Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Legal and Constitutional Affairs
Issue 4 - Evidence - April 22, 2010
OTTAWA, Thursday, April 22, 2010
The Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs met this day at 10:34 a.m. to consider Bill S-2, An Act to amend the Criminal Code and other Acts.
Senator Joan Fraser (Chair) in the chair.
[Translation]
The Chair: Honourable Senators, the Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs is continuing its study of Bill S-2, an Act to amend the Criminal Code and other Acts.
This morning, we have the pleasure of welcoming our first witnesses.
[English]
Jim Stephenson and his wife, Anna Stephenson, will tell us their story and their tragic reasons for being familiar with this topic. I believe you have a statement. Is that correct?
Jim Stephenson, as an individual: Yes, we do.
The Chair: The floor is now yours.
Mr. Stephenson: Good morning, honourable senators. Let me start with a formal statement.
Our son Christopher was 11 years old when a convicted child molester with a heinous criminal record abducted him from a local shopping mall where he was shopping with his mother and sister on Father's Day weekend in 1988. His abductor kept Christopher alive for approximately 36 hours. Christopher was brutally attacked before being murdered and left in a vacant field.
Police quickly launched a massive investigation in response to Christopher's abduction. By the end of that weekend, his killer was in custody. At his murder trial in 1989, he was found guilty and given a mandatory life sentence. Two years later, in January 1992, he was murdered in Kingston prison at the hands of a fellow inmate.
For Anna and me, things had only begun. An inquest into Christopher's death began in the fall of 1992. It lasted six months before producing a verdict resulting in a number of recommendations. Among them was that the federal government move immediately to create a national sex offender registry.
These years were clearly not the best of times for us. It took seven years before the Government of Ontario, acting on its own initiative, introduced Christopher's Law, which is Ontario's sex offender registry. It has since become a state-of-the-art tool used by police forces to manage the province's convicted sex offender population.
However, it would be another three years before the national Sex Offender Information Registration Act would become operational. Apart from the fact that both the national and Ontario's sex offender registries operated a database of known convicted sex offenders, they had little else in common. We have many times referred to the National Sex Offender Registry as Canada's notional sex offender registry because of its many shortcomings and inability to deliver on its promises.
One year ago tomorrow, Anna and I spoke to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights in the West Block on the proposed changes to the national registry. Bill C-34 would be introduced in the House of Commons shortly after that. Changes included mandatory registration of convicted sex offenders and proactive use of the registry by police services.
Today — one year later — things on the ground remain the same. Approximately one half of those convicted of sexual offences in this country are still not required to register. Police services are still unable to use the database for investigative searches.
However, we are not giving up. In fact, today there is much to be positive about. With the changes contained in Bill S-2, much will be done to enhance the National Sex Offender Registry and place the two registries, Ontario's registry and the national one, on a similar playing field and give them their respective capacity to provide police with information to investigate crimes of a sexual nature.
The greater success police achieve in their investigations and apprehension of sex offenders, the more they will prevent others from becoming victims of sex crimes. These, then, are the goals of both: to investigate successfully, apprehend and prevent further victimization.
In the years since our son's death, Anna and I have learned a great deal about the issue before this committee, and I can say without reservation that we both look forward to taking part in a discussion about this important issue this morning.
The Chair: Thank you very much. Do you want to add anything, Ms. Stephenson?
Anna Stephenson, as an individual: No, thank you very much.
Senator Runciman: The Stephenson family and I go back a long way. It has been a long road for you. I am a huge admirer of yours and the challenges you have had to face along the way. Mr. Stephenson, you mentioned you are not giving up, and that has been your life story since Christopher's tragic death.
Obviously, from your presentation, you support the legislation we are dealing with here today. We heard from the Privacy Commissioner last week. Her views were perhaps misinterpreted by some, including myself, but I had the clear sense that she felt, and I think a lot of this view was based on American studies, that sex offender registries are an ineffective tool. She based that view on, as I said, studies that have no relevance to the Canadian situation. Are you familiar with that perspective? What kind of a response do you have to that view?
Mr. Stephenson: I did not hear that testimony, but I have a sense of what might have been said and how it may have been construed by the members of the committee here. Certainly, there is no other registry or no other mechanism regime in place other than Ontario's registry at the present time that can be talked about in terms of accomplishment. When it is compared with other registries throughout the North American jurisdiction, we compare apples with oranges. There are registries in the States. Pretty much every state in the U.S. has its own version of a registry. Some of them are primitive. Some are them are no more than a loose-coil notebook. That, as you can imagine, cannot be compared accurately or effectively with a computerized database, one where the information in that database can be manipulated by police, and searches can be made by specific fields. If you compare that type of a registry with a primitive notebook, there is no comparison.
To say that the success in other jurisdictions is questionable or marginal, one has to stand back and take a proper look at things and consider what is being compared. Are we comparing one registry that is operated with an electronic database with another, or are we comparing an electronically based operation with essentially a paper-coil notebook? That is one of the distinct differences that many studies and references made to question the availability of a sex offender registry to perform. Unfortunately, comments are based on that conception.
Ms. Stephenson: Most registries in the States are able to be accessed by the public. Even with the Ontario registry, when we talked about that registry, we specifically told them that we did not want the public to have access. To me, it is important that only the proper people be allowed to access that information. That access is a big difference between the registries in the States and what we have here in Canada. I hope that the registry will stay that way, because we do not want the public to have access to it.
Senator Runciman: Christopher's inquest recommended a National Sex Offender Registry. The Ontario registry was established essentially out of frustration with the failure of the government of the day nationally to follow through on that registry. Do you ever see a day when there will be no need for an Ontario registry and we follow the original recommendation of the inquest? I know the Ontario registry has been a great success story, but I wonder about the necessity. No other jurisdiction in Canada has a registry in operation.
Mr. Stephenson: When the national registry was finally proclaimed in 2004, that possibility occurred to us. We gave it obviously a great deal of thought. We have an emotional stake and investment in the Ontario registry. It is named after our son. However, if the model that is finally adopted federally, the national model, is as good as, or better than, the Ontario model, I have no objection at all to seeing the two merged into one, particularly when it will benefit other jurisdictions in this country. Right now, Ontario benefits almost exclusively from an effectively put together and managed sex offender registry. In the other provinces, it is put together with duct tape.
Senator Runciman: The legislation we are dealing with mirrors the legislation that was tabled in the West Block that you spoke about.
Mr. Stephenson: Yes.
Senator Runciman: Will this legislation achieve that goal, or do you see weaknesses in its current structure?
Mr. Stephenson: One of the most distinguishing characteristics between the two is how robust the Ontario system is when the database can include such things as vehicle information. The national registry cannot do include that information now. You heard testimony from the RCMP yesterday indicating that they do not have a field in their database, in their software right now, that can accommodate that type of information. If it were to be included as a requirement, upgrades to the RCMP database would be necessary.
Other fields are present in the Ontario registry that are lacking in the current model and would have, for the same reasons as vehicle information, difficulty migrating to the national registry, and that information include such things as the perpetrator's method of operation or, as the U.S. TV shows like to use the term, modus operandi, M.O. However, that information field does not currently exist in the capacity or the capability of the national database.
Do I see the national registry fulfilling the function of the Ontario registry or matching the capability and competence? Not quite.
Another important feature missing from the national model too is the enforcement component. In Ontario, they can boast extremely high compliance compared to compliance rates of other jurisdictions — I think it is approaching 98 per cent — because there is an enforcement component to the registry. In other words, someone ensures that that sex offender who has registered at an address is in fact there; that the sex offender has not registered and met the requirement to place a name and certain identifying formation with police, and then moved on to some other address.
Ontario has that enforcement capability. It is missing from the national proposal in the present legislation this committee is considering. It will be a while yet, I think, before the national registry will be at the same level.
Senator Runciman: Some of my colleagues have raised the anomaly of the legislation, which is the permissive approach with respect to Corrections Canada in that they are not obligated to report a release in this legislation. Do you have a view on that anomaly?
Mr. Stephenson: I do not have a view that I can speak of from first-hand experience, but I am aware of the difficulty in receiving or obtaining information on offenders scheduled for release.
I know that the national registry is not contacted with this information, so they are playing catch-up from the moment the offender walks out of the institution. On the other hand, Corrections Canada seems to be efficient at providing the information about the impending release to the local police authorities. What is missed at one end is caught at the local end, where that individual will re-enter the community and potentially pose a risk.
I would not like to choose the model to go with. I would rather have the police on the local scene aware of that offender's presence in the community and the threat the offender might represent to the safety of the individuals in my community.
Senator Runciman: Thank you for being here and thank you for your ongoing commitment.
Senator Carstairs: I am pleased to have you here this morning. I want to correct briefly what I think is a misrepresentation of the presentation of the Privacy Commissioner. The Privacy Commissioner is always invited to raise privacy concerns as she sees them, only from a privacy perspective. It is one element we have to consider.
In terms of Bill S-2, however, you have indicated that you think it does not match the Ontario registry in a number of ways. One was the vehicle information; one was the perpetrator's method of operation; one was the enforcement component; and the other was the offender's release information.
Is there any other aspect of the Ontario legislation that you can think of that will enable us to have a genuine National Sex Offender Registry, which means having one not in an individual province but one that works from coast to coast to coast?
Mr. Stephenson: I did not come prepared for that question in particular. I suspect there are other aspects. I cannot recall other instances or other examples of information or shortcomings in the one that can be picked up and addressed, with the result that the national registry will be at the same level.
We have heard in various statements made by members of the Ontario Provincial Police that they are funded to the tune of $4 million annually specifically to operate the Ontario provincial model. I heard in testimony yesterday, via video conference, that the funding varies substantially from what the RCMP are required to operate with.
In fact, when the national registry was put in place, they were told to run it, without providing them with any funding envelope. That puts them way behind in the race to deliver a product that is competitive with Ontario's model. They need serious funding of that area.
I know the RCMP indicated they can manage the registry with what they have. I am not sure how they will pay for the software and hardware upgrades. It seems unfair when a program such as the National Sex Offender Registry is put on their plate and they are not provided with proper funding to run it, knowing full well that in any household where someone is faced with a new expense and not provided with a new source of income, something goes. One program or another is sacrificed to make up for the newer emergency expense.
