Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Pardon me if I'm somewhat nervous. This is my first time before the committee.
My name is Anthony Helary. I was born in eastern Canada and now live in the lower mainland; however, between then and now, most of my life has been spent in federal prison, for a wide variety of crimes, many of which I'm not very proud of.
I've been in prison in all regions in Canada--Dorchester, Millhaven, Collins Bay, Warkworth, Prince Albert, Kent, and Matsqui. I am here today to share with the committee some of my experiences. Today my goal in life is to have no more victims. I am doing this through my church and my spiritual beliefs. Today I do what I can to help the homeless and prisoners with addictions, one person at a time.
I have a house in Abbotsford with four men in recovery who had been living on the street, one of them in a cardboard box under a bridge. That is not, however, why I would like to share some of my experiences and knowledge of the federal prison system. CSC is a failing corporation. I believe this is because their hands are tied, between the Charter of Rights and the mission statement. The ball is in the prisoner's court.
Gangs are becoming rampant in prison: the prairies have the native gangs; the Angels and the Rock Machine are in Quebec; the Aryan Brotherhood and white power gangs are in eastern Canada. B.C. has any number of gangs, including the Angels. The federal system is a recruiting area for many gangs, especially inmates who are doing five years or less. The major problem I see in CSC is they are unable to move gang members to other regions where they would have less power and very little influence in the general area. Just as it is on the street, fear is what they use in prison, in both places, and violence is a means of dealing with issues.
There's so much corruption in the CSC that it's easy to get whatever you want, from cellphones to drugs. In the seventies it was the Palmers, and now it is any number of gangs. Unless some changes are made, the gangs will continue to do their activities inside prison walls with little interference.
I predict that in the near future prison gangs will be--if not are--the biggest problem in the CSC today. Drugs are control and drugs are power. Money is the motivator and staff are only human. I have recruited staff in the prison system. I basically controlled two prison gangs in Prince Albert for about five years, and I controlled them with the use of drugs and the getting of drugs in the institution, because I knew how, and it was usually through manipulation and fear. I'm not proud of the things I've done, but there is a big need to stop the activities that are happening today in the prison system.
Putting the Bacon brothers in prison here is doing nothing to stop their activities, or any of the Angels--Mom Boucher in Quebec or any of the gang members. It does little to put them behind prison walls. If you put them here in Matsqui or Kent, they still have the power, the power of fear in the community. As long as they have that power, the staff just lay dormant to do anything about it, for fear.... Until we let loose on some of the laws with regard to the mission statement, with regard to transfers of inmates from one region to another--because the mission statement talks about family and goes on and on in that regard--it's going to keep going, and it's sad.
Anyway, that's my take on that.
As far as decriminalization of marijuana is concerned, I totally disagree. I've seen it and I've done it; I've manipulated people by saying “here's some pot”, and the next thing I had them using harder drugs. I've especially preyed on white-collar criminals in the system. They come in and are basically green, but within a matter of months they're owing me their shirt. That's the way it is.
I think there should be a revamping of or a committee to study the prison system in Canada, because it's getting worse and worse. These criminals are getting back out. The result of them getting back out is that they're just back into the gangs. I really think that communities should be more involved, churches especially, with the integration of inmates and offenders. That's the way I see it.