Um, but this is a,
00:39:44.280
this is an example of, I mean, this, this kid is clearly, um, the kid who's been accused is,
00:39:51.360
is, was bragging about it online. I mean, posing with guns. I mean, he is clearly, um, if not a full
00:40:01.300
blown menace of society now, well, what am I talking about? He just killed a woman. He's,
00:40:06.920
he's a full blown menace of society and was even before that. So, and, and, and, and the,
00:40:14.360
and one of the things that always strikes me about these cases is that there can never be any
00:40:19.200
accountability because we'll never know if he reoffends.
00:40:23.160
If this is, we'll start with you, Chris, and then I want to hear Jamie's take. I'm shocked that
00:40:31.800
this story of a grandmother being killed loading groceries into her car hasn't received more
00:40:36.840
attention, more outrage, more outcry. I, I know there was the, um, the focus on him while he was
00:40:47.340
still at loose, but other than that, it feels like people are just shrugging this one off like
00:40:51.980
so many others. Well, I guess, I mean, I don't know what, what else, I mean, you shouldn't shrug it
00:40:59.340
off, but I, there's only so much that your average Torontoian can do about this, you know? Um, it's a
00:41:07.320
horrible thing. Um, she could have been murdered by an adult doing the same thing. It is certainly
00:41:16.780
disturbing. Um, you know, it fits into a pattern of, of terribly violent youth crime recently
00:41:23.200
in Toronto, um, which is genuinely disturbing and makes you wonder if, if there's something,
00:41:31.060
you know, I remember thinking this, this, this kid who's been accused would have been about nine
00:41:37.600
years old when the pandemic hit. And, you know, I'm not blaming the pandemic for anything, but I'm just
00:41:44.500
saying like, you know, you, you're denied social contact, you're denied, you know, a kid who's
00:41:50.100
going off the rails is only going to go quicker off the rails. It seems to me in a situation like
00:41:53.940
that, but I, you know, but again, we're never going to know because, um, well, we can cover the
00:42:01.520
trial. We just can't name him. But then as I say that there's, there's no, we can never know if
00:42:08.600
rehabilitation worked, however long or short the term was, we'll never know because we won't be able
00:42:17.760
to, you know, his, his name will be sealed. Um, now we will know of course, cause I mean,
00:42:25.380
it's interesting, right? More and more in these cases where, uh, you have a, uh, young offender
00:42:33.720
identified and then instantly unidentified, uh, once they're arrested, people on, on social media
00:42:40.880
are just not, you know, they're not playing ball, right? You're, you know, you know, Mario cart
00:42:46.480
six, nine, four, one, two is not adhering to a publication ban from an, from an Ontario court.
00:42:54.360
So, I mean, that's a whole other kettle of fish is, is the youth justice in the modern era. But I think
00:43:01.360
it all just, like, I feel like we just need an inquiry into the entire justice system.
00:43:10.140
As we've been discussing for the last 45 minutes, it is a mess. Jamie, um, did this story resonate
00:43:17.460
in, in Western Canada? Was it, uh, you know, locally, of course, it's going to be on the news
00:43:22.480
here, but, you know, a shocking grandmother being stabbed by kid while, you know, at grocery
00:43:29.180
store seems like it's the type of thing that should grab national attention. Did it resonate
00:43:35.480
I, I think there's an impression that Toronto is chaotic, uh, over here in Edmonton. Not
00:43:40.520
that we don't have crime. We, there is crime out here too, but Toronto has, Chris says, there's,
00:43:47.420
has had a number of high profile cases of youth, or I guess Toronto in the area has had these
00:43:54.240
cases that are quite high profile of youth committing such a vile crime. It's, it's very
00:43:59.000
hard for, uh, a regular person to just picture a kid doing such a thing. You know, the thought
00:44:05.700
of a 14 year old acting that way is unrealistic. It's not even believable, I think, to normal
00:44:11.440
people because 14 year olds are playing video games and sports. They're not stabbing.
00:44:19.680
Although with this Supreme Court decision, maybe they'll all be recruited into gangs now.
00:44:24.440
Well, that's the thing is there's, there's certain lifestyles, uh, certain types of people
00:44:32.020
that get sucked into gang life early. And it's, it's so isolated from the average person
00:44:39.960
and also from the, the average judge, you know, the average judge isn't in circles where, where
00:44:44.860
children get sucked up into gang life. So in the case of IM, he saw his crime as a stepping
00:44:52.580
stone to a great criminal career that was discussed in the case. Um, this 14 year old,
00:44:58.200
we don't know yet. Um, but it, it doesn't look good based on those snippets of, of, uh, social
00:45:05.960
media video that were going around. It seemed that there was some glorification of violence
00:45:10.340
going on. Gangs are known to recruit young people because gangs know that Canada has very
00:45:19.220
few consequences for young people. So it's, it's, it's good to offload a bunch of dirty
00:45:25.860
work that can be done by minors to minors. And then, you know, by the time they turn 18,
00:45:32.140
they're a bit more fully fledged and, and you can upgrade them to, to worse criminal activity.
00:45:38.140
But this is a real thing that's happening. And, um, you know, when they, when they know
00:45:43.080
to exploit a system like that, it's, it's a sign that maybe you should look at the system
00:45:51.920
Jamie, Chris, we have not solved the problems of the world or of Canada and its rotten justice
00:45:57.160
system, but it has been cathartic to be able to talk and complain about it with you both
00:46:01.480
because we've all been writing about it. And I know the audience has been reading and hearing
00:46:05.980
about it and feeling frustrated as well. So thanks for the time today.
00:46:12.700
Full comment is a post-media podcast. My name's Brian Lilly, your host. This episode was produced
00:46:17.980
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Here's that clip from Canada Did What? I promised you.
00:46:43.840
Two years later, he was still opposition leader and he lost again to the Pearson Liberals.
00:46:50.500
Despite this, Diefenbaker doesn't resign as leader of the Progressive Conservatives, which
00:46:56.160
put the party in an awkward situation that hasn't really happened before. The typical rules
00:47:01.800
of a Canadian political party were that you stayed leader until you died or resigned. And
00:47:06.880
if you lost twice in a row, you were supposed to do the honorable thing and step aside. But
00:47:12.380
Diefenbaker just didn't, prompting the party to take the unprecedented step of forcing a party
00:47:18.720
convention in Toronto for the singular purpose of crowbarring Diefenbaker out of the leadership.
00:47:24.140
Diefenbaker shows up, pretends everything is fine, and gives a finger-wagging speech chastising his
00:47:31.820
fellow party members for their disloyalty. He's politely cheered by the assembled Conservatives,
00:47:51.680
and then abjectly humiliated in their subsequent leadership vote. On the first ballot, Diefenbaker
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gets a distant fifth place, and even then he refuses to admit defeat.
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