Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Legal and Constitutional Affairs
Issue 11 - Evidence for May 5, 2005
OTTAWA, Thursday, May 5, 2005
The Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, to which was referred Bill C-10, to amend the Criminal Code (mental disorder) and to make consequential amendments to other acts, met this day at 10:53 a.m. to give consideration to the bill.
Senator Lise Bacon (Chairman) in the chair.
[English]
The Chairman: We will resume our discussion on Bill C-10, to amend the Criminal Code (mental disorder) and to make consequential amendments to other acts.
Today we have with us Mr. Sullivan, the President of the Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of Crime. Thank you for appearing before us today. The floor is yours, and then I am sure we will have some questions to ask you.
Mr. Steve Sullivan, President, Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of Crime: Thank you, honourable senators, for allowing me to come here and discuss this important bill and our perspective. I will give an explanation of the kind of the work we do at the Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of Crime.
We are a national, non-profit, victim advocacy group. Although we are very small, headquartered here in Ottawa, we do provide assistance to victims across the country at various stages of the justice system, helping victims with provincial compensation applications and getting information from Crown counsel. Much of our work deals with the federal parole and corrections systems. There are services for victims in courthouses and police services, but there are no services once an offender is convicted or, in the case we will be talking about today, found not criminally responsible. Much of our work is with victims at parole levels and involves going to parole hearings. If victims cannot go, we go on their behalf. We ensure that they know what their rights are. I will make some analogies between the parole processes and the review board process as well.
My opening remarks will be brief. There are only two issues I feel qualified to speak to on the bill. As I am sure you have heard, review board hearings and the whole mental disorder provisions of the Criminal Code are complicated processes. I do not pretend to have any special expertise.
The one issue I wanted to touch on in support of the bill is the repealing of the capping provisions. These provisions were never proclaimed, and we have had Supreme Court decisions since then that have reinforced the practicality that these provisions really are not necessary and that the protections in the system are there. We support the repealing of those provisions.
The other issue, not surprisingly, is victim impact statements and the role of victims in this process. There have been those who have questioned the value of victim impact statements at review board hearings. I have heard that outside this process. You will be aware that the introduction of impact statements at review board hearings is not new. That was provided for in 1999 when Bill C-79 was passed, but the difference here is that victims will have the chance to read their statements. It is our contention that there is real value in allowing victims to be part of that process. I will touch first on the value for the individual person.
In my experience with parole hearings, victims have gone to hearings and have entered the room absolutely terrified of the offender being released. They have sat through a two or three hour hearing, learning for the first time what this individual has done, such as taken programs and taken education, or have heard that he has reconnected with his family. He might have done many important things to change the kind of person he was when he was incarcerated there. I have walked out of those parole hearings with a victim who may or may not be happy that the individual is getting out, and may feel that he has not been in long enough for punishment's sake, but they walk out with much less fear of the offender being released. I see an equivalent with victims attending review board hearings, being a part of the process, understanding how it works, understanding why decisions are made either to keep an offender or a not criminally responsible individual in or to release someone with the appropriate conditions. Victims understanding that perspective and why that was done can address the ongoing concerns they might have for their own personal safety.
We know that victims want a voice in the process, whatever process it may be. The needs of victims are not any different whether the offender is found not guilty or found not criminally responsible. They want protection, they want a voice in the process, and they want to understand how things are done. Not criminally responsible orders can be difficult for victims because, in essence, the court is saying that this person is not responsible for the harm done to the individual, whether it is a violent act or a sexual assault or homicide. When an offender is found guilty, victims have someone to blame and a place for their anger, which is an important part of the healing process. When someone is found not criminally responsible, that is confusing for the victim because we are basically saying that this person is not responsible. It is difficult for victims to perhaps deal with some of their anger over the violence. I speak of victims of violence because they are mainly who we work with. There are certainly other offences as well, but we deal mainly with serious violence and homicides.
It is important as well for the individual, the person not found criminally responsible, when he or she is coming up at a review board hearing, to hear or read first-hand the impact of their actions on the victim, even though they are not responsible for those actions. I do not pretend to have any medical expertise, but my understanding is that in many of these cases when people are released, there are conditions on them or requirements to continue with medication. Sometimes that medication may not have the nicest side effects. From my perspective, it can be important for people to hear the impact of what might happen if they do not take their medication. It is not a question of blame but one of responsibility to continue with medication, even though there are negative side effects: ``If I do not do this, I may hurt someone else.''
Hearing directly from victims about the long-term impacts of violence and of being violated in violent ways is lifelong, and it is important for everyone to hear that, including the person who is being considered for release.