I think the same thing applies to them. I am going way off track here, am I not?
Senator Carstairs: No, not at all: That point is extremely important. If Ontario requires $4 million to run their registry, proportionately there should be a fund of $12 million to fund a national registry appropriately.
I assume, then, that you do not want Ontario's program to close until such time as it is matched by legislation in the National Sex Offenders Registry and the appropriate funding is in place.
Mr. Stephenson: That is correct, yes.
Senator Baker: The testimony was interesting — $4 million for the Ontario registry and a measly $400,000 for the national registry, the RCMP. As I understand it, from the testimony given at the same hearings at which you appeared for the House of Commons committee in their five-year review of the legislation, the Ontario system has a computerized organization that allows them to identify quickly — what they call geo-locators — and the federal system has no such capacity. The federal system requires officers to go out and search around for long periods of time to accomplish what the Ontario police can see right in front of them.
Does that understanding meet with yours?
Mr. Stephenson: Yes, it does.
Senator Baker: It is tragic. In the Ontario law, there is a requirement, after someone has reported to the registry that police check at least once and make sure. Is that your understanding?
Mr. Stephenson: Yes, it is.
Senator Baker: That requirement is not in our legislation at all, is that correct?
Mr. Stephenson: It falls under the enforcement component of the Ontario model.
Senator Baker: There is also a provision on the notification of the release of an offender, simply because the police force is running it in Ontario and there is a connection there.
I have always found your testimony at all your hearings to be filled with information that is of value to lawmakers, and that is what we are doing here: We are crafting a law nationally that we hope will be effective.
Let me ask you two short questions. I will put them together as a consideration to the committee.
I noticed in the recommendations that the chairman of the House of Commons committee was a Mr. Breitkreuz when the committee gave its five-year review. The committee recommended automatic registration. It is only a small point, but perhaps it is a major point in law. The committee also recommended that registration not be automatic for all persons. The court was to decide in those extremely rare cases where a person should not be registered if their offence is not commensurate with the registry.
Bill S-2 makes everyone register automatically and then provides the accused with the opportunity to terminate the order later. The bill departs from the recommendation of the House of Commons committee in that respect. Do you agree with what is in the bill, compared to what the House of Commons recommended?
When the bill was enacted, it provided for one year of retroactive application. The courts call it retrospective application. Police forces can register anyone under sentence on December 15, 2004, for one year. Police only had that one-year window in which to register them. In other words, potential registration applied not only to offences that took place following passage of the bill, but offences that took place 20 years earlier for which someone is on probation. ``Under sentence'' is defined not only as someone in jail, but includes those on probation.
Would you like to see retrospective or retroactive application to all those ``under sentence'' instead of applying it only upon passage of the bill?
Mr. Stephenson: I listened to the proceedings yesterday afternoon. The one-year period of time was questioned that authorities have to undertake a head count of offenders in custody that will be captured by this legislation.
I understand that period was for the purpose of being efficient and not to allow the process to capture all offenders in custody to go on ad infinitum. Someone suggested that the process be done within one year. If it is not done within one year, we have missed the opportunity and so be it: Let us move forward with those that will offend in the future.
A bell went off for me regarding the wording of your first question, senator. You mentioned that the bill orders the ``accused'' to register. That is incorrect. The legislation orders the ``convicted'' individual to register.
Senator Baker: Yes, that is correct.
Mr. Stephenson: That point must be borne in mind.
In dealing with Bill S-2, it is my feeling that any individual serving a sentence for a designated offence, either within the institution or outside, should be reviewed and required to register. That requirement follows the regime applied in Ontario when that legislation was enacted and proclaimed.
We cannot go back forever. Testimony was given yesterday to the effect of, why not go back and ensure we have every sex offender ever convicted in this database. I think the officer from the RCMP said they could do that if they had unlimited resources, but they do not. We do not even know where some sex offenders are, or whether they are alive or out of the country. That approach is overzealous. I do not think the bottom line justifies it.
Senator Baker: The reason we put ``under sentence'' in the legislation at the time — I recall it well — was not to allow registration to go back indefinitely. Persons who are under sentence or probation orders are normally checked by the police. Police will have to check the records of every provincial court, but that is not too onerous a task.
You say registration should apply to those persons under sentence, as the original bill did. That is preferable to what is here.
Mr. Stephenson: Yes.
Senator Wallace: Your presence here is informative from the point of view, regretfully, of your real-life experience. The registry is not only an academic exercise for you. I doubt there are any two people in the country who have given this topic the kind of thought you have. Your knowledge and the impetus you created enabled the Ontario registry to be created. You are to be commended. We have a national registry as well.
From your comments, Mr. Stephenson, I understood that you support Bill S-2. It will improve the registry over what it is today. However, further progress can always be made. You made that clear.
Can you expand on the elements of Bill S-2 that you feel improve the current National Sex Offender Registry in a real way from the perspective of preventing future victims? Do you feel the improvements in Bill S-2 will have that impact?
Mr. Stephenson: There is always time for sober second thought — as if I have to say that to this committee.
Since our testimony one year ago, when we testified on the proposed changes to Bill C-34, we had time to look more deeply into that legislation and its intent.
The primary purpose of the registry, whether it is the Ontario registry or the National Sex Offender Registry, is not protection of the public. For both pieces of legislation, the primary purpose is to provide police services with a management tool to enable them to investigate crimes of a sexual nature properly and more thoroughly. As I mentioned in my remarks, the more successful police services become in that investigation process, the more likely we are to apprehend an offender and put that offender in custody to save potential victims from being victimized.
Prevention is part of the purpose, but the most important part of this legislation is not to be misrepresented, whether in regard to the Ontario or national models.
Outside of the province of Ontario, police services do not have access currently to such a management tool. I said that things on the ground are the same one year later. Police cannot proactively investigate a suspected sex offender because of the limitations of the existing legislation, nor is registration mandatory in the courts yet upon conviction. We still have 50 per of offenders not required to register.
However, prevention is also a large part of what we are doing. Unfortunately, prevention becomes a by-product. When I say ``unfortunately,'' as a society, we cannot become preoccupied with police services focusing only on prevention. Their job is crime investigation and laying charges.
Let us not overzealously state the purpose of the legislation or the mandate to be ``protection of the public.'' That objective is important but secondary. The primary objective is to provide an investigative tool.
I do not know whether I have responded fully to your questions. If I have not, please let me know.
Senator Wallace: I would say you have. My emphasis on prevention is from the perspective that the police need enhanced investigative tools. I think when they have those tools, the result will be a higher degree of protection for the public. In any event, that was the thought there.
Mr. Stephenson: Can I expand upon that point? Once an offender is apprehended, charged, convicted and sentenced, we tend to lose track of them unless we pick them up in a registry. In Ontario, it is the OSOR; outside of Ontario, it is the National Sex Offender Registry.
I have spent a fair amount of my time volunteering in the provincial institutions and dealing with sex offenders. It is unique to talk to a sex offender about their impending release and the fact that they will have to register with the local police service under Christopher's Law. When that subject comes up in the conversation I will have with that individual, it is often extremely awkward.
When we move past that awkwardness and embarrassment on their part, one thing that comes out of the conversation is the fact that they do not deny the need to be registered. In fact, look at the registry. The requirement to register and be contacted throughout the period of the reporting time by a police officer, under the enforcement component of the Ontario registry, is a kind of check on their activity. More often than not, the majority of individuals that I have talked to express the requirement in that way.
A lot of them will never offend again. Unfortunately, some will. The ones who are likely to offend, the marginal ones that can go either way, are encouraged when they know that a policeman can be knocking at their door. In six months, the time for renewal of their registration is coming up and they will have to go into the police station again and say, it has been a year since I have been here, officer. I have moved or not moved. I have not changed jobs; I am doing the same thing and I am all right.
The officers of the enforcement component do not appear in uniform; they do not drive up to the house or to the apartment building in a marked car with a SWAT jacket on. They come in discreetly in business or casual attire and speak to the individual in private to ask how they are doing and if there are any issues.
That kind of support is foreign even to a lot of police officers, who admit in conversations we have had with them that this support is not what they had signed up for when they were dealing with sex offenders. However, after being asked to carry out those duties and the enforcement calls, they realize how important it is in keeping that sex offender on the straight and narrow, if that can be done.
There will always be those who reoffend; but there are those who will offend, who commit sex crimes, that we do not even know about. These offenders are the ones who are not on the registry. We cannot do anything about that situation.
A registry will not prevent a sexual assault. In fact, if the registry had been in place on that Father's Day weekend in 1988 — let me personalize this — I do not think there is a thing that would have prevented Joseph Fredericks from abducting our son, unless we had assigned him a police officer as a live-in partner. He would have gone out and abducted our son with or without a registry in place.
The difference is — and this is an important difference — had the registry been in place, police officers would have been able to access a database. If Joseph Fredericks had registered upon his release from the institution, he would have been on a database; and the police would have come up with a number of names within minutes of Christopher being reported missing. I am sure that the outcome of that weekend would have been extremely, positively, different.
It will not prevent an offender from reoffending, but it will give police the capacity — and that is the important thing — to investigate and, hopefully, solve and intervene.
Senator Wallace: Thank you. I do not think anyone could make that point clearer than you have.
Ms. Stephenson: To expand a little, the registry basically manages these people once they come out into society. Our courts will not keep them in jail forever. Eventually, they all come out, with the exception of a few.
Therefore, these tools are important to society and to police. That is the way we must manage these people. In the long term, the tool could prevent another crime, or at least change the outcome of a crime.
The Chair: Thank you both very much indeed, more than usual.
Honourable senators, our next witnesses on Bill S-2, from the Circles of Support and Accountability, are Susan Love, Ottawa Program Director; and Andrew McWhinnie, National Advisor, who both have a statement. Please proceed, Ms. Love.
Susan Love, Ottawa Program Director, Circles of Support and Accountability: Good morning, committee members. I am joined today by my colleague Andrew McWhinnie, National Advisor to the Correctional Service of Canada's Director General of Chaplaincy with respect to the Circles of Support and Accountability, CoSA. He has been part of our project in an advisory role for some time and has been involved in all aspects of the research conducted on CoSA to date.
