Justice Committee on Oct. 23rd, 2009

[Supt Brian Brennan]

I have looked at Bill C-46, yes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

Okay. Does it address your concern about the porting of cell numbers and being able to get the information you need from the service providers, or do you feel amendments are still needed?

[Supt Brian Brennan]

From reading it, in my opinion it addresses those concerns. As with all legislation, it's the functionality behind it in communication between, say, police and their service providers that may show us the challenges, but in terms of legislation I couldn't find anything to enhance it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

Great. You have a unique opportunity because we have this legislation before Parliament right now, and all of you may want to look at Bill C-46 and Bill C-47 and see if we've addressed all the issues that are currently before you in terms of technology. If some additional improvements are needed, obviously that's the role of this committee--actually, the public safety committee will be looking at that--so this is your one opportunity to have direct input.

Mr. Comartin.

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

I think, Mr. Chair, it's Bill C-47 that deals with this issue of accessibility and the requirements for the providers to retain that information.

I just want to make a comment before I ask a question about the witness protection program. Chief, this is the first panel that has come up at, and I think that's probably an oversight. We should be looking at this. I initiated that study in front of the public safety committee because of concerns I had with the program.

You're being overly generous about the financial part of it. It is woefully underfunded. Municipal and provincial governments have had to step in with a large amount of dollars. There are also programs--so I'm going to take issue with you--where there are problems with the plan.

Mr. Chair, with regard to that, I think we should look at pulling some information--maybe our analysts could do that--because we never finished that study. I don't believe they ever issued a report. I think an election intervened, and I left that committee as well. So it's not my fault; it's the election's fault.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

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

I'm pointing at the government in that regard.

When you look at the American one, one of the most impressive witnesses I've ever seen was one of the marshalls who heads that; they have an interesting one. He was an extremely impressive witness. Their program is by far the best in the world. We looked at the U.K. and Australia, although Australia's was coming along quite well at that point, and they had introduced new legislation as well.

Having made all those comments, the one question I do have.... The number of gangs--you used the number of 109, Superintendent--is that for the four Atlantic provinces or just for Nova Scotia? I wasn't clear on that, and it wasn't clear from your notes either.

[Supt Brian Brennan]

There are 109 identified organized crime groups. I believe that's for the Atlantic region.

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

Is that for all four of the Atlantic provinces?

[Supt Brian Brennan]

Yes.

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

Are they more concentrated in Nova Scotia because of Halifax, or are they spread equally among the four provinces?

[Supt Brian Brennan]

They aren't spread equally. The majority are in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

Thank you.

We have time for one more question.

Ms. Jennings.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

We know that in the past, for instance, in Montreal, organized crime managed to infiltrate our docks where we have port authorities. I'd like to know from you, Mr. Aggett, how your agency is dealing with this through integration and coordination with the other police forces. We know that organized crime has infiltrated the construction industry and the ports in Montreal. For instance, the West End Gang is notorious for infiltrating and controlling the unions, the whole bit.

So I'd like to know what kind of work is being done on that issue and what the challenges are.

[David Aggett]

That's a good question. The Canada Border Services Agency deals only with the ports and the borders. We don't have the capacity to deal with such a large issue. Because organized crime extends into the communities, we work on those issues with the national port enforcement team, particularly at the waterfront here in Halifax.

As I said, I had an intelligence officer embedded with NPET. They collect and analyze information to try to keep a handle on the size of the activities, who these people are, and the interrelationships. It's an ongoing and active project with the NPETs and the integrated intelligence units with which we're involved.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

Thanks to all of you.

Are there any other initiatives, legislative proposals, or thoughts you want to leave with us before we suspend? Nothing.

Thank you so much for coming. I know this is time out of your busy days. All of the testimony you've given will form part of our public record. Some of those proposals will probably also find their way into the recommendations the study will make. So thank you so much.

We'll suspend and reconvene in about 15 minutes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

We'll reconvene the meeting.