I should mention as well that we deal with victims going to parole hearings. I know this issue has been raised in the past — victims who to go to parole hearings, not just the first one but to many in some cases — and I think it is important for that as well. At the first parole hearing to which the victim goes, the offender may not get released. However, in two or four years, the offender may get released so it is important for the victim to understand that process as well, that when they went the first time, the parole board said he was a risk, but three years later, he is not a risk. I think attending multiple hearings is important.
One of the downfalls in our system, whether it be parole or corrections or even at the trial stage, is that the victims often are not notified of their rights. Although we have provisions in the Criminal Code for impact statements at sentencing, we know the numbers are very low of victims who actually present. One problem is that our trial system is, in most cases, plea bargains that are done quickly and there is not time to notify the victim. The provisions in the bill to help that along, to ensure victims are notified once they have indicated a willingness to be notified, is an important aspect of the bill.
The Chairman: We already heard that victim impact statements could, because of their emotional content, inappropriately detract from the requirement to impose the least onerous disposition on a mentally disordered accused. At the review board hearings, the task is to assess current risk and not past behaviour, we have been told. I would like to have your views on that position.
Mr. Sullivan: It is no different than questions or arguments that were raised when we introduced victim impact statements at parole hearings, where the parole board is assessing the individual's risk to be released into the community and what relevance the impact of the crime committed five or 10 years ago has on the offender's risk today. Aside from the benefits to the victims themselves, it is important in helping the review board panel to understand what happened. Victims often have information that is not available anywhere else. A lot of the cases go through the system pretty quickly and there are not always trials. People plead and, in this case, accept the NCR designation. Victims often can bring information that no one else has.
It is also important, when the board is assessing risk, to assess how the individual responds to it. I talked to many parole board members who said that when victims speak at parole hearings, they watch the offenders' response to that testimony, what kind of impact it has on them. I have never been in a hearing where I thought the impact statement changed a decision one way or the other. However, it is one more piece of information that the parole board panel can have to help them assess the risk and also help set conditions on someone's release.
The Chairman: On the question of publication bans, Bill C-10 gives review boards the power to order a discretionary publication ban. Do you anticipate many hearings in private, and can the interests of the victim and the media be taken into sufficient account in that instance?
Mr. Sullivan: I think they can. I do not anticipate that we will see a huge increase in the number of victims who attend review board hearings because of Bill C-10. We still have a lot of work to do to ensure that victims know their rights. The board, as judges do at the time of trials or sentencing, can weigh the balance of the freedom of the press against protection of the victim. I do not think it will be a common issue.
The other thing is that if there has been a publication ban in the past by the courts, then I would assume that publication ban would still be in place. There would be that consideration as well.
Senator Mercer: I have a concern about the civil rights of the accused. If they are found not criminally responsible, that means they have not been found guilty of the offence. As such, I have some difficulty with the concept.
While I hold a lot of sympathy for the victim of this event, whatever it might be, I also have a concern that we have made an assumption, if the person is found not criminally responsible, that if the NCR had been removed they would have been guilty. We have made an assumption of guilt when we start talking about victim impact statements.
I am concerned that we have gone that way; and it goes to my other concern about what seems to be happening today in society generally, where we are talking about trying to follow people who have served their full terms of punishment. The punishment is the punishment. I would like your comment on that.
As I say, I am concerned about the civil rights of the accused. I am very sympathetic to, and I have a great deal of empathy for the victims and their civil rights, but we are talking about the law here.
Mr. Sullivan: It is sort of a dichotomy in our system, as you pointed out. On the one hand, we say you are not criminally responsible, you have not been found guilty; on the other hand, there is still a victim. The legalese of that is difficult to understand.
In reality, though, we know someone was hurt, whether it was an assault or a homicide or whatever. Someone was hurt and we cannot ignore that fact. The person is there in the hospital being treated for what the offender did. Whether he was responsible for it is a whole other question; but he is there because of what he did. We cannot ignore that fact. We cannot ignore that there is a victim.
The other part is that there is some responsibility on people who are coming out who have these mental disorders — and I have great sympathy for them, as well. There is some responsibility, perhaps, if there is medication that is required to control certain behaviours. On the one hand, we are saying you are not responsible or guilty but we will make requirements on you to take medication; it is a grey area in our whole system.
However, we must be realistic about it. Someone was hurt, and they have an interest in this process, even though it is not a traditional finding from the court.
Senator Mercer: In your statement, again you have made an assumption of guilt.
Mr. Sullivan: The system does make an assumption of guilt.