I welcome this opportunity to appear before you today. Circles of Support and Accountability is important work performed by Canadians who want to make a difference in their communities by reducing sexual victimization among their fellow Canadians. It is significant that we are appearing before this committee during National Victims of Crime Awareness Week and also National Volunteer Week, as it gives us both the opportunity to draw attention to CoSA's success in reducing victimization through the hard work of volunteers in our communities.
In our opening remarks, we want to ensure we respond to two issues. First, I will provide a brief overview of the history of CoSA; second, Mr. McWhinnie will address the impact of CoSA on reoffending rates among our clientele, who we refer to as ``core members.''
Circles of Support and Accountability, which is a volunteer-based initiative, began in 1994 as a response to the release of high-risk sex offenders from federal prisons at the end of their sentences, or at their warrant expiry dates. In 1994, and again in 1995, two such offenders were released in Ontario. A Mennonite Church congregation in Hamilton and, in the following year, a Community Chaplain of Correctional Services of Canada in Peterborough each formed what we know today as CoSA groups for these two individuals.
Their efforts were met with relative success, which encouraged the Community Chaplain in Toronto to approach the Correctional Service of Canada to establish a pilot project to focus on providing CoSA groups to other high-risk sex offenders and then, provide an evaluation of those efforts.
The results of the original pilot indicated, among other things, that sexual recidivism by high-risk sex offenders who had a CoSA group was 70 per cent lower than a matched group of high-risk sex offenders who did not have a CoSA group and who were released at the same time. These results are remarkable. It was decided to attempt a replication study to see if these results can be generalized to other high-risk sex offenders released elsewhere in Canada.
Meanwhile, other communities in Canada independently undertook their own CoSA projects with support from various partners, including CSC Chaplaincy, local Mennonite committees and various churches and community faith groups. Between 1994 and 2009, 17 CoSA organizations emerged. The CoSA Ottawa project is one of these local groups that represents a locally inspired, volunteer-driven response to a community need.
While each CoSA project developed as an independent local community response, they remained true to a common set of values based on the belief that there should be no more victims. CoSA implicitly recognizes the pain, suffering and need for healing among victims. As well, each CoSA group ardently believes that no one is disposable. Healthy relationships and community-building are central to the health and safety of all citizens, and critical to the safe reintegration of offenders.
While building relationships and community, each group and its volunteers recognize that support must be balanced with accountability and responsible living. This recognition means it is vital that CoSA groups remain connected with correctional, health and safety, and law enforcement professionals. No group can work safely alone. Healthy working relationships with criminal justice and mental health professionals and purposeful engagement with the local community, including victim's groups and advocates, accounts for a major portion of each CoSA group's daily work.
I look forward to responding to your questions after Mr. McWhinnie addresses the committee.
Andrew McWhinnie, National Advisor, Circles of Support and Accountability: Thank you for allowing us to address you today.
As Ms. Love mentioned, the remarkable results obtained in the first pilot study of the Circles of Support and Accountability required replication to see if these results can be generalized to other high-risk sex offenders released elsewhere in Canada. A 2008 report published by the Correctional Service of Canada showed that two groups of 44 high-risk sex offenders — one group with a CoSA and one without — were analyzed in this replication using a standardized follow-up period of three years.
In this study, it was observed that none of the CoSA participants had any sexual recidivism, meaning a new sexual offence charge or conviction, in the three-year period following release. Unfortunately, five participants of the comparison group did reoffend in that period.
In addition, the CoSA participants had 82 per cent less violent reoffending and 83 per cent less reoffending of any kind than the matched comparison group. These results reflect not only reduced reoffending but significant reductions in the number of Canadians victimized by sexual, violent including sexual, or any other type of crime.
Further, the CoSA group incurred 89 per cent fewer charges and convictions than the comparison group. This result leads to significant reductions in law enforcement activity, court costs and correctional costs.
Some might argue that these results are owed to the intensified monitoring provided by CoSA. We would counter, first, that CoSA does not monitor or supervise sex offenders. However, we provide communities of care that are characterized by warm and positive regard and a meaningful sense of belonging, while also holding the participant accountable. It is exactly this combination of support and accountability that so many offenders today lack upon release at warrant expiry.
We know from these results and nearly 15 years of experience that the majority of Circles of Support and Accountability participants retain their relationships with circle volunteers for many years. Many grow to see their circle as quasi-family relations. In cases where core members have moved on, our observation has been that they have kept in contact with their Circle of Support and Accountability, or at least one or two of their volunteers. For those members, if needed, contact is expanded and, as has happened several times across the country, a full circle is reconvened.
Putting the current study in the context of the greater debate as to whether sex offenders can be managed in community settings, our findings, in combination with those obtained earlier from the previously mentioned 2008 report and in a British replication of CoSA in the Hampshire and Thames Valley, strongly suggest that such management is not only possible but can be safe and effective when the services of a CoSA group are available. However, community engagement with the risk management process is crucial for its success.
The CoSA model provides clear evidence that sex offenders, particularly high-risk sex offenders, need not be destined to fail over and over again. CoSA is an excellent example of a positive approach used by the community to increase offender accountability, enhance community safety and significantly reduce victimization and the damage, pain and debilitation that so often comes with it.
Critics will say that providing support for sex offenders, especially those at highest risk for repeat behaviour, is wrong-headed. They will tell you that people who transgress in these ways need to be expelled from the community.
We wish to impress upon this committee, in the strongest way possible, that far from increasing our collective safety, driving people out of their communities increases the public's risk of harm. Drawing people into community, in appropriate, intentional, safe and risk-aware ways, provides the best protection that we know of against further victimization. This view is backed by empirical evidence that clearly demonstrates reductions in victimization, something few other initiatives that attempt to address the scourge of sexual offending and protect victims can legitimately lay claim to.
I want to state in closing that I am passionate about the challenges this work entails, and I am proud to be associated with the volunteers — my fellow Canadians — as well as the many public and voluntary sector partners who work every day to ensure the safety of people across this country and who, through CoSA partnerships, ensure Canada is a safe country in which no one is disposable.
We look forward to your questions.
The Chair: Can you give a little more detail about what the CoSA Circles do? Your results are obviously striking, but, forgive me, I am still a little unclear about what you do and how you go from here to there.
Mr. McWhinnie: Let us pretend you are a sex offender, and let us look at this table as a Circle of Support and Accountability. We are all citizens of this country. Our job is to offer you support in any way possible, including, for instance, ensuring that you have registered with the sex offender registry and that you maintain your obligations to sections of the Criminal Code, such as section 810. The circle also ensures that you are supported and have a place to come to when you have difficulties, when things are not working. Knowing full well what your background is and what your criminal potentials are, what your crime cycle is, we watch your back and make sure you are attending to those factors as well. It is also a safe community where we can talk to one another honestly and openly about what is troubling us both as volunteers and citizens of the country and you as a former sex offender. That is basically it.
The Chair: Do you meet on a regular basis, such as once a week?
Ms. Love: I will describe what a circle looks like. It is not usually this large. We have the core member.
The Chair: That is me, the core member?
Ms. Love: That is correct. We have about three to five trained and screened volunteers. They meet as a group and also one-on-one on a regular basis. That is pretty well it.
We work with a covenant, which is an important piece to CoSA because it outlines all the expectations and responsibilities of both the core member and the volunteers, ensuring the core member attends meetings, adheres to the legal requirements, whatever they are; section 810 conditions or long-term supervision conditions. It is all there in the covenant. We ask for a commitment of one year from both the core member and the volunteers. Over that time, trust develops. Through the development of trust, core members are gradually more willing to be open and honest about what goes on in their mind.
The Chair: Thank you. I have eaten into the time of senators wanting to put questions.
Senator Wallace: Thank you very much for the presentation.
Following somewhat on Senator Fraser's comments, I want to understand better what your organization actually does. As you have said, it is based on volunteers who provide this comfort, this circle of support. That support seems to be a good idea.
From my understanding of the psychological issues and profiles of sex offenders, this area is difficult and complex. When dealing with this area on a volunteer basis, are those providing the support qualified to provide the type of direction and instruction that sexual offenders requires? Do you have training programs for your volunteers? How do you penetrate that challenging requirement?
Mr. McWhinnie: It is a challenging requirement. We have a careful recruitment, screening and training process. During that time, we also engage professionals on a volunteer basis from the community — forensic psychologists, corrections officials and law enforcement people — to talk to our volunteers about what they are dealing with.
One thing they talk to our volunteers about is not to think of themselves as trained or quasi-professionals. They are taught to recognize when we need to involve a professional individual. We encourage our core members to attend community maintenance programs for sexual offending when these programs are available in the community, which is not often. Core members also attend substance abuse programming. That type of work and its complexities that you speak of are left to the professionals.
We have a great relationship in most cases with parole officers, correctional psychologists and other forensics professionals in the community. Our job is to ensure we do not confuse our role, which is to provide support and encouragement.
If Senator Fraser is not attending her programs, we will offer to take her there.
Senator Wallace: Dr. Paul Fedoroff appeared yesterday. He gave excellent, helpful evidence. Mr. and Ms. Stephenson were in earlier today. What they said may have been a surprise for some of us. All three of them seemed to say that sex offenders registered on the national registry find it somewhat beneficial as they move along. That was their experience.
What has been your experience regarding the attitude of offenders toward their registration in the system?
Mr. McWhinnie: I will pass part of that question to my colleague who works every day with these individuals.
My experience has been in going into institutions to talk to high-risk sex offenders about the potential for their involvement in a Circle of Support and Accountability. I endorse what you heard from Dr. Fedoroff and the Stephensons. It was to my surprise when I began this work 12 years ago that many sex offenders in jail — by and large — look forward to being held accountable. They are often ashamed of their behaviour.
Many individuals do not want to come out of the institution and they are afraid of two things: the community response and their own offence pattern. In many cases, they are responsive to the conditions in section 810 of the Criminal Code they are placed under. We give them a way to offer their bond to the community and say: Yes, I will be attentive to the conditions imposed under section 810; I may not like it, but I will register; and this is a way for me to be held accountable and held to a position where I will be able to come out with fewer fears than I originally had.