We're pleased to welcome two new witnesses.

First, appearing on his own behalf, we have Stephen Schneider, who is an associate professor in the department of sociology and criminology at Saint Mary's University. Welcome.

We also have Robert Purcell, who is counsel with the Nova Scotia Department of Justice. Welcome to you as well.

I think you know the routine. You each get 10 minutes to present, and then we'll open the floor to questions from our members.

Mr. Schneider, why don't you start.

[Stephen Schneider, Associate Professor, Saint Mary's University, Department of Sociology and Criminology, As an Individual]

Thank you very much. It's an honour to speak to you today on this obviously very important issue.

I'll break my presentation down into three parts. The first is to provide a historical overview of organized crime in this country; the second is to look at some of the lessons learned from this history and from the current trends; and the third is to make a few suggestions on possible future policy implications.

I think we know that we learn a lot about ourselves and about societal problems from our history, and it's no different with organized crime. Particularly attuned to the issue of history, in part because of my latest book, which is a history of organized crime--and if that sounds like a shameless plug for the book, it is--organized crime can in fact be traced back to pirates operating off the Atlantic coast in the 17th and 18th centuries, but more significantly, we can find a lot of precedents today in organized criminality during the 19th century. So, first and foremost, it was the issue of smuggling.

Smuggling is probably the greatest constant in the history of organized crime in Canada. During the 18th and 19th centuries, tea was the most popular contraband being smuggled into the country. Why? Because of the British mercantile policies that placed exorbitant taxes on tea. It's estimated that in the Maritimes, 90% of all tea consumed was contraband.

Liquor smuggling targeted aboriginal peoples and railway workers.

People smuggling was rampant in the late 19th century, very similar to today, with Chinese being smuggled into Canada en route to the United States, because of American immigration policies at the time.

There was large-scale cigarette smuggling in the late 19th century because of taxes on Canadian cigarettes, and opium smuggling escalated dramatically after the British government slapped a significant excise tax on opium imported into the colony of British Columbia in 1875. Soon thereafter, British Columbia actually became the largest manufacturer of smokable opium in the Commonwealth, again a precedent perhaps for the marijuana industry in B.C. today.

Quebec became a major centre for currency counterfeiting in the 19th century, and Canada was also accused of large-scale product piracy in the late 19th century, including pirating copyrighted materials, books, and music.

In the early 20th century, the two most significant developments in promoting the expansion, proliferation, power reach, and modernization of organized crime were, first, the criminalization of opium in 1908, and second, the prohibition of alcohol in the United States. You can tell that for both of these the major impetus to organized crime was government policies.

For much of the 20th century, Canadian organized crime was a branch plant of Italian American organized crime. To this end, Canada was a major conduit for the smuggling of opium and heroin into the U.S.

Regarding recent trends, one of the most recent trends in the last 20 or 30 years has been the proliferation of crime groups. In its 2007 annual report, Criminal Intelligence Service Canada estimated there were 950 known organized crime groups in Canada, an increase of nearly 20% over the previous year. The vast majority of these groups were involved in drug trafficking. In British Columbia alone, an estimated number of organized crime gangs more than doubled from 52 in 2003 to 108 in 2005.

Another recent trend has been an increase in coordination and cooperation. This has always existed, especially in international drug trafficking, because there was never one group that was able to conduct every aspect from production to retailing, but it has really increased in recent years. You see a significant increase among different crime groups, among different professional criminals.

Commensurate with this increased cooperation has been a differentiation in the structure of contemporary crime groups. This is characterized by less of a hierarchical pyramid structure, to a flatter, much more ephemeral, much more flexible cooperation between professional criminals. That's why I always question these numbers that police come up with on trying to identify the number of crime groups, because they themselves admit that there's really no such thing as a crime group any more. It's criminals getting together on a very ad hoc basis on different deals. So it's particularly difficult to try to identify a self-contained group any more.