Senator Mercer: I do not think the assumption of guilt is something I am personally willing to accept. If the person is guilty, then let the full weight of the law come to bear on him or her; but if there is some mental incapacity of the person who is accused, then we need to deal with that mental incapacity. If we are able to deal with that, then maybe we can deal with the criminality.
However, everyone keeps talking here as if people are guilty. If you are not criminally responsible, I am not sure you are guilty. Or if you are guilty, then I think you need to have a process wherein you are declared guilty.
Senator Milne: I believe if they are not criminally responsible, they have been already found guilty. It is where they are unfit to stand trial that they have not yet been found guilty.
Mr. Sullivan: Our system recognizes that these individuals did the act, whatever it was. They just are not responsible for it because they did not have the mental capacity to form the intent. In saying that there was a crime committed, this person committed it but is not responsible for it, we can still say someone was hurt and they are a victim of this crime. It is a challenging area, but in our system, in one sense, we do find people guilty. There is just a difference in how we deal with them after that point.
Senator Milne: If they are unfit to stand trial, they are never found guilty.
Senator Callbeck: Mr. Sullivan, you mentioned just a couple of areas in this legislation, the repealing of the capping and the victim impact statement. You agree with the legislation on those areas. Therefore, I assume you are supportive of the entire piece of legislation.
Mr. Sullivan: I do not know enough about the inner workings of the system to have an opinion either way on the provision. I am supportive of the bill in a general sense.
Senator Callbeck: I want to ask you about your organization, the Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of Crime. You say it is non-profit and that you are situated in Ottawa. You provide services to people across the country, making victims aware of their rights and so on. For example, what services do you provide to somebody in Prince Edward Island? Do you have people who go down there?
Mr. Sullivan: I wish we did. Unfortunately, we are a very small organization. There are two people in our office plus some volunteers, usually students doing placement programs. We are limited in the direct services that we can provide. A lot of our services are over the phone. Because we are so small we do not have much of a budget to advertise our services, but victims who come to us are usually people who have had a problem with the system. There is something that is happening or has happened in their lives. We can often advise them from a distance as to what their rights are. For example, if it is the Crown not returning calls, we can try to intercede in that. We are limited in what we can do. I do not pretend to suggest that we service all the needs of all the crime victims in the country. We have a network with the existing victim services which are funded by the provinces. We can help make those relationships and connections as well.
Senator Callbeck: You do get some phone calls from victims in the Maritimes, do you?
Mr. Sullivan: Yes.
Senator Andreychuk: I want to go back to the victim impact statement. I am inclined to want to have the victim involved. The problem I have is that we have developed an understanding of what victim impact statements mean in the criminal sense, and then we moved it over to the mental health field. Would we have been better off to view some other words to allow the victim to be part of the process, to get away from this question of whether the person was accused, convicted or not criminally responsible? In other words, if they are not criminally responsible or unfit to stand trial, surely the person who has been the subject of some action with them should know the process, should feel some justice in it, and might be part of the treatment for that person.
Is part of our problem that we use the same phrase, having borrowed it from the criminal law, and we should think about revisiting and repackaging it to allow for a relationship there that is not based on the criminality but on the responsibility? Even if you are found not fit, you still have other rights and responsibilities as a Canadian citizen. Should we not put it into that kind of terminology?
Mr. Sullivan: I have never thought of it that way, but it is an interesting proposal. I am not sure what the words would be. I think there is some value in keeping the term ``victim impact statement'' because it is well known and people understand what it is, and victims have an understanding of what it is as well. Certainly, if there was more appropriate terminology to address the same goal of making sure victims feel part of the process and understand the process, and also address the difficulties in the fact that this person was not found criminally responsible, not found guilty, that would be worth pursuing. I have never thought of that, so I do not know what it would be. It is an interesting proposal, and I would not have any objections to it with the proper terminology.
Senator Andreychuk: I am sorry I came in late because of other duties.
In your work, have you found that putting the victim into the process has either been detrimental to the victim or the person who has been found mentally incapacitated?
Mr. Sullivan: To be honest, we have not dealt with that many victims who have gone to review board hearings and given impact statements. It is not a common thing, and part of that is because some of the victims who contact us have only found out after the fact that there was a hearing. The biggest complaint is ``I did not know and I did not have a chance to participate.''
I do not have any personal experience of where the victim participated and it was detrimental for either them, or for the person who was found NCR and considered for potential release. My guess is there may be anecdotal stories that individuals might have, but we certainly would not have enough victims present to have any sort of research on that.