Ms. Love: I agree with Mr. Stephenson; they are happy to comply.
It is important to note that our applicants come to the program voluntarily. Registration is a requirement of their coming out of jail and turning their lives around. I have not seen great resentment to their having to register. They do not particularly like it if uniformed police officers come to their door. They are trying to make their way back into society. They do not want their neighbours to know about their history. That is a bit problematic.
Senator Wallace: Thank you. Those comments are helpful.
Senator Carstairs: Ms. Love, you indicated that there are 17 Circles of Support and Accountability. Where are they located in Canada, and how are they funded?
Ms. Love: They are located from coast to coast. Perhaps, we can provide a map with all of the locations.
The Chair: Can you provide that information to the clerk?
Ms. Love: Yes, I am happy to provide it. The list is a bit long to give now.
How are they funded? CoSAs are funded independently. We are not linked by a ``CoSA Canada,'' per se. Some are funded, as we are in Ottawa, through Correctional Service of Canada's Chaplaincy Service and through various grants for which we apply. We have recently received funding from the National Crime Prevention Centre, a branch of Public Safety Canada. Mennonite Central Committee also funds several sites across Canada.
Mr. McWhinnie: In terms of locations, Circles of Support and Accountability exist in every major centre across the country with the exception of Edmonton, which is because of a resourcing issue.
Senator Carstairs: There are more than 17 cities in Canada. CoSAs are not across the country, although there may be one geographically in every province. Is there one in Thompson or Portage la Prairie, Manitoba? There may be one in Winnipeg. How widespread are they? If there were more financial resources, would there be more CoSAs?
Mr. McWhinnie: Do you want me to read the list?
The Chair: Please read the list rapidly, but then if you can provide the map to the clerk when you leave the table, we will copy it to committee members.
Mr. McWhinnie: We have CoSAs in: St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador; Halifax, Nova Scotia; Moncton, New Brunswick; three in the greater Montreal area, one is English speaking and the other two are bilingual and French; Ottawa, Ontario; Kingston, Ontario; Toronto, Ontario, which covers south-western Ontario, including Hamilton and Kitchener-Waterloo; Peterborough, Ontario; Winnipeg, Manitoba; Regina, Saskatchewan; Saskatoon, Saskatchewan; Prince Albert, Saskatchewan; Calgary, Alberta; and in British Columbia, we have one project that covers the catchment area from Hope to the Pacific Ocean. It is a large project.
We do not have a CoSA in Thompson, Manitoba. Everyone needs increased resources, but if we had more resources, we have an intentional effort to establish a Circle of Support and Accountability in Thompson.
Senator Carstairs: If you have one CoSA in British Columbia serving 4.4 million people, it seems barely adequate to meet the needs of the sex offenders released from institutions in the province of British Columbia. Therefore, resources are clearly an issue in terms of the availability of CoSAs.
Mr. McWhinnie: Those resources are not only in terms of money.
Senator Carstairs: And volunteers.
Mr. McWhinnie: Yes.
Senator Joyal: How much money are we talking about?
Mr. McWhinnie: There is a multitude of funding sources to fund CoSAs across the country, as Ms. Love has outlined.
Senator Joyal: What is the overall budget of all the centres?
Mr. McWhinnie: We are mounting a demonstration project with the National Crime Prevention Centre to conduct further research over a five-year period. We are looking at a total of $2.5 million currently from all sources, including those from the National Crime Prevention Centre. That funding brings us near our capacity in terms of how we can operate across the country.
At the end of the five-year period with the National Crime Prevention Centre, we will be back to where we were prior to October 1 of this year when that project began, where we were funded in the neighbourhood of about $600,000, all told, from all sources in Canada. Frankly, that funding is woefully inadequate for the work we are doing, but our people do it anyway.
I know Ms. Love worked for many years on close to a $6,000 grant from the Correctional Service of Canada, and then extra money that she can speak more directly to from the Trillium Fund.
Senator Joyal: I want to establish a ratio of effectiveness on the basis of the amount of money involved, which was $600,000, and the number of core members. How many core members do you have?
Mr. McWhinnie: At last count, we were working with about 120 across Canada.
Senator Joyal: I am trying to understand where we put our money. Where is our priority here? Is it more important to invest in the type of initiative that you monitor — with great dedication, as far as I can see from your testimony — and the fact that we have to hire police to watch and keep up-to-date information on offenders? I think the dollars are better invested in your initiative than in police forces trying to monitor sex offenders — and with a greater chance of limiting the risk of recidivism, which is important to highlight.
A society has only so much money available; it decides its priorities and where the money has a better return. It seems you have a much better return for the amount of money involved versus the number of members. Therefore, your approach is much better than to try to multiply the police forces, which is expensive; we all know that.
Have you ever looked at your initiative on that basis?
Mr. McWhinnie: It is not either/or for us. We work, as much as possible, in close collaboration with the police. It is both/and — the monitoring that law enforcement officials provide effectively across the country, although they also need additional resources, and the day-to-day operations that we provide through CoSA that police forces can never do. We can resource them as much as we want, and as much as they need; they still will not be able to do what we do, nor can we do what they do.
In terms of Bill S-2, Mr. Stephenson made the point clearly that the registry is not a preventative tool. We are primarily a preventative tool. The sex offender registry is a good tool for police to use to investigate proactively — particularly with the changes that I think you are proposing — the potential for sexual offending and when a sexual offence occurs.
Our job is in league with that work in that we do not want to see any further victims, but we are a proactive protective tool. In an ideal world, in a good Canada, we would fund both organizations to the capacity that they need.
Senator Joyal: It puzzles me that you are a volunteer, like Ms. Love and others. What kind of professional training do you have? To me, a sex offender is a person with a kind of handicap. You do not ask just anyone to try to approach someone with a handicap. Training is needed, especially when you deal with the highest risk offenders or people probably with mental disorders.
Not everyone is fit and has the technique and the manner to approach a person in that condition. How do you train your people? What approach do you have to ensure that the volunteers have the capacity to nurture the person in a way that prevents recidivism?
Ms. Love: We rely heavily on our community partners to assist us in training. We are lucky here in Ottawa to have a partnership or a working relationship with people at the Royal Ottawa Hospital, including Dr. Fedoroff, whom you met, and others. They come in and talk about sexual deviance and that sort of thing.
We also work with people from the John Howard Society, who come in and talk about crime cycles and the effects of incarceration or institutionalization. As well, we invite victims groups in, who talk about the impact that these types of offences have on victims and survivors. We rely on the outside circle.
As Mr. McWhinnie mentioned, we do not claim to set up our volunteers as therapists. What we hope for from our volunteers is to provide compassion, to walk with these people — to listen to them, to help them and to challenge them.
If their cognitive distortion says it is okay to do something, maybe it is not. That is where our focus is; to help them make good choices and to role model.
If I can return to your original comment about the value of the program, we have to measure the value in more than monetary value. We also have to look at the value of using community members. This program empowers citizens to be part of the solution to this huge problem. We can all be part of the solution, rather than sit in our homes and be afraid.
Senator Baker: I congratulate you on the excellent job that you are doing right across Canada. I suppose one of the biggest problems we have when someone has been convicted of a criminal offence and is released is in complying with the conditions of release. Sometimes they are placed back in the same environment from which they came prior to being charged, where perhaps drugs and alcohol, for example, cause the offence or are a major reason for the offence.
Is your organization sometimes a part of the conditions upon release after terms, or is it a completely voluntary mechanism whereby someone comes to see you? Does a judge sometimes say to the offender that they are sentenced to 60 or 90 days in jail, and upon release they will be on probation for a year — abstain from alcohol, drugs and so on, the normal conditions — and they are to be a part of your organization? Is that sometimes in judicial orders upon release?
Mr. McWhinnie: It has been attempted, senator. We actively discourage that from happening. The reason is that we want to operate at arm's length from the official criminal justice system. We cannot do the job they do and they cannot do the job we do.
Also, the best motivation — and for anyone to turn their life around, they must be motivated — is they come to us; they hear who we are and decide on their own that this circle is something they need and want in their life. Development of a relationship to enhance that change is the same as you and I would develop when we form a friendship with someone. It is not ordered by anyone.
We have an experience, for instance, in starting a Circle of Support and Accountability in Minnesota, where the Department of Corrections in Minnesota made Circles of Support and Accountability an adjunct to their Department of Corrections. When the person was finished with the Department of Corrections, when their sentence was over and they were free to go, they also left the Circle of Support and Accountability because that was part of the DOC. We want to avoid that situation at all costs. We were approached by defence counsel as recently as a week ago as to whether we can ask a judge to impose Circles of Support and Accountability: absolutely not. Neither can we impose a relationship on Canadian citizens with a sex offender. We cannot do that. We can try but it will not work. You know what you would do and I know what I would do if the court said we will be in a relationship with this person. I would say, I do not think so. It is a fine balance that must be there.
Senator Neufeld: Mr. McWhinnie, I read the study that you performed with the two groups. You stated that none of the CoSA participants had any sexual offence charge or conviction in the three-year period following. You said that, in addition, the CoSA participants had 82 per cent less violent reoffending and 83 per cent less reoffending. Maybe I did not understand what you said, but it implies to me there was some reoffending.
Mr. McWhinnie: Yes, that was a standardized three-year period and we looked at reoffending rates within that three- year period. The study was much longer than that period and looked at whenever a person was released until we ended the study or until they failed. In that expanded period of time, yes, there was reoffending, and in some cases it was sexual reoffending, though rarely. We reduced sexual reoffending over that longer period of time by 83 per cent compared to the comparison group. The sample was a bit larger over that longer period of time. We wanted to say, let us take a three-year chunk of time where everything is equal and find out what happens in that period of time.
Next week, you will hear from an official from the research division of the Correctional Service of Canada, Dr. Andrew Harris, who will go through the recidivism rates that are normal for sex offenders. We have been able to reduce reoffending rates — not eliminate them — for the most serious repeat offenders that come to us.
