Justice Committee on April 20th, 2009

[Randall Richmond]

There were two other decisions, last September and last December in Toronto, in which Mr. Justice McMahon of the Superior Court stated that the Hells Angels were a criminal organization everywhere in Canada.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

I am prepared to have the material distributed to my colleagues, if that is the will of the committee.

I have three quick questions to ask, because I see that my clock is ticking now, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Richmond, I have provided the clerk with a motion that will debated on Wednesday, and that I feel that all my colleagues will support. The motion seeks to designate the Hells Angels as an illegal organization. I really like the idea of having a conviction-based list, that is, a list showing all the organizations that have been declared criminal under section 467 of the Criminal Code. To my knowledge, only the Hells Angels have been declared a criminal organization, but the Criminal Intelligence Service Canada claims that there are 38 criminal biker groups. So I would like to know who I should include in the motion, on which we will be voting on Wednesday. That was my first question.

Here is my second question. The gentleman from the Ontario Provincial Police seems to be saying that the provisions on recklessly discharging a firearm would not be effective, while Mr. Richmond brilliantly refuted that in his testimony. I would like to understand what makes you doubt its effectiveness. We were under the impression that the provisions in the bill allowed you to arrest people. But you are telling us that the provisions will not reduce drive-by shootings. Could you please explain that view?

My third and last question goes to Mr. Latulippe. Is all the infiltration into the legal economy done through numbered companies? What can you tell us about that? Can you give us more information? It does not have to be a list of the names of people who have set up numbered companies. But, in an ideal world, it would be.

Let us start with Mr. Richmond, followed by the OPP representative and finishing with Mr. Latulippe.

[Randall Richmond]

In terms of organizations that have been declared criminal by the courts, I mentioned the Bandidos earlier. This is an international organization that has been convicted by a jury in Quebec. That is one specific example.

In Montreal, there were also guilty pleas to charges of gangsterism by members of a group called the Italian Mafia; in the United States, it is called the Cosa Nostra. A number of other groups have been convicted, but, most of the time, these groups have no name. There are Hells Angels feeder groups that have been declared criminal organizations, but these are often just a lot of people working together in drug trafficking. They do not necessarily have a name, they do not wear patches, and they are not set up like the bikers.

I am not proposing that we abolish our present system. I am simply proposing that, in some specific cases where the criminal nature of the organization is clear, we should not have to prove it every time.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Okay, I understand.

[C/Supt Ross Bingley]

Yes, my concern relates to urban areas, and I certainly don't want to speak on behalf of any of the big metropolitan police agencies, because that's not where we police, although we police in a joint force environment with them. The concern in relation to drive-by shootings has been and always is the fact of witnesses' reluctance to come forward.

If I can specifically speak about the Toronto area, the gangs literally own that turf and area. Many gang members in Toronto proper and downtown Toronto have never seen Lake Ontario. They literally do not leave that area, whatever the square block may be. There is a reluctance by witnesses to come forward. I don't know that changing in this manner will be sufficient to cause these people to come forward to be able to convict people of these offences. The issue is the actual identifying of the drive-by shooters, based on the lack of witnesses stepping forward.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

Thank you.

Monsieur Ménard, did you have another question?

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Yes, my last question was for Mr. Latulippe, If I may. With your permission, of course.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

If you can, keep it very short.

[Jocelyn Latulippe]

The problem is not just with numbered companies. There are also dummy companies, trusts, shells. They are all part of a collection of mechanisms used by organized crime to put roadblocks in the way of police and to lengthen investigations. When investigations are longer, we have to take certain actions. When we take those actions, the criminals become aware of our movements. So they manoeuvre and manipulate their money so that it is always impossible to trace. So, in cases like that, our investigations have limited success; the financial manipulations can go through as many as five different levels.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

Thank you.

Mr. Comartin, you have five minutes.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you all for being here.

Ms. Barr-Telford, are you tracking the proceeds of crime litigation at the provincial level?

[Craig Grimes, Senior Analyst, Courts Program, Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics, Statistics Canada]

We have some data on proceeds of crime. There are some problems with collecting the information because of the numbering of the Criminal Code and the systems we're interfacing to.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

I'm sorry, Mr. Grimes, I'm asking about provincial legislation that can seize proceeds of crime. Are you tracking that legislation?

[Craig Grimes]

Do you mean the amount?

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Yes, and the number of files.

[Craig Grimes]

We have supplied data to FINTRAC in their efforts to track that information, but Statistics Canada isn't tracking the amount. It's not part of what we're collecting.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Are you tracking the number of cases?

[Craig Grimes]

Yes. The same issue exists with that legislation and our tracking that information. Some jurisdictions provide us the information using the section of the code, but within their systems they're only able to capture five characters. Changing those systems is very expensive. There are legacy systems, and it takes a long time. There are huge training issues associated with that. I have some data on laundering the proceeds of crime, section 462.31.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

On the number of incidents you're showing in the supplementary information, do you have a comparable figure on the number of incidents where provincial legislation was used to go after proceeds of crime?

[Craig Grimes]

We don't have it related to provincial legislation.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Thank you.

Mr. Richmond, the point you are making has intrigued me for some time because of what we did with terrorist groups. In that legislation we basically relied to a great extent on international designations and simply adopted them holus-bolus. None have been challenged up to this point. If I understand your proposal, you are suggesting we first have a designation determined by a court and a judge--maybe a judge and a jury. You've detailed what you want to do almost on a theoretical basis. I'm looking for some of the practicality.

[Randall Richmond]

That's one way of doing it. I know some people have proposed it. I believe Mr. Ménard proposed something along those lines recently.

The other way is to simply ask Parliament to receive the evidence available on the question and let Parliament decide. That, in effect, was done with terrorist groups. In the case of terrorist groups, you didn't even ask for evidence to be presented; you just received a list of organizations from foreign authorities declaring that they were terrorist groups. You accepted that evidence and declared them, by order in council, to be terrorist groups. So there was no intervention by a court authority to decide whether that was justified or not. But at the same time, in your terrorist legislation you said that if some group wanted to have its name taken off the list, they could apply to a court to have that issue studied.

All of those options are favourable.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

On the system used with the terrorist groups, we have people who are still on that list. In fact, I think four or five of them don't even exist anymore. On the adequacy of that process from a Charter of Rights position, using that system when we're going after organized crime would be very troubling for me, especially looking at some of the street gangs and the potential for abuse if it's more of a political consideration than a judicial one. I'm looking for what system we would use. I would not be comfortable with the one we're using for terrorist reasons.

[Randall Richmond]

I'm not proposing that you adopt a system exactly the same as the one for terrorist groups, because in the case of terrorist groups you put names on a list without receiving any evidence as to what those groups have done. I'm proposing you wait until sufficient evidence has come from Canadian criminal courts declaring groups to be criminal. Once you have that evidence before you, then Governor in Council or Parliament can put that name on a list.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

Thank you.

We'll move on to Mr. Moore, for five minutes.