There has been an increase in the types of criminal activities carried out. Practically everything is fair game for organized crime. There has been a return to predatory crime. Following prohibition, you saw a real emphasis on consensual crimes: drugs, gambling, and prostitution. Now you're seeing a real return to predatory crimes, including fraud. There's greater sophistication, although most crime groups historically are quite rudimentary.

The last trend is a steady diminishing of the law enforcement resources necessary to keep up with the proliferation of organized crime.

In the early part of the century we were quite successful in targeting and disbanding some of the largest drug trafficking crime groups in the world. Today, the playing field is not as level as before, and organized crime has outstripped government resources. It's really unprecedented.

Canada currently supplies an embarrassingly rich assortment of illegal and contraband goods. By the end of the 1990s, Canada had established itself as the continent's premier supplier of high-grade marijuana, methamphetamines, and ecstasy. It has become an international centre for telemarketing fraud as well as counterfeiting of currency, bank cards, and digital entertainment products. Today Canada is a branch plant and sometimes a headquarters for some of the biggest organized crime conspiracies in the world, whether it's the so-called Italian Mafia, the Hells Angels, or Chinese organized crime.

What are the lessons we've learned from the history of contemporary organized crime?

First of all, organized crime is a reflection of the societies it inhabits. There's an old saying in criminology that societies get the crime they deserve. That's very much applicable to organized crime. Organized crime exists through a complex interaction with government policies, socio-cultural traits, demand for illegal goods and services, and social conditions that give rise to or aggravate factors that put individuals at risk of offending. Governments are a crucial player in creating and sustaining organized crime by prohibiting certain goods and services demanded by the public. As we've seen throughout history, the greatest impetus to organized crime has been government policies.

Another lesson we've learned is that the more things change the more the stay the same. What goes on today is very much a reflection of the types of criminal activities that were prevalent in the 19th and early 20th centuries, except that modern criminals have access to better technologies and employ more sophisticated methods.

Lastly, we learned that the criminal justice system has generally failed in its efforts to combat or even control organized crime. The prohibition/enforcement model is flawed and may even produce more costs than benefits. As for future policy directions, we need to re-evaluate the prohibition/enforcement model in targeting organized crime. I'm not advocating that it be replaced; I'm simply saying that we need to have a serious, scientific debate on this model.

We need more emphasis on demand reduction. We need more resources for detox and treatment centres. We need more resources for preventative programs, more for at-risk children, especially in drug education. We need more resources for mental health programs, because there's a strong causal relationship between mental health problems and drug use.

We have to look at alternatives to the prohibition/enforcement model. Yes, that includes legalization and regulation. We need an organized crime policy based on science, on what works and what doesn't work. The prohibition/enforcement model is not based on science. Most research shows that it is not effective in controlling the problem.

We need to look at conducting a scientific cost-benefit analysis of different approaches. What are the costs? Any public policy will try to maximize benefits and minimize costs. To control the problem, we need to apply this kind of scientific policy framework to different models. What are the costs and benefits that prohibition/enforcement delivers? What is it for the decriminalization model? What is it for the legalization and regulation model? In a larger context, we need to pursue an evidence-based, scientifically informed policy on organized crime.

In the longer term, to address crime in general, we need to shift resources away from the criminal justice system to a more scientifically based, proven, proactive, and preventative approach.

The criminal justice system is inherently flawed for at least two reasons. First of all, it's largely reactive. It only responds to problems. Secondly, it addresses only the symptoms, without addressing the root causes of the problems. Moreover, there are many operational problems such as an insufficiency of resources.

We need more resources dedicated to prevention and proactive work, especially targeting at-risk communities and at-risk children. This has been shown to work. Every major scientific article on these developmental approaches to at-risk children shows that they work if they're implemented properly. This includes addressing organized crime, because it not only addresses demand issues—effective drug prevention works best in schools—but it also addresses the factors that put kids at risk of future offending, either on an organized or unorganized basis, so you address both the supply and demand with preventive programs for at-risk kids.