Senator Neufeld: How do you go about working in the communities to have them accept this offender? I think that would be one of the hurdles. I appreciate the work that you do. As a recovering alcoholic, I can relate to Alcoholics Anonymous types of things. It is a bit different but kind of the same.
How do you convince the community, because there is usually an uprising — not always — when a high-risk sex offender is released into a community. How do you deal with that uprising in a community? I am not saying that you are not dealing with that situation; in fact, I compliment you on what you are doing.
Mr. McWhinnie: First, there probably is not anything we do to try to convince a community that this is a good idea unless we are recruiting volunteers. By the way, there will be a list at the door for you to sign up for later.
When something happens in a community like the release of a high-risk sex offender with a lot of publicity, the community is afraid and angry. Those are legitimate responses to something that is horrific. That situation tells us there is something we need to pay attention to here.
We have made the mistake of trying to say to the public: you do not need to be afraid; you have a circle of support; you have a police officer. That is wrong. There is a reason to be afraid and concerned. How to channel that fear, which is from the gut or the belly, into something that comes from up here, through a Circle of Support and Accountability, is a message we try to give people. We validate their fear and anger that such things happen in the community.
Let me take this opportunity to say that we are talking about ``they'' as sex offenders, ``them'' or ``those people over there.'' That is incorrect. Sex offenders are amongst us in this room and on the street. Sex offenders are us, basically. We are talking about our fellow citizens. We are talking about our hockey coaches and our priests. A judge was convicted yesterday or the day before for acting inappropriately from the bench. People from every walk of life — and I think you heard that from the RCMP yesterday — are the people who commit these sexual offences. They are our brothers and fathers, our uncles and grandfathers. We need to keep that in mind. We also speak to the destructive impact that sexual offending has on a community and acknowledge it, and say there is a reason to be afraid and angry. When we talk to volunteers, we tell them this is a proactive way for them to become involved in the criminal justice system. They will meet some awesome people. They will meet their police officers, their chiefs of police and forensic psychologists. They will learn a great deal and also make a difference in terms of what happens in their community and their community safety. They will not know those things until they have actually been part of it.
We will portray actual volunteer experiences in terms of people who have come to this volunteering with great fear and great temerity, what their experience was afterwards and how that experience changed their life, because it is a life- changing experience.
The Chair: I have a question dealing with the study by the Correctional Service of Canada and the statistics. The Library of Parliament has provided for me this study from the Correctional Service by Wilson, Picheca and Prinzo, dated May 2005. Your submission referred to a 2008 report. Is that a different report?
Mr. McWhinnie: Yes; is the number on your report R-168?
The Chair: Yes.
Mr. McWhinnie: There is R-185.
The Chair: Is that a public document?
Mr. McWhinnie: Yes.
The Chair: Thank you very much. We will ensure that senators receive that document.
Mr. McWhinnie: There is also the December 2009 issue of Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment, a well-known peer-reviewed journal that contains even more data after R-185.
Senator Watt: Your organization seems to be successful in terms of rehabilitating the people that you deal with. I hope at one point down the road the people within your organization will look at the High North. Communities there also require these services. There is a high rate of suicide amongst young people within the Inuit society and within the First Nations society. Much of the problem is probably connected to what happened to them in the early stages of their lives. Many of those people could be involved in committing crimes of a sexual nature.
I want to ask you about the automatic registration of offenders in Bill S-2. Can you expand more on how you feel about the automatic registration of offenders?
I also want your thoughts about whether we should keep those people on the sexual offender registration list forever. Should offenders have the ability to have their names removed? Should we consider registering all sexual offenders, regardless of the nature of their crime?
Should we put additional information on the registry about the nature of the crime committed and information about the victim so the police will have complete information to carry out their duties?
Mr. McWhinnie: I would have to answer that question as a private citizen, because this question is a matter of government policy. If you want me to do so, I will. I am here to talk about Circles of Support and Accountability, however, which is independent from the sex offender registry.
Senator Watt: I am aware of that.
Mr. McWhinnie: As a private citizen, everything I say is predicated on the fact that the sexual offender registry never becomes accessible to anyone other than law enforcement officials.
Senator Watt: We agree.
Mr. McWhinnie: As a private citizen, I approve of automatic registration. I think that yes, absolutely, there should be automatic registration. The current provisions say that in a very few cases, where there are extenuating circumstances, the court may decline to require the person to register. I also agree with that provision. I trust our courts in this land.
I believe that people at some point — I do not know what point that is, but if you look at recidivism rates over a 10- year, 15-year or 20-year period, that information may help you decide — can be removed from the registry. There must be a pathway out. We have to go back to pre-war Europe to find out what registries did and can do to people. There must be a way to remove your name from that list. There may be strict criteria, but we need to provide that pathway.
Should all sex offenders be registered automatically? I work in private practice with people who, for instance, have been found with child pornography on their computer — not a lot, but some. I do not know if all those people should be on the registry. However, if you register all sexual offenders, maybe they should be there.
As to whether there should be additional information in the registry, again, to reiterate, as long as the information is accessible only by law enforcement officials, then absolutely. The police need to have the tools to be able to use that information. The RCMP behavioural sciences unit will be able to provide data like who the victims are, what the defence patterns were like, what these people are capable of doing and what their offence patterns are like.
Those are my comments as a private citizen. In Circles of Support and Accountability, apart from helping people register if they are required to register, we ensure that our core members are compliant with whatever legislation is imposed upon them. That is our official stance as Circles of Support and Accountability.
Senator Watt: In your opening remarks, you said that one of your responsibilities is to go into penitentiaries and talk to people who are locked up.
Mr. McWhinnie: When possible, yes.
Senator Watt: That is definitely before they go out. At that stage, do you solicit to see when those people will be released? Do you somehow monitor them and find out when you are talking to them on a one-to-one basis at what stage they will be discharged from the penitentiary and ready to enter into the community? Do you follow them, or does that monitoring not exist? Can you elaborate more on how that process takes place?
Mr. McWhinnie: It varies across the country in terms of accessibility to an institution. I invite my colleague to comment on her practice here in Ottawa with the institutions in Kingston. Where possible, we go into an institution and talk to a person about Circles of Support. We receive a referral from the Correctional Service, a chaplain or from the offender or the offender's family members, as offenders approach their warrant expiry date or release date. Sometimes we receive that referral from a community parole office, saying they have someone approaching their warrant expiry date and that offender is being supervised under the provisions of a long-term supervision order. Those referrals come to us usually in a timely fashion. It is relation-building, and we are always trying to improve that. At that point, we attempt to make contact with an individual. Resourcing is another issue that comes up with those referrals.
If your question is whether we monitor them afterwards, the answer is not usually. We leave the door open, however. At six months prior to the release date, you can imagine that a high-risk sex offender who is highly unsocial, will say: Get lost, I do not want to have anything to do with you. However, at three months prior to the release date, the offender figures out what will happen and says, I think I need that Circle of Support. Then, we will come back and talk to that offender. Past the release date, again, the door is open. If we have the resources, we will take someone into a Circle of Support provided they meet our criteria, but we do not actively monitor them after that. That monitoring is the job of police officers. We will receive other referrals occasionally from the police department, saying: We have an offender in the community; he is from New Brunswick and was released to Ottawa; he has been here for three months and is struggling; we think he could use a Circle of Support; what can you do?
Ms. Love will take it from there.
Ms. Love: We work closely with the police here in Ottawa who are tasked to work with high-risk releases to Ottawa. If an offender is released at warrant expiry, with or without a section 810 order, the police receive a release package. The officer's name is Mitch Houle. He might contact me and ask me if I am working with this offender. There is a close relationship with regard to that release.
I do not know if I answered your question.
Senator Watt: Yes, you did.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: I want to start by congratulating you on your dedication. Priority must be given to the social and psychological reintegration of offenders that can be rehabilitated. Senator Joyal put me on to a fundamental issue, and it might help to reassure the public about the work that you are doing with this clientele. You work in particular with offenders who exhibit deviant behaviour, and not just with people who exhibit delinquent behaviour. That is my main area of concern.
I also know that the work you do is fastidious, especially when it involves volunteers. This also concerns me because the main character trait of these offenders is their great ability to manipulate people. So then, without delving into the subject too deeply, can you tell us a little about the counselling and psychotherapy techniques you employ and how you go about assessing whether an offender that you are counselling has in fact been cured? I am concerned that volunteers may be treating dangerous offenders.
[English]
Mr. McWhinnie: If I understand your question correctly, yes, we are working with a highly deviant population who are capable of manipulating people, and have manipulated people, to commit their offences and to escape detection. Our protection against that population, first, is being apprised by professionals who are knowledgeable of those things; of the techniques of manipulation that some people may engage in. The professionals will talk to our volunteers to be cautious about that manipulation, to recognize boundaries and to recognize when something may not be true and how to confront that situation.
Our second level of protection against that situation is, as Ms. Love pointed out in her presentation, that none of this work can be done alone so we have a circle of support working with a convicted sex offender rather than only one person. We talk to one another. We learn how to talk to one another to share our observations: what we are seeing moment to moment, day to day, and what our core member might have said in a private moment with one of our volunteers.
By the way, the safety of that volunteer is also ensured by looking at the member's offence pattern, and if it is not safe for a volunteer to be with that person alone, then that will not happen.
If we have concerns, we share them in our circle. If we have concerns we are confused about or do not know about, then we have access to professionals who help us in our training in order to ask them what we are looking at and what we should do next. We are working with a highly deviant population.
We do not have a psychological technique, unless we consider forming a human bond with another person a psychological technique. We cannot change behaviour or expect there to be any improvement in behaviour unless you and I develop a bond of trust with each other first. It is not possible otherwise. That is our psychological technique, if you like. We try to be close to this person and extend our hand in friendship. It does not happen right away. That is where time is involved.
Finally, at what point do we recognize that someone has been healed? You are right in that ``healing'' or ``fixing'' a sex offender is probably not in the cards. What we are all concerned about, and we can put it on the table, I suppose, is if someone has a deviant sexual attraction to children, will we correct that deviance? No; that person will probably always feel a sexual attraction towards children. How does that person manage that attraction? How does that person deal with that attraction from day to day? No one goes through childhood saying: I know what I want to be when I grow up; I want to be a pedophile.