It is a relevant concern. I think the legislation allows the review board the discretion to accept statements, except if there is a reason not to. If the victim comes in and is hostile, or if there is something in the dynamics of the hearing with which the impact statement might cause problems, I think the review board has the ability to say ``We will not do it,'' just as judges do in their courtrooms. I think there is the discretion to protect both parties if there are those slim cases where there might be a problem.
Senator Andreychuk: You said that some of the people you deal with come in and say they did not know about it and it is after the fact. With the new act, do you think that problem will be solved?
Mr. Sullivan: I think it will help. The administration of this aspect is largely provincial. We have been pushing it for a while because, largely, this part of the process from current victim services is not part of their mandate, so victims are left with nothing. I am hoping with this legislation we will be able to see victim services take this on as part of the services they offer as they exist presently in the Crown's office. I think the legislation will help.
I do not know that we will see a huge increase in the number of victims who attend review board hearings. Basically, we advocate for choice so the victims know they can attend if they want to. They can do a written statement or just go and observe the hearing. A lot of victims go and listen to parole hearings because they want to hear the offender speak about the offence. It is really about choice, and I think this legislation will help.
Senator Andreychuk: Are more of these victims involved with this offender previously by either being a family member, a friend or a neighbour, or are ``strangers'' involved in these cases?
Mr. Sullivan: In the cases we have had contact with, there has been some connection. I think generally it was someone who either worked with the individual or is a neighbour. There has been some connection. I do not know of any where there has been a stranger that we have dealt with personally. There has usually been a relationship. When they are released, often the person will come back into the same community. That is why it is important for people to understand why individuals might be released so that they will be less fearful. They are notified in advance so that they do not walk into the supermarket, for instance, and see the offender there.
Senator Joyal: When we talk about victims in the context of a person who is mentally handicapped, I have always had a problem seeing an accused or a criminally responsible person and a victim. Both are victims. We are dealing with two victims. We enjoy good health, all of us, and we thank whoever we have to thank for that. The reality we are dealing with in this bill is, of course, that there is a victim of a crime on one hand, but there is another victim on the other hand, which is a person who has no mental capacity either to stand trial or to be criminally responsible. Personally, I have great difficulty trying to reconcile the healing process for the victim of the crime and the responsibility that we have to assume for the other victim.
Yesterday we had Mr. Walter, who is the Chair of Review Boards Canada, here as a witness. We asked him to give us the profile of the person, the average subject of your preoccupation. The profile he gave us convinced me that the offender is a victim, most of the time, starting at a young age as a child, as Senator Pearson knows well. It is very difficult to take his point a step further and to put the two in the context of the references you have been making — the parole board.
I agree with you that in a parole board hearing, the situation is totally different. The victim has to be satisfied that justice has been rendered and that someone has been found guilty, and that before the person is released, that person has rehabilitated himself or herself by the fact that they are in a repentant mood vis-à-vis the victim, and perhaps even ready to compensate the victim for the damage or harm done to them.
The case we are dealing with here is in a totally different context. We have to deal with two victims. The participation of the victim in the process is important, as you said, because for some victims it is part of what I call the healing process, to use an Aboriginal term, but how do we keep to the fact that the other one is a victim as well, and probably in a worse position than the victim, per se? I do not underestimate the damages, moral and physical, to which the victim of a crime by a person who is mentally handicapped might have been subjected — on the contrary. On the other hand, we have to take into account how the system works to ensure that we take that reality into account. I am sure that that is what we have in mind when we are dealing with this issue.
Mr. Sullivan: I have referred to the parole board a lot, and I do so because I look at the perspective of victims who have attended parole board hearings. I think the benefits of doing that are similar to those obtained by victims who might want to attend review board hearings. I understand that offenders at parole board hearings and those at review board hearings have a different process, but for the victims, the value of going to a parole board hearing is hearing what kind of programs, treatment and changes that offender has gone through so that when he is released, victims are not as fearful. We can see the same in review board hearings. Often, the only thing victims know about the offender, and/or the person found not criminally responsible, is what that person did to them, that act of violence. Going to a review board hearing and hearing experts and the person themselves talk about the programs and rehabilitation they have gone through and how it has made a difference in their lives so if they are released, they do not have the same issues or problems that might lead to more violence, has the same benefit for victims.
On your point about the people who are found not criminally responsible often being victims themselves, I do not know that that is much different from the people you find in prison. Arguably, they have suffered a lot in their young lives or as children, and that has played a role in them getting into prison. If you look at the statistics, the average person who is arrested for an offence is a 15 to 24-year-old young male. That is ironically the same description of the people who are the majority of victims. There are many similarities between victims and offenders.