To this end we need to build more schools, recreation centres, hockey rinks, health care centres—not more prisons. We also will always need enforcement. Even if we had legalization of all drugs, we're still going to have an organized crime problem, so we need more effective enforcement, intelligence-led enforcement—integrated units are very effective. Most of all, we need to work better at the international level, because crime groups recognize the boundaries and barriers to law enforcement on the international level and definitely take advantage of those.

Thank you very much. I'll end it there.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

Thank you very much.

We'll move on to Mr. Purcell. You have 10 minutes.

[Robert Purcell, Executive Director, Public Safety Division, Nova Scotia Department of Justice, Government of Nova Scotia]

Thank you very much. Just as I begin, let me make a couple of opening comments flowing from that presentation.

First, I wish tea were our only problem today.

Second, like Mr. Norlock, I spent 25 years in law enforcement with the RCMP before joining the province. Maybe to follow up on a comment by Ms. Jennings, you're all probably wondering how he could have spent 25 years in law enforcement and still look the way he does. In that, we might have something in common.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

You look young.

[Robert Purcell]

Thank you.

Just as another clarification, while I was once counsel for the Province of Nova Scotia, I am now the executive director of the public safety and security division of the Nova Scotia Department of Justice.

I do thank you for the opportunity to meet and speak on behalf of the department to this committee on this most serious issue. I come today to share our views on the state of organized crime and offer suggestions that you may consider in making recommendations to the House of Commons.

I know our time for comments is short, so I am pleased that my presentation follows the police panel. With their backdrop, I can begin by saying that Nova Scotia is not immune to organized crime. To put it in context, organized crime by its very nature is not exclusively that which is portrayed in Hollywood, and for that reason it should not be surprising that it has the potential to impact every community in Canada and in Nova Scotia.

As you know, the definition of a criminal organization is as follows: as few as three or more persons acting together and having, as one of its main purposes or activities, the commission of a serious offence whereby it directly or indirectly benefits. In other words, in this province we are not just talking about outlaw motorcycle gangs or mafia groups, but rather far smaller groups of street gangs that trade for their benefit in illicit drugs and stolen goods and participate in other criminal activity.

Our police colleagues have identified for you that Nova Scotia experiences its share of violent crime that they and our joint intelligence service believe is directly related to organized crime. As you know, and you've heard Chief Beazley say this morning, HRM in 2004 was considered, according to Statistics Canada's general social survey, as having the highest rate of violent victimization in Canada.

One of the ways the Department of Justice is combatting this is through the Criminal Intelligence Service Nova Scotia; I'll refer to it as CISNS. To quote it, “Organized crime doesn't only happen on TV. It happens in Nova Scotia. And it affects your life every day.” We also know that organized crime groups have been identified outside Halifax. Therefore, this is not exclusively a big-city phenomenon.

Where might the situation differ in Nova Scotia? Elsewhere in Canada, the criminal picture implicates high-profile organized crime groups with global links. In contrast, CISNS wrote that Nova Scotia's drug trade includes mainly local, independent trafficking networks. As you've heard today, and from my experience in 25 years—almost 20 of which were here in Nova Scotia—we know that the international and national folks have their paws in Nova Scotia. In particular, that is in relation to our vast coastlines and extensive container activity at our ports. Drugs, cybercrime, street gangs, grow ops, firearms, child exploitation, and illegal tobacco sales are all activities we deal with within the confines of Nova Scotia.

So what have we done in the province and what are we going to do? Let me first say that our response must recognize, as earlier stated, that organized crime is not just a big-city phenomenon and our collective efforts must be designed to promote safety and security of all Nova Scotians.

The Department of Justice has taken this very seriously, and we have responded in a multifaceted manner. We believe the response to organized crime is through collaborative efforts of our law enforcement agencies and partners. We know we will need to continue to work hard, but we also must work smarter and in a strategic, adaptable manner.