How does that person talk about that attraction with their therapist? Do they have a therapist? Can they talk openly within their group about what happened to them in their childhoods? Perhaps they were molested as children and they have been sexualized too early. This is what we talk about within the circle, but not to provide therapy; it is so there is a safe environment for these people to talk about what is bothering them. Believe me, in most cases, someone who experiences that kind of deviant sexual arousal, it bothers them as well.
Senator Boisvenu: How long do you work with these people?
Mr. McWhinnie: As Ms. Love said in her presentation, we invite them into a relationship for at least a year. That one year is based on the fact that a person was exposed to conditions generally under section 810, until recently, that lasted for up to one year. It is now two years so probably we will invite people and volunteers into a group now for two years. Sometimes it goes on for a lifetime.
Senator Boisvenu: If a person is recidivist, do you report that to the police?
Mr. McWhinnie: Absolutely; we invite the person to report it first in order to act responsibly, but if that person will not do so, we will.
The Chair: There is an interesting distinction of nuance, perhaps, in English between the words ``healing'' and ``curing.'' You talk about ``healing.'' I think both words probably would be translated in French as ``guérir,'' but I find it interesting that you do not in fact talk about curing; you talk about healing.
Along a general line, given that you pick up your core members as they leave the prison system, do you have views on the therapeutic rehabilitative programs available in prison, federal and provincial? Are there enough programs? Are they good enough? What can you do to help us understand the adequacy of that element of the system?
Mr. McWhinnie: We are not professionals in that area. Dr. Fedoroff, Dr. Harris and others who might come before you at a different time will be able to address that question more effectively than we can. We are aware of some of the statistics in that generally they find a 32-per-cent reduction in reoffending rates by people who have been treated versus those who have not. Are there enough treatment programs in prison? Probably there are not.
I can tell you as a matter of fact, where we are involved, we are not seeing sufficient treatment approaches in the community in the form of follow-up care, even if there were good programs in the institutions. Community is where the rubber meets the road. That is where the programs have to be. You probably need to talk to others who are more familiar with that area.
The Chair: We will, but you have a unique perspective, at least in terms of the witnesses that this committee is hearing, so I want to hear your perspective. Do you have anything to add, Ms. Love?
Ms. Love: I do not have a lot to add. Mr. McWhinnie is probably more familiar with the treatment programs because he is more in and out of the prisons than I am. As he said, the fact that our nearest institution is two hours away is a bit preventative to frequent visits.
What I do know about the programs is that they are good. I have heard varying things from different institutions. I know that Bill Marshall, for instance, is connected to the one in Bath. I have heard rave reviews about that program. Generally, I think programs are good but, as Mr. McWhinnie said, probably not frequently offered.
The Chair: Thank you both very much indeed. It was extremely interesting. I think we have all learned important information this morning. We are grateful to you for helping us do so.
Honourable senators, we now are joined by Superintendent David Truax, from the Ontario Provincial Police. Thank you very much for being here, Mr. Truax.
David Truax, Superintendent, Ontario Provincial Police: Good afternoon.
I am a superintendent with the Ontario Provincial Police. The OPP operates the Ontario Sex Offender Registry on behalf of the Ontario Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services. I am here representing the Ontario Sex Offender Registry and the police community in Ontario which utilizes the sex offender registry on a daily basis, and have been doing so since April 21, 2001.
My current position with the OPP is Director of the Behavioural Sciences and Analysis Services, within the Investigation and Support Bureau, which also includes the OSOR.
Ontario's sex offender registration legislation is known as Christopher's Law, in memory of 11-year-old Christopher Stephenson who, in 1988, was abducted and brutally murdered by a convicted sex offender on federal statutory release. At the 1993 inquest into Christopher's death, the coroner's jury recommended creating a national registry for convicted sex offenders.
In the absence of that having occurred, with the encouragement and support of the Stephenson family, victims' groups and law enforcement organizations, Ontario implemented the first sex offender registry in Canada. It remains today the only provincial registry and has maintained its existence, given the limitations and restrictions of the Sex Offender Information Registration Act and the current National Sex Offender Registry program.
After consulting with police agencies across Canada, in August 1988, OPP Commissioner Julian Fantino requested that the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, CACP, call upon the Government of Canada through the Minister of Justice, the Attorney General and the Minister of Public Safety to amend the Criminal Code and consider the Province of Ontario's sex offender registry legislation and software application as a model for enhancing the National Sex Offender Registry. Commissioner Fantino's resolution to maximize the public safety of all Canadian residents was subsequently adopted by the CACP.
To ensure the safety and security of all Canadian residents, the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police supports that the National Sex Offender Registry program should be further enhanced by, for example: mandating automatic registration of sex offenders upon conviction rather than pursuant to a judge's order; ensuring that members of all police services in Canada have access, use and disclosure of registered offender information for crime prevention or other law enforcement purposes; mandating federal and provincial correctional services to notify sex offender registry centres of offender release dates; creating an electronic link between all provincial and federal corrections agencies to the National Sex Offender Registry to ensure the identification of offenders being released from institutions and to ensure their compliance in relation to registration; ensuring the police service of jurisdiction verifies the registered offender's reported home address; allowing data matching, which includes comparison with other electronic applications with the NSOR that is currently prohibited by the Sex Offender Information Registration Act; and, furthermore, that the federal government financially support a program enhancement, including development, implementation and maintenance.
Commissioner Fantino had extended an invitation to the previous Minister of Public Safety, the Honourable Peter Van Loan, to visit Ontario's Sex Offender Registry, which is located in Orillia, Ontario, at OPP's general headquarters, and review its software application and its capabilities. On behalf of Commissioner Fantino, I extend that invitation to all members of this committee. Were it not for the usual restrictions on audiovisual equipment for committee meetings, I would like to have used my time in this presentation to show you the tremendous capabilities the Ontario database has in protecting the citizens of Ontario, particularly those most vulnerable: our children.
Ontario's registry currently houses information on over 12,000 sex offenders and has one of the highest compliance rates worldwide, in excess of 97 per cent. I can tell you as of 10 o'clock this morning, the compliance rate was 97.59 per cent, the highest we have ever achieved. That amount includes 9,179 compliant offenders and 3,562 inactive offenders, who could be deceased, relocated outside the Province of Ontario, incarcerated, or deported.
Ontario's police officers continue to access the registry directly on a daily basis regarding ongoing investigations, as well as in relation to their crime prevention efforts.
Recently, an Ontario policy agency disclosed information on three registered sex offenders in their jurisdiction to their employers pursuant to the Police Service Act of Ontario. Two of these offenders had been on the OSOR for offences against children and were in positions where they had access to children through the course of their employment. The other offender had a history of sex abuse of the elderly and was currently employed at a nursing home. This information was obtained and shared as a result of the offenders' obligations to register.
In another case that I can highlight for you, a male store clerk had been sexually assaulted. The physical description and behaviour of the offender was queried in the OSOR database and provided police with a possible person of interest. A photo line-up was prepared and the victim subsequently identified the offender. That person was charged with sexual assault and was subsequently convicted.
If a child were to go missing in the City of Ottawa today, somewhere outside of this particular building, right now, given its query capabilities, Ontario's registry could do a radius search within minutes to identify registered sex offenders in the area, provide their physical description and their occupation, as well as a description of the vehicle they own, lease or regularly operate. Within a short period of time, police would be knocking on those particular addresses and also looking for the vehicles as described.
If the Christopher Stephenson case were to have occurred today in Ontario, police would have been aware that a released sex offender was living close by and, if police had gone to that particular address, they potentially could have found that person holding Christopher against his will. Christopher's parents, Jim and Anna Stephenson, whom I consider friends, have appeared before you and they were involved with the success of Ontario's registry. More than 20 years later, they have not given up this cause.
I welcome any questions you may have.
Senator Wallace: Thank you, Mr. Truax.
When Minister Toews appeared before us last week, he spoke about an extensive consultation process that led up to the preparation of Bill S-2. From what I recall, that process involved consulting with law enforcement across the country and representatives of justice departments in the various provinces and territories.
In your presentation you referred to consultations that occurred with your commissioner and others in 2008. Can you tell us about your experience as Ontario police officials and your involvement in the consultation process that led to the preparation of Bill S-2?
Mr. Truax: I am a member on behalf of the province of Ontario of the federal-provincial-territorial working group on high-risk offenders, and I attend those meetings whenever possible. I can also advise you that the consultation process has occurred since 2008 as well. I regularly work with Mary Campbell and Doug Hoover— who I believe have appeared before you as well — in that consultation process, as well as with my colleagues from the RCMP who operate the National Sex Offender Registry. Those discussions are alive and well and we have good discussions in relation to going forward.
Senator Wallace: Is it fair to say that Bill S-2 represents, in a significant way, the results of the outcome of those consultations within that working group involving the federal and provincial governments?
Mr. Truax: Very much so: Bill S-2 brings a number of components and enhancements to the National Sex Offender Registry program that I believe are much needed, as you can understand from the position of the CACP. Being familiar with the Ontario Sex Offender Registry and all its capabilities, I am also aware of the challenges that the National Sex Offender Registry legislation has brought for the RCMP and I believe my colleagues from the RCMP have commented on that difference as well.
Senator Wallace: Witnesses have appeared before us who have questioned generally the effectiveness of sex offender registries. To support their position, they referred to studies from the United States and have commented that there has been a lack of analysis here in Canada to assess the effectiveness of these registries in Canada, both in Ontario and nationally. This view leads me to believe that we may not be creating the sense of security for our citizens that Bill S-2 — and the national registry in particular — might lead one to believe.
From what I have read, I do not believe those opinions are correct. What is your opinion on that issue? In asking that question, I realize that you are not dealing with these issues in theory or in a classroom; rather, you are dealing with them on the street, you are dealing with the reality.
What is your comment with regard to those opinions that we have heard?
Mr. Truax: My initial thought as a police officer with more than 20 years' experience and as someone familiar with the Ontario Sex Offender Registry is that the registry is effective. It has some deterrent effect. I base that comment on the fact that an offender is interacted with on a minimum annual basis. There is an address verification that goes with that registry. Extensive information is collected in relation to that offender and the offender needs to meet a number of obligations, based on the Ontario legislation.