The other point is that we make this assumption that when victims want to participate, it is because they are opposed to release. I have been at parole hearings and been involved in cases, and also at sentencings, where victims have not wanted the person to go to jail, or not wanted a harsh penalty, or have not been opposed to parole. I would see some victims saying the same things at these hearings. We make the assumption that when victims want to give an impact statement, it is, ``Keep them inside and do not let them out,'' and that is simply not the case. Those are the cases we often hear about through the media, but frankly it is not always the case that victims are opposed.
One thing that might come out of hearings that is not intended, and I do not know that we can design the system with this intention, is that victims and, in this system, those found not criminally responsible can gain a better understanding of each other. Maybe, if they are living in the same community, there is not that fear and there is not that resentment. I am not saying they will go and have dinner together, but people will understand both sides. Having been to parole hearings, and I apologize for continuing to make that analogy, where victims who have walked in terrified and have walked out not being concerned about their safety at all, I would not see anything different in this process.
Senator Joyal: As the chairman said at the beginning, the person is mentally handicapped, suffering from schizophrenia or some other serious mental disease, and as you have said yourself and as some witnesses have said, a large number of the victims of crime by those kinds of people are family or neighbours. If I have somebody in my entourage who is mentally handicapped, it is not a secret disease. It shows one way or the other. To me, the first healing process for the victim is to help them understand that that person is not responsible for what he or she has done.
The greatest objective of the system that Bill C-10 puts into place is to protect society against the risk that that person represents. The whole process should be to maintain the capacity to evaluate the risk. I think the victim can be part of that, but not more and beyond that; not, as you said yourself, with an objective of punishing or retaliation or repair to a point where, in fact, we are not taking into account the fact that we have somebody in society who is not responsible for their actions and cannot be held responsible. The only thing we have to measure is the level of risk that this person represents for society. It is not parole. It has nothing to do with parole. It is a different legal context legally from a parole situation. I totally rely on you for what you have said on the parole experience, and I support what you say, but in the context of a mentally handicapped person, we are not in the same relationship.
Mr. Sullivan: In reality, most of the violence committed by those found guilty is against somebody they know. It is not that different in that context.
As to how this provision will play out in the real world, my guess is that if the victim is a family member, they may be aware of the issues, the mental disorder, so they may go to support the person and have different motivations. If someone is a neighbour, for example, it might be important to go to that hearing to hear about the schizophrenia and to understand how these things work, so there is value in that.
I do not think anyone should mistake a victim's ability to participate for a victim's controlling of the process. Going there and hearing what is going on and being part of it, and providing any information that would be relevant to the decision that the board will make, that is ultimately their role. Neither our organization nor any other victim's group that I know of would ever say that victims have more of a role than that, just providing some information that the board will weigh with other information. Sometimes if a victim goes and is talking about punishment, the board will say that that is not very relevant. The board has the discretion to weigh that information. Giving the victim a chance to participate is important, and their information is judged by the board, which has a whole pile of information before it.
You are right. The goal of the process is to assess risk and whether this person can be managed.
Senator Andreychuk: I have a supplementary. Senator Joyal has been talking about mental illness. Some illnesses are well known or well exhibited in a person. Others come and go, depending on treatment or time, or other influences.
Do you find, in your dealing with the issue, that part of the problem is determining the state of the mental illness within that person? Or is it so set and known that all of the psychiatrists who have dealt with the person agree on what the problem is? Have you found that there are some varying opinions from the experts?
Mr. Sullivan: I do not know that I have enough experience to really answer that except to say that I know that when people are in the court process and are perhaps trying to go through the NCR process, there are differing opinions about whether someone meets that criteria or not. It is not always cut and dried.
I know one of the concerns of victims is often that the person is abusing the process. They are pretending to be schizophrenic or something. People think they benefit through this process. I think being at the review board hearings might educate them more. It is not easy to go through this process and pretend successfully that you are schizophrenic. However, I do not really have enough experience that I feel adequate to answer in any concrete way.
Senator Andreychuk: It reminded me of cases that I have dealt with where there was not a definitive diagnosis and a confirmation by the experts. Those who lived with this person, who had been the subject of harm, gave interesting factual information that was helpful in the diagnosis. I do not know whether you have had that experience or not.
Mr. Sullivan: In a general sense, one of my earlier points was that victims often have information that is not in the police reports or the files or the psychiatric reports. Living with, or having lived beside the person for a number of years, they can bring experiences that would not otherwise be known, which might help with the treatment process.
Senator Milne: I believe I heard you say that in your experience when you have been in court with victims, their statements have never made any difference to the outcome of the parole board hearings.