In 2005, the province supplied additional funding to CISNS. At that time, it was for 7 positions; we expanded the funding to increase it to 26 positions for analysts and local intelligence officers who are located all across Nova Scotia.

Again, our efforts must be to ensure the safety and security for all of Nova Scotia. This is consistent with the provincial interest in addressing the challenges of organized crime.

CISNS allows law enforcement agencies to be intelligence-led and strategically focused. What's more, in 2007, through the intelligence and community consultations with communities throughout Nova Scotia by the Department of Justice, we were told that enforcement efforts would be required to be enhanced and increased police resources were required in Nova Scotia.

The province has supported, and continues to support, the extra enforcement from a financial perspective. In the past two years, since the inception of the additional officer program, the province has funded positions for every municipality in Nova Scotia. That means that as of now there are at least 150 more police officers on the streets in Nova Scotia than there were two years. That investment was part of our crime prevention strategy, which I'll be happy to talk about after because it does not only include enforcement, but it was a focus on intervention and prevention to get at the root causes of crime.

To give you some insight, the two largest municipalities in Nova Scotia, the Halifax Regional Municipality and the Cape Breton Regional Municipality, have been funded the most. For example, in the Halifax Regional Municipality, Chief Beazley has been provided with over 50 officers per year, for a total of 50 officers per year, and that is in excess of $5 million funding per year. In fact, Superintendent Donnie Spicer, who was with him this morning, was one of the positions we funded for them for their public safety program.

With more resources spread across the province, it is now our desire and challenge to ensure that these additional resources are available and ready to work closely with our provincial police service in order to strategically target provincial priorities and mutual local priorities, which clearly would include organized crime.

Currently, we have 60-plus officers situated throughout Nova Scotia, primarily working in integrated teams with the provincial police; they are known as street crime enforcement teams. These units target local issues in an integrated manner, as crime respects no borders.

Other officers are assigned to school safety resource officers, proceeds of crime, integrated child exploitation, and CISNS. Therefore, in our view, we have the resources provincially funded to strategically target organized crime through our additional officer program and provincial police service. Our goal will be to remain intelligence-led and strategically focused. This will allow us to respond to organized crime activity.

In the upcoming year, we will call upon our municipal partners, who have provincially funded positions with them, to work together to combat organized crime. It is our belief that we must now shift our focus to emerging and new targets, including organized crime and other priorities. This can be accomplished by having the officers who I've mentioned throughout Nova Scotia. The challenge will be to ensure that we have the flexibility to call upon them to work on the projects that need to be worked on--in police language, operationalize or go tactical. If we operate singularly we will not succeed. It is our belief that all levels of government must operate collectively to achieve safety and security in our communities.

So what's next? We are optimistic that the additional officer program has turned the corner to providing a forum so that the provincial police service and municipal police services can work collaboratively together. We will continue to promote this.

I will conclude with two suggestions we have for you to consider. I have stated earlier that Nova Scotia is blessed with vast coastlines and port activity, but these same natural wonders and economic stimulants are also opportunities for organized crime. We must, as I said earlier, work collectively with the federal government to enhance the security at our ports through integrated effort, and I think more discussion needs to be had with the federal government level to decide. You've heard much this morning about the intelligence-led projects there, but we need to be able to take intelligence-led projects and make them tactical and operational.

The federal 2,500 police officers program was a good start to add federal officers to work on collaborative issues, but it must be sustainable. It had a five-year sunset clause. We would like to have discussions with the federal government to see if that program could be made sustainable beyond five years.

I'd like to end on a positive note. Our crime rates have continued to drop in Nova Scotia since 2006. Together with our partners we have worked very hard to help make that happen. I am optimistic that we will be able to effectively tackle organized crime in the same manner.

Thank you for the opportunity to be here today. I'd be happy to take questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

Thank you. You will receive some questions.

We'll begin with Ms. Jennings, for seven minutes.