The fact that the records of the Ontario Sex Offender Registry are restricted from public access also works in obtaining compliance from sex offenders so that information is not in the public domain and, as a result, offenders are not facing repercussions from the community, et cetera.
However, the relationship between the police and the offender in Ontario is established through the legislation we have. Any changes in address and so on, that information is communicated to the registry. We keep current information that way to carry out investigations of public safety. Particularly when it comes to children, for instance, investigations can be carried out expeditiously and with the advantage of having the information within the Ontario Sex Offender Registry.
Senator Runciman: Thank you, Mr. Truax, for being here. Jim Stephenson testified earlier and he described the registry as being, in its primary role, an investigative tool for policing. The secondary benefit is the preventive impact it can have as well. I assume you share that view.
We had a discussion here earlier that it is one thing to have legislation in place, but another thing to have the ability to implement the goals of the legislation.
I am not sure what familiarity you have with the technology at the federal level and how compatible that technology is with what you are utilizing. Do you see that technology as a problem?
Mr. Truax: I am not intimately familiar with the technological aspects of the National Sex Offender Registry, but I can provide comments from the Ontario perspective. The Ontario Sex Offender Registry software application provides automatic notifications in relation to an individual's upcoming registration date. The software provides photographs of the individual. It provides photographs of their tattoos, for instance. That type of information is important as an investigative tool.
We also have, within the OSOR, a geo-mapping capability. We can enter an address and put that address on a map that is up to date, providing the locations of sex offenders. It is my understanding that the National Sex Offender Registry may not have all those capabilities necessarily.
Senator Runciman: I think an argument can be made, and we heard it from the Royal Ottawa Health Care Group the other day, in terms of the costs of reducing recidivism versus the cost implications associated with someone who goes on to commit a serious crime. Too often, these cost implications are not part of the equation when making these kinds of investment decisions.
In terms of Bill S-2 and the Ontario legislation, the purpose of the legislation in Ontario seems to be broader. I am looking at this difference in terms of investigation, and I suppose crime prevention as well. Bill S-2 seems to relate to crimes of a sexual nature. The reality is, of course, that the police may not know the motive for a crime until there is a later investigation. Time can be lost.
How do you feel about that issue in terms of the legislation? Should Bill S-2 be broader in terms of purpose?
Mr. Truax: Bill S-2 still has a distinctive difference in relation to the access by police. In Ontario, the legislation for access by police, is worded as ``for crime prevention or law enforcement purposes.''
Bill S-2 stipulates access by police is to investigate and prevent ``crimes of a sexual nature.''
If I can give you an example, if police are investigating a reported abduction of a child, the abduction may not necessarily be of a sexual nature. It could be for ransom, for instance. Bill S-2 would limit the police from accessing the National Sex Offender Registry files to further their investigation. The wording in the Ontario legislation is ``for crime prevention or law enforcement purposes.'' That legislation has been in place for a considerable period of time. We find the registry to be a functional and valuable investigative tool.
Senator Runciman: You recommend that we look at that wording as a potential amendment to the legislation, then.
You mention mandating federal and provincial correctional services to notify registry centres.
We have raised this issue. Should that notification be an obligation? You say ``mandating.'' They have been mandated, but no obligation is placed upon them by the legislation. Do you have a view on that issue?
Mr. Truax: I can inform this committee that since 2008 our relationship between the Ontario Sex Offender Registry and the Correctional Service of Canada has improved considerably. We now have a memorandum of agreement in place in relation to obtaining offender information through Corrections Canada, so that situation has improved greatly. If notification is mandated, then of course that is an obvious improvement, but I can tell you that the level of cooperation has increased considerably in the last 18 months.
Senator Runciman: How important do you think it is in terms of direct access from local police? I know currently, if they want to involve the federal system, they have to go through one of the NSOR centres.
Mr. Truax: Correct.
Senator Runciman: In Ontario, local police can contact the registry immediately. How important is that access from your perspective?
Mr. Truax: In Ontario, any authorized police officer has direct access to the Ontario Sex Offender Registry software application through their computer in their office, wherever they may be in the province of Ontario.
I understand the way the National Sex Offender Registry operates is that police need to contact a provincial or territorial NSOR centre to make their query. There is a difference in relation to the officer working on community patrol in Ontario, for example. The officer can see the offender's photos, view the offender's files, find an address and view addresses within their patrol zone. That information is all accessed directly without having to go to a provincial centre. We find that access to be beneficial in Ontario.
Senator Baker: Christopher's Law also has provisions that enable your centre to be informed when someone who has been convicted of a designated offence is released from prison and also that enable police to check information given by someone who has contacted the registry at least once after that person has contacted the registry.
Do I recall those two matters correctly from your legislation?
Mr. Truax: Yes, Senator Baker, in essence, they are correct. We are notified of the release dates of incarcerated sexual offenders to invoke the clause where they must report and register to the OSOR within 15 days of their release.
Senator Baker: You provided testimony to the statutory review of the Sex Offender Information Registration Act before a Commons committee chaired by Member of Parliament Garry Breitkreuz. That committee came forward with recommendations that formed the basis of the bill introduced last year into the House of Commons and now replaced by Bill S-2.
The House of Commons committee's second recommendation in regard to automatic registration was:
The Committee recommends . . . automatic registration of offenders found guilty of offences listed in paragraph 490.011(1)(a), (c), (c.1), (d) or (e) of the Criminal Code, except in rare circumstances that warrant a departure from this rule when the judge is convinced that the impact of inclusion in the registry on the offender's privacy and liberty would be grossly disproportionate to the public interest. SOIRA must clearly provide that, in these rare circumstances, the court must justify its decision.
In Bill S-2, everyone convicted of a designated offence is automatically registered. There is then a later provision that allows the offender to be removed from the registry upon application to the court. This provision is considerably different than the recommendation made by the House of Commons.
What do you think of that departure from the recommendation of the House of Commons committee?
The Chair: Senator Baker, for clarification, if the offender applies, I think the offender receives an exemption from the obligation to register and report. We heard testimony that offenders cannot ever have their names taken off the list as long as they live.
Senator Baker: You are absolutely correct.
However, the recommendation was that if the judge thought the offence was relatively minor compared to other offences in the same category, the offender would be excluded from automatic registration. In this bill, everyone is automatically registered. Then an application can be made later to the court to remove the offender's name from the registry.
Jennifer Bird, Researcher, Library of Parliament: The legislation allows for their obligation to notify the registry to be terminated. Their name is not removed from the registry. Only their obligation to notify the registry of a change of address and so forth is terminated.
Senator Baker: You will agree that recommendation 2 of the House of Commons committee is not what is in Bill S- 2?
The Chair: Indeed; I am not trying to chew up your time, Senator Baker.
Senator Baker: I hope not.
The Chair: We heard much testimony on this area, and it was difficult to try to ascertain the details. I simply wanted to be clear.
Senator Baker: My second question is this: In 2004 when we introduced the bill — I remember it well — a provision in that bill was taken out through amendments. The provision allowed for the retrospective or retroactive provision of the act to all those who are under sentence. The paragraph that was in the bill at that time was:
Within one year of SOIRA coming into force, the Attorney General of a province may serve a notice in a form specified in the Criminal Code requiring persons who were under sentence for a designated offence when the act came into force to register.
In other words, a year was given for the police forces to register anyone who was under sentence on December 15, 2004. That does not mean only anyone in jail, but anyone on probation or any order issued by a judge as defined in the Criminal Code. The offence may have taken place 20 years ago. If an offender is under court orders in the original bill, they could be placed on the sex offender registry if their offence was serious. That provision is not in Bill S-2. It was taken out in 2004.
What are your thoughts on making the bill retrospective or retroactive to apply to all those who are under sentence currently, which includes those on probation or serving conditions after release?
Mr. Truax: In relation to the first question about automatic inclusion, I am supportive of automatic inclusion upon conviction of a prescribed offence, from a law enforcement perspective. The Ontario legislation has automatic inclusion.
In relation to retrospective or retroactive inclusion, when Christopher's Law came into force in 2001, the approach taken was to require registration of all offenders currently under sentence. It was a practical approach to address that issue. We can identify those individuals presently serving sentences. They can be identified and we can require that registration.
It is difficult to go back in time several years to try to collect all that information.
Senator Baker: I am not suggesting that, but someone under sentence could have committed the offence 20 years ago. The offence was serious if they are still under sentence. That is simply the point.
Mr. Truax: Correct.
Senator Baker: You say it is practical to require a person to register if the person is still under sentence.
Mr. Truax: Yes, it is.
Senator Carstairs: I understand that vehicle information is not required in Bill S-2, although it is part of the Ontario registry, because fiscal and technological challenges facing the RCMP do not make it possible.
If Ontario already has such software, why has there been no communication between the federal government and the Ontario police, or whatever ministry to which you report, to make that software available to the RCMP for this purpose?
Mr. Truax: That software has been made available to our federal counterparts. They have also taken the opportunity to review and consider it in the hopes this legislation is passed. If that legislation is passed, that software design, et cetera, will be available to our federal counterparts to avoid reinventing the wheel.
In relation to vehicle information, Bill C-16 amended the Ontario legislation in December 2008. Since December 15, 2008, the Ontario Sex Offender Registry now holds 3,090 records in relation to vehicles that are leased or owned by offenders, as well as 1,189 vehicles that are operated regularly by offenders. We now collect that vehicle information upon their annual registration.
As you can appreciate, in the number of investigations that are launched, often the only description that may be available in relation to that crime is a vehicle description. If police are looking for a particular colour of pickup truck with a cement company name on the side, for instance, that information is contained within the Ontario Sex Offender Registry application. That information can expedite an investigation quickly. The vehicle information has been added in Ontario and we find it to be valuable in relation to advancing investigations, especially in the interest of public safety.
Senator Carstairs: First, let me congratulate the Ontario government for generously sharing the software with the federal government. It does not always work that way, as my colleague across the floor understands.