Mr. Sullivan: What I said is that when I have been at parole hearings with victims, I do not think their statement made the decision for the parole board, one way or the other.
Senator Milne: That must be very frustrating.
Mr. Sullivan: I do not know. Victims who attend parole board hearings see the range of information. The files can be very large. They see the range of information from psychiatrists and people in the community, parole officers. Certainly, for some victims who go in and are opposed to parole, it can be frustrating that the outcome is different.
We know in relation to impact statements on sentencing, there is no evidence that suggests that they really make a difference with respect to the harshness of the sentence.
Senator Milne: Have there been any kinds of studies done on this aspect at all, on how victim participation in a hearing has either helped or hurt the victims or the accused, the person who has been found guilty or NCR? Is there any anecdotal evidence that victims really are helped? I would think that if a victim went in and made a statement 10 years after the fact of whatever had happened, it would be like ripping a scab off a wound. It might be much more harmful than helpful.
Mr. Sullivan: There has been research on how victims feel about doing impact statements at sentencing hearings. The interesting thing is that what affects their perception of the system is not whether their statement had an impact or not. One of the most important things is whether the judge in his or her statement acknowledges the fact that there was an impact statement. That has a huge impact on victims.
Often, the other thing that impacts on victims is how they were treated throughout the process — that they were given the information, that they had a chance to participate and give the impact statement. Even if their statement had no impact on the sentence, or does not appear to have had an impact on the sentence, being a part of the system and being informed is beneficial.
Anecdotally, I can tell you, having been at parole hearings, one of the problems is that victims go into the hearing and give statements, not knowing anything about what the offender has been doing for the last 10 years. They are basing their statement often on what he did at the time; and perhaps he has changed. Often one of the frustrating parts for victims is ``If I had known all of that, my statement would have been different.''
However, my anecdotal experience in attending hearings with victims where they do give statements is that even though they may not agree with the decision, they appreciate having a voice, and understanding how decisions are made in the process.
One of the most beneficial things is hearing the offender talk about what he did for the first time. In plea bargains, the accused do not testify. For the first time, hearing the offender talk about what he did is incredibly important on the healing journey.
Senator Milne: Then there really have not been any studies done on this aspect. Have there been any studies done on the person who is not the victim but the other victim?
Mr. Sullivan: There have been no studies on this process in particular because there just have not been very many impact statements presented at these hearings. I do not know of any studies that look at the impact on offenders at the sentencing or parole stage, or on NCR individuals to this date. I do not think it exists.
Senator Joyal: Yesterday we had Mr. Walter, who is the Chair of Review Boards Canada. There was no opportunity after he described a profile of who the people are that the review board has to deal with — as I would say, the other victims, not of the system but of nature, to a point.
In your experience, have you ever had to deal with Aboriginal people?
Mr. Sullivan: For this process, no. We have dealt with Aboriginal people in the past with different aspects of the system.
Senator Joyal: But not in this context?
Mr. Sullivan: No.
Senator Joyal: With the parole board and the context of your experience at other levels, have you had experience with Aboriginal people?
Mr. Sullivan: We have worked with Aboriginal people with respect to parole issues, mainly helping them get information about the process, what their rights are and how they can exercise them. Some have been upset about a particular sentence — a conditional sentence — or had information about someone violating conditions of a conditional sentence; and we have also worked with them on compensation applications, helping them get the applications and walking them through that process.
Senator Joyal: Do you feel that the system works as efficiently for them as it does for non-Aboriginal people?
Mr. Sullivan: For the victims? I am not sure the system works that effectively for most victims. We work with victims from Romania and various countries. I am not sure the system works that well for most victims.
Oftentimes, the remoteness of the reserves is a particular challenge for existing victims' services — there are not the services available for some of the Aboriginal communities that exist in the bigger cities. That is an issue. Certainly, there are certain areas of Saskatchewan where there is an emphasis on the particular needs of Aboriginal victims. Other services are more general. They have a list of services. If the Aboriginal victims need them, then we can meet them. There is not an emphasis on the culture or the different kinds of needs.
No, the system does not treat Aboriginals as well as it should. It also does not treat other victims as well as it should. The existing services in the provinces are targeted mainly towards domestic violence and sexual assault centres. There is a safety issue there that sometimes does not exist in other situations. They get the majority of the funding from the provinces. The other victims fall in somewhere.
Senator Joyal: It seems that it is a volunteer initiative.
Mr. Sullivan: Very much so.
