I would absolutely applaud that sort of amendment because it does restore and reflect faith in the judiciary to do exactly what it is that we swear them in to do on a daily basis. They have the expertise to do that. They would have the evidence before them to do that. That measure of flexibility, quite frankly, would turn a piece of legislation that is likely never or rarely, if ever, going to be used into something that might, in the appropriate case, be used.
Let me add one other element. If you're going to look at the parole board, you can get a little more creative than using the blunt tool of criminal law and saying 25 or 50. How about perhaps introducing a screening function in the parole board? We do that with faint hope right now. You don't have an automatic right to a faint hope. You have to present your case first to a judge on paper. If that judge sees there's a reasonable prospect of succeeding, it then goes to a faint hope application. That was done to spare families of the victims from being retraumatized.
Why couldn't the parole board, quite frankly, exercise a screening function and look at an application on paper and say, “This is doomed, it's hopeless, and it's not going to go ahead to a full hearing”? A guy like Olson won't be sitting there having a public display every few years, traumatizing people. There are more creative ways to do it.
Certainly, injecting a true measure of discretion at the judicial level would be key in softening this bill and making it, quite frankly, more usable.