My second question deals with the deterrence factor. We have been told by a number of witnesses that the protocol of checking on the sex offender works better if the police officer who knocks on the door is in plain clothes, as opposed to being in uniform. That does not always occur, however.
Is there a protocol for the OPP to appear in plain clothes rather than in police uniform, not when a crime has been committed, but when police are checking to ensure that someone lives where they say they live?
Mr. Truax: We work closely with registered offenders to respect their privacy. For example, the annual reminder of the registration is sent in an unmarked envelope, so the individual does not receive clearly marked mail from the Ontario Sex Offender Registry. We work with offenders in scheduling appointments, visits, et cetera, with the utmost consideration in relation to their privacy.
Depending on the length of time they need to report to the registry, that relationship can be five years, 10 years, 20 years or life, so that relationship is established, usually for a considerable period of time. We make our best efforts not to disrupt their lives too much.
Senator Joyal: Welcome, Mr. Truax. I understand that the Ontario Sex Offender Registry has been in operation for several years now. What troubles me is that the 2007 Annual Report of the Office of the Auditor General of Ontario stated:
There is little evidence demonstrating the effectiveness of registries in reducing sexual crimes or helping investigators to solve them, and the Ministry has yet to establish performance measures for its Registry.
On what basis was the effectiveness of the registry evaluated by the Auditor General?
Mr. Truax: This issue has arisen before in relation to trying to quantify how many crimes have been prevented through the existence and operation of the Ontario Sex Offender Registry. That number is not one that I am able to provide you. I am not familiar with any studies that have been conducted to quantify that number in relation to recidivism or its effectiveness.
Performance measures have been established with the Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services in relation to measuring the effectiveness of the registry. Those performance measures came into being in 2010. Obviously, they are something we use to examine and measure the effectiveness of the registry, based on the performance measures. I do not have those performance measures with me at this time, however.
Senator Joyal: I was about to ask you that question; I think you were expecting it. I can understand that 2007 was three years ago and you might have taken initiatives to improve the effectiveness.
Mr. Truax: Yes, we have.
Senator Joyal: Can you share that information with us through the chair?
The Chair: You can send the material to the clerk, Mr. Truax.
Senator Joyal: In a nutshell, can you inform us of what kind of major initiatives you have undertaken to make the registry more effective in terms of its goal and the way it is operated?
Mr. Truax: We have made considerable efforts in the last two years in educating law enforcement agencies throughout the province of Ontario on the software and application. Training is conducted on a weekly basis all over Ontario in educating police officers and other law enforcement personnel on its use, such as the query capabilities, for instance.
We also reinforce the message that the information contained within the registry is available to any law enforcement agency on a 24/7 basis. Often, we conduct quick queries. If an investigation is launched in relation to the disappearance of a child, on a 24/7 basis, we can assist police agencies and provide them with expertise in building the inquiry to carry out their investigation.
Additionally, we work with our law enforcement partners in the province of Ontario directly in support of addressing compliance, so that noncompliant offenders can be located, registration can be processed, their file updated, et cetera, so we have current information within the registry. We work with police services throughout the province on that compliance. We have a number of police services who have been able to achieve 100-per-cent compliance in relation to the sex offenders who reside within their police jurisdiction.
That is helpful as an example of the measures that we take to improve it.
Senator Joyal: In other words, you can measure if the offender whose name appears on the registry has reported at the time they were supposed to report. I understand there is a sea of difference between the computer systems of 2010 versus those from 2000.
Mr. Truax: Very much so; the technology has improved considerably. Improving those services is an ongoing project. With regard to the technological development of the software, we are supported by Justice Technology Services, which is a government branch in the Province of Ontario. That work is ongoing, and we have a close relationship with them with respect to improving the capabilities and operations of the computer system.
Senator Joyal: As director of the Ontario Sex Offender Registry, can you look at your computer screen every morning and know, for instance, how many offenders are required to report today, according to the date of their entry? Do you have that capacity now?
Mr. Truax: Authorized users, as well as each police agency in Ontario, has that capability of knowing the status of each offender within their police jurisdiction: to know who is noncompliant, who is due for registration updates, et cetera. That is done on a daily basis. That information is available to them at any time.
Senator Joyal: At the same time, do you have a report of how many offenders have not reported?
Mr. Truax: Correct; I can tell you as of ten o'clock this morning how many are noncompliant.
Senator Joyal: Can you give us that figure?
Mr. Truax: Out of in excess of 12,000 offenders, the figure is 227. Noncompliant offenders can be described as the following: They have missed their annual registration date, for instance; they may have moved out of the province and not notified the OSOR of their current registered address; the period of 15 days has expired since their release from custody on a criteria sex offence; or their information was entered erroneously by one of the law enforcement agencies in the province, that particular file has been flagged as noncompliant and it will be reviewed immediately to rectify any administrative issues. That information is available on a daily basis.
Senator Joyal: Do you go so far as to inform the police station where the offender must report that you have on your computer the name of an offender who has not reported, so that if the police are caught up in other situations on that day, they need to look after that situation?
Mr. Truax: Yes, we do that on a regular basis in the interests of public safety. We work with the policing services division of the Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services in notifying law enforcement agencies of noncompliant offenders. We notify them on a daily, monthly and quarterly basis as well to support them in noncompliance investigations so that those matters also are followed up.
As a result of our efforts, some agencies have achieved 100 per cent compliance. Some of the jurisdictions are large, with a large number of offenders, which is a tremendous amount of work.
Senator Joyal: I do not underestimate the work, even though the tools are more up to date today. That means that the last person to look for the information must launch an investigation. Let us suppose Mr. X has not reported today and you know about it and the police headquarters know about it. That day, they have to dispatch someone to do something with the fact that offender has not reported.
Mr. Truax: Noncompliance investigations are launched regularly. Sometimes the investigation is only a matter of contacting the individual. Often, that contact is made by phone. The police agency can say that their registration date is past due and they need to come in today. We are able to garner a lot of compliance only with that initial phone call.
Sometimes, however, that noncompliance investigation has to be carried out — to learn that an individual has left the province or the country, for instance. Some of those noncompliant offender investigations may go on for a long time, but efforts are made.
Senator Joyal: If the person has vanished, how do you ensure that person does not become a greater risk?
Mr. Truax: There is an entry on the Canadian Police Information Centre, CPIC, as a person of special interest regarding the OSOR's interest in that individual. Hopefully, an interaction will occur between law enforcement and that individual at some point, so that if a CPIC inquiry is made, the interest by the OSOR is known.
The Chair: Before I go back to Senator Wallace for a last question, I have two of my own, which I will put together in the interests of time.
The first relates to the fact that in your brief, you talked about three occasions when the Ontario police disclosed information on registered sex offenders to employers of those offenders. It sounds as though possibly in so doing, the chances of reoffence by those people were diminished. I am not saying that disclosure is a bad thing.
On the other hand, many witnesses, including those who preceded you this morning, have told us that it is important that the disclosure of information in the registry be limited to law enforcement; that it not be, or start sliding down the slope toward, the same system in some American jurisdictions where the public has access to that information.
Are there limits? Are there regulations? Are there principles governing the occasions on which the Ontario police can disclose the information on the registry to other persons? If that issue requires a long answer, I will ask you to put it in a letter to us.
The second question relates to the mechanics of automatic inclusion in the registry. Can you give us some idea of how the mechanism works?
Someone is convicted of a sexual offence and, by law, that person must go into the registry. How does that happen? Does the court clerk send a notice to someone? Do the police handle this matter? If further photographic evidence must be compiled, when, where and how is that done?
Again, we are short for time but I am a little puzzled about this kind of thing. It has a certain relevance to various elements of the work of this committee.
Mr. Truax: On the first point in relation to release of information, there is a specific provision within the Police Services Act of Ontario, where a chief of police or the Commissioner of the OPP is authorized to release information of that type to the public for public safety interests. Those occasions that I gave you as examples are extreme measures taken in relation to public safety. The Police Services Act of Ontario provides the authority to disclose that kind of information, but it is on a limited basis.
The Chair: Must it be a matter of immediacy, or is the chief of police authorized only to say, Karla Homolka is out of jail; here is where she will live, everyone.''
Mr. Truax: No, a specific set of criteria within the Police Services Act of Ontario must be met for that type of information to be disclosed.
Second, with regard to the mechanics of automatic registration, upon conviction in a court in Ontario, that particular information is communicated from courts in Ontario to the law enforcement agency. We have now enhanced communication so that information is channelled directly to the Ontario Sex Offender Registry to capture the fact that an individual has been convicted of a criteria sexual offence and requires to be registered on the Ontario Sex Offender Registry.
Senator Rivest: What if there is an appeal?
Mr. Truax: There is a 30-day appeal process. That information is forwarded upon conviction.
The Chair: Upon the first conviction?
Mr. Truax: Yes, that is my understanding.
[Translation]
Senator Boisvenu: I am fascinated by the OPP's statistics and I have been monitoring the situation for about five years. Between 2001 and 2006, you arrested nearly 600 offenders who were unlawfully at large. I congratulate you on that record, which is one of the best in Canada.
Did the sex offender registry prove useful in helping you arrest the offenders who were unlawfully at large?
Mr. Truax: I do not know that for a fact, but I can tell you that the registry does contain information about the offenders. All police forces in Ontario can consult the registry to find an address, the names of resource persons, the place of employment of the offender, a description of his vehicle, and so forth. The sex offender registry can be consulted for public safety reasons.
Senator Boisvenu: What I want to know is whether the sex offender registry helped you to track down and arrest, between 2001 and 2006, these 600 sexual offenders who were unlawfully at large? The real issue here is prevention.
The Chair: If you do not have the information for us at this time, you can always send it to the clerk later.
Mr. Truax: I will check and see if that information is available and if so, I will send it to you.
[English]
The Chair: I think we have run out of time.
Mr. Truax, thank you very much indeed. It was extremely helpful and we are grateful for you being with us today.
Mr. Truax: I want to thank the members of the committee for this honour and privilege.
The Chair: Our next meeting will be in this room on Wednesday next, April 28, at 4:15 in the afternoon, at which time we shall hear from various witnesses from the legal profession.
(The committee adjourned.)