Senator Joyal: What I have understood from our witnesses is that it does not exist, per se, in the system. It is not part of the administration of justice. It is left to the volunteer initiative of groups of citizens. We heard about Mr. Boisvenue. I think that was raised by Senator Rivest yesterday in Quebec. I do not know the situation as well in other provinces, but I do not see it as an essential component of the administration of justice in Canada that is recognized, per se, in the system and funded accordingly in the system.
Mr. Sullivan: Many of the services that do exist at the police and Crown level are targeted towards victims who will testify at trials. The services were created originally very much to assist the Crown in getting victims to testify. The real target is making sure victims know when court dates are set, and court accompaniment and orientation of that and helping them if they are to testify. In one sense, the system is focused on its duty to prosecute accused people.
With regard to your comment on funding, there was a study done by Stats Can released in December. I do not know the exact numbers. In 2003, looking at 360,000 victims who were assisted in that year, $8 million were spent on those victims. A lot of it is volunteer work.
Senator Milne: I am interested in knowing if any studies have been done on healing circles that are now part of our legal system and if these are found to help the victims and the accused?
Mr. Sullivan: I cannot name you any studies, although I am sure that there have been studies. One program I will mention is here in Ottawa, and is the only one of its kind in Canada. It would not necessarily be applicable to this scenario, but the principles are important. It is called the Collaborative Justice Project. It is here in the Ottawa courthouse and deals with people who have accepted guilt but have not been sentenced. It is based on justice. Victims are given the opportunity to meet with the offender — he has accepted the responsibility — and they can meet or exchange letters and maybe come to an agreement on restitution. I know of some cases where victims have said ``I want you to create a fund for your daughter's education.'' It is not always about retribution. The victims want the offender to be a better person and not do this sort of thing again. It deals with serious crime. It deals with aggravated assault, armed robbery, impaired driving causing harm. It does not deal with domestic violence because of the particulars there. If both parties can agree, that agreement can go to the judge before he or she sentences. This project has been funded jointly by the correctional service and the province, and the evaluations have been incredibly high from each side, offenders and victims alike. It is often in these kinds of meetings, which can happen in parole hearings or review board hearings, although not directly because people cannot interact, where victims have questions about why this happened and will they come back and do it again. Hearing the person say ``No, you were just chosen randomly,'' or ``I just needed drug money that night and you were there,'' those kinds of things are incredibly beneficial for victims. It is that kind of information that the system does not traditionally provide to the victims.
Senator Joyal: The answer of Mr. Sullivan is very important. Yesterday at the adjournment we agreed that we would hear the provincial-territorial representative. This is part of the administration of justice and it should be part of that discussion. Thank you very much.
Senator Andreychuk: Senator Milne had asked for the studies. I know there are some from Saskatchewan. I do not know if they are helpful to what we want to do.
Senator Milne: It is a matter of interest in the study of this bill.
Senator Cools: I would like to thank Mr. Sullivan for coming before us. I have many different thoughts bouncing around in my head. In the particular bill that is before us, most of these victims are not only related to the accused, they are related quite often by very close, intimate ties, like family members. By the nature of some of these offences, there is quite a common thread, sometimes stabbings of 500 times, that sort of thing.
Of the victims you work with, what percentage do not want to go to these hearings and make those statements? I was speaking to someone just a couple of weeks ago who sat through one of those proceedings. I will not say which one. It was a very famous one. At the end of it, she regretted that she had sat through to hear every single gory detail every single minute. She wished she had not accepted the advice to go.
Some years ago on an unrelated bill we had Debra Mahaffy before us, the mother of young Leslie, who was one of the Homolka-Bernardo victims. During the hearing, there was the noise of a saw running somewhere else. There was a carpenter working nearby, and Debra Mahaffy virtually came apart, sitting here as we were watching her. I have not looked at the details. Leslie Mahaffy had been sawn up, and Mrs. Mahaffy always had a fear that she might have been alive when this happened.
The experiences that these people go through are so unspeakable that I just wonder what percentage of people do not want to go near this process. They want to know when the person is released or a few details. Many people I have talked to do not want to go through this detailed process.
I have done a lot of work in this area, although not recently. With many of these people, it will take their lifetime to recover, if they do recover. Perhaps you can tell me a little bit more about who wants to do this and who does not?
Mr. Sullivan: I do not know if I can give you any numbers, except to say that victims' needs are not universal. They are as different as any other group of people.
I apologize for always referring to the parole system, but because there are no services it is one of the things we do a lot of. We will often act as a victim's agent, and just receive information from the parole board that the offender is being released and provide that information. For some people, that is all they want to know. Others prefer not to attend the parole hearing but have us go on their behalf. We cannot speak, but we can report back. With some hearings I have attended, I am glad the person did not go because the crimes are particularly brutal.
