Justice committee  Since I've been the main proponent of legalization, as you explained, I didn't come to this conclusion out of any one study or because I use drugs, or anything like that. It has taken me 30-odd years. If you look at some of my books, you'll see that I don't argue this at all, but

Justice committee  The logic is strange, but it's used all the time. The government runs a lot of gambling, yet spends a lot of money on anti-gambling campaigns, which are not all that effective, I have to admit. The government is very involved in alcohol and spends some money on campaigns against

Justice committee  Well, it would take away from them one of their main money producers.

Justice committee  No. They'll get into other things. They'll get into more things. A lot of legal drugs like oxycontin are sold on the street through organized crime. It's going to happen that organized crime will be in drugs. All I'm saying is that a number of organizations, whether it's in Mexic

Justice committee  I can tell you a bit about it because I have studied it for many years. Right now in Toronto it's quite different from what it was, say, in the 1970s or 1980s, when we had four or five major Mafia families and a few other groups. Now we have quite a lot of different organized c

Justice committee  Well, that's part of it. There are other groups. There are bikers, and there are all sorts of.... Bikers won't let in certain ethnic groups, such as black people.

Justice committee  I've mentioned several. Obviously, what Antonio said is quite right: you go after the money. If you can knock out the money of any given organized crime leader or gang, that is excellent. Some of the anti-gang laws go after the money, too, so that's extremely important. The ant

Justice committee  Oh, okay, but it's part of your question; that is to say, because marijuana is illegal, it doesn't mean that it isn't readily available to everyone in high school and everyone else in our society.

Justice committee  I don't, because I actually said that I don't think we need more laws.

Justice committee  We have a lot of things out there that are not being used--

Justice committee  Since we're in Toronto, Bill Blair, since he's been the chief, and even before he was the chief—and some would argue against this, particularly in the youth gang field—has used the same anti-gang laws that they've been using in Quebec against the black organized crime gangs in To

Justice committee  I think there have been operations as a result of intense violence, where the pressure is on the police to sort it out, as in Vancouver last year. The Quebec operations--which of course Mr. Ménard was a part of as the leader--were focusing because there were two big biker gangs

Justice committee  Right. It created an opportunity for other gangs, as we said earlier--Haitian gangs, black organized crime.

Justice committee  Absolutely. I think they're very good.

Justice committee  I said yes.