Evidence of meeting #51 for Justice and Human Rights in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was aboriginal.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Marlene Jennings Liberal Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC
By the way, if any of the Conservatives want to take a transcript of what I just said and put it on their fliers or any of their advertising, feel free to do so.
Conservative
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Ed Fast
I'm going to the Bloc.
Mr. Lee, why don't you go ahead. You still have five minutes.
Liberal
Derek Lee Liberal Scarborough—Rouge River, ON
I'd love to be as kind as my colleague. I don't mind being as kind, but my purpose in asking this question is really technical.
Is there any particular reason why you or the drafters decided to use section 130.1 as the numbering for this proposed section rather than just keeping this new phrase or subsection as part of section 130? It could easily have been added as paragraph 130(2)(c).
Is there any particular reason why you added a whole new section?
Conservative
Earl Dreeshen Conservative Red Deer, AB
Mr. Lee, when we were looking at it, we thought this was specifically speaking to the personation of a peace officer and that would be the opportunity to be able to address the consequences of someone who had been charged, I would assume, under section 130. But definitely I am not the person to get into the majority of technical information.
Liberal
Derek Lee Liberal Scarborough—Rouge River, ON
I would just ask you then if you would have any objection to an amendment—if members of the committee thought it was appropriate—to move this whole section, as it is currently written, back into section 130, either to subsection 130(1) or subsection 130(2). The sentencing section of section 130, which is subsection 130(2), could easily receive a new subsection because subsection 130(2) deals with the sentencing for that section on personation. Your amendment adds an aggravating factor to the sentencing and could easily be built in.
Are you aware of any technical reason why that would be inappropriate to your purposes?
Conservative
Earl Dreeshen Conservative Red Deer, AB
No, I'm not aware of any technical reason why that would be the case. My intent, however, is to make it as clean as possible so that when we look at it, it could move as quickly as possible. That is the reason why.
Liberal
Bloc
Serge Ménard Bloc Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC
I'll make this quick.
When I read your bill for the first time, I told myself that, if a judge must render a sentence for a person who impersonated a police officer in order to commit another offence, he will probably consider the impersonation to be an aggravating circumstance and take that fact into account when handing down a decision. I think that goes without saying.
Have you looked into the case law of sentences related to section 130 of the Criminal Code? Have you found cases where, under similar circumstances, the judge did not deem this type of behaviour to be an aggravating circumstance?
Conservative
Earl Dreeshen Conservative Red Deer, AB
No, I hadn't. Basically, what I was trying to do was focus on the seriousness of the offence. When I first spoke with the victim and her family, I talked for over an hour just about the types of concerns that existed and how that actually.... The personation was the weapon that was being used, if one could use that terminology, and therefore I was trying to look for something that would show the significance of that. Then when we started looking at it, we found that was not the case. So that was the rationale for concentrating specifically on the aggravating circumstances at that position.
Bloc
Serge Ménard Bloc Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC
Regarding the specific case you considered, which made you