I do not know if you have ever had the experience of attending a parole board hearing. It is not, as is the perception that some people have, a rubber stamp. There can be difficult and detailed questions.
I have never been to a hearing with a victim where they have regretted going. Part of that is that because we have the experience, we can give the victims the pros and cons about going. You can hear very detailed stuff, if that is an issue, and you can hear the benefits as well. One of the problems is that, as the statistics indicate, the number of victims who go to parole hearings is a fairly small percentage. I am not sure we do a very good job of telling victims that they have the right to go. There is no funding for victims to travel to hearings. If the budget passes, there will be. Some of it may not be the victim's choice. There are other victims whom we have talked to who do not want to know anything about the offender. It is not relevant to them. I cannot give any breakdown. I can look in our files and give you a sense of that.
Senator Cools: In this instance, in the bill before us, most of these victims will be family members, so it would be different personal reactions and different personal circumstances. The victims involved there would be quite different from a victim who is a total stranger and had this tragedy visited upon them.
You have done the parole board hearings but you have never taken part in a hearing, say, at Penetanguishene, or one of these other institutions?
Mr. Sullivan: Usually the experience has been that the victims who have contacted us in this context were not notified of a hearing so they did not have the chance to attend. The complaint is that they were not notified, as opposed to whether they wanted to go or not. Since the process does not exist to give the victim a choice yet, it is hard to determine how many will take part and how many will not.
Senator Cools: I do not know if one could ever get insights, but it is a very huge tragedy to see a family trying to continue to relate to each other when one of its members has done this sort of thing.
Mr. Sullivan: On that point, and again I acknowledge that it is different, but right now I am working with parents whose daughter was murdered by their son. He is currently incarcerated. It would be similar in these kinds of situations. The dynamics are so difficult.
Senator Cools: Have you had any cases where the assailant, the aggressor, for the sake of argument, was very youthful, 11 years old or that sort of thing?
Mr. Sullivan: I have read about them. We have never had direct involvement in a case where the aggressor has been that young.
Senator Cools: Madam Chairman, this witness is underscoring the dismal lack of research and information before us. I will use this opportunity yet again to urge this committee that the whole phenomenon of the administration of criminal justice in this country has not been properly studied by this committee or a committee in the Senate for a very long time. Whether it is the parole and remission system or the system of clemency, system of plea bargains, the penitentiaries, I really urge this committee to look at undertaking one of those substantive studies.
Years ago, we had a senator who was very involved with the penitentiaries and with inmates. Because of Senator Hastings' interest, the committee hearings used to be more exciting because he was always bringing forward the issues. Each and every one of these matters is a large question. We should really take a shot at looking at some of this material.
Many victims often forget that, at parole boards, it is not a question of innocence or guilt. They are before the board because they were found guilty and they are serving a sentence. What the board is trying to determine there is if the inmate has changed sufficiently to be able to function in society, and whether or not his or her release would be a risk to himself or to herself, or to society. It is not as easy as one would think. Those parole board hearings have ballooned in size from what they used to be.
I really urge this committee to take a serious look at the kinds of issues, in particular, that this witness has been talking about. What is happening with the parole board? In addition, these organizations, in an administrative way, have grown like Topsy. What started out as a parole board with a small staff must be now who knows how big, because that is the nature of bureaucracy. It begets itself and it keeps growing. I would be very interested to support some studies in this matter, even on how these inmates are housed and accommodated, even the classifications of dangerousness.
In the bill in question, this is probably the most under-studied group of all. I am not sure that the term ``mental disorder'' is a clear term. I have a lot of problems with that, because everybody can be said to have some kind of a form of mental disorder. The old language never made any pretensions to it being a psychiatric term. Insanity was a legal term. There was never a diagnosis in a medical clinic of insanity. I have a lot of concerns with the direction that the law has taken, but that is for another day.
The Chairman: We have noted your concerns.
Senator Cools: Honourable senators, we do not know how important it is for members of Parliament to do these serious studies and to get out to the institutions and to get a full report of what is going on, and take a good look at the process. It is very important.
The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Sullivan. You have been very patient with us, but your answers have been a great help to everyone today, as has your experience.
Senators, we are contacting at the present time the representative of the federal/ provincial/territorial working group, as well as the Quebec bar for Wednesday. We might have a long meeting on Wednesday. The next day we are attempting to have appear the members of the department or the minister responsible.
Senator Callbeck: Will we have clause-by-clause consideration next week?
The Chairman: No. We have more witnesses to hear from first. Thank you very much, senators.
The committee adjourned.