Law & Blunders - Canadian Judas-prudence

One thing that troubles me beyond reconcilliation is the Canada justice system. To say that it's hopelessly flawed doesn't seem to grasp the enormity and thoroughness of its wrong-headedness.

An example from Windsor, Ontario illustrates my point down to the ground: a woman was brutal sexual assaulted in the city one or two years ago, her assailant caught and tried -- sentenced to 30 days house arrest. The victim was quoted in the newspaper as saying that every consideration had been given to the accused's rights, yet her's seemed never to enter the judicial equation. The lack of severity of the sentence was stunning. The sexual assault had been violent; not just some guy slapping a woman's ass in the concession line at the cinema.

What troubles and angers me most about Canada Judas-prudence is that it's based on clarvoyance: Is the accused likely to commit the crime in question again?

This is beyond ridiculous! Why does the law -- or, at least, those who are responsible for enforcing it -- interested in the "crime of the moment"? This is the most bizarre aspects of Canada law. No punishment is meted out for the infraction in question, our justices engage in a sorty of Minority Report-like scan of the future before handing down their sentences. And their sentences are always in sufferably light. Am I some "blood and guts" vengeance-mongers? No. But if my wife, mother, or sister had been sexually assaulted as the poor woman in my example above had been, I'd have been breathless and legless with outrage hearing the accused handed a sentence of 30 days house arrest. Who wouldn't.

And then there are the notorious cases of miscarriages of Canadian justice; stomach-turning, tear-provoking in their obvious injustice and base stupidity and incompetence. Today a former police officer apologized for his role in the 1969 wrongful jailing of David Milgaard. Thirty-six years late is better than nothing, I guess. Then there is the notorious case of Stephen Truscott, wrongly accused so many decades ago of the murder of 12-year-old Lynne Harper. Truscott was fifteen years old when he was arrested, sentenced to death, and incarcerated in an empty prison. Somehow the authorities of the day, and of that place, felt Truscott was their "man" with regard to that murder, even though a pedophilic, alcoholic military man with a history of sexual assaults happened to be in the area during the very same time. He died without ever coming under significant suspicion. The Truscott story is a singular blight on Canada's embarrassing record of Judas-prudence. Not to forget other outrages, such as Ron and Linda Sterling of Saskatchewan operated a home day care in Martensville north of Saskatoon. And the phenomenally heartbreaking, gutwrenching story of Richard Klassen and his family. I can honestly say that while watching the Fifth Estate program on the Klassen case and its extraordinary miscarriage of justice, I have never, never been so aghast and filled with outrage.

I guess the lesson with Canadian law and order is the same as when Ontario Premier Mike Harris eviscerated the Ontario healthcare system: Pray you'll never need it.

If you're interested: Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted

Update:
Group says murder convict is innocent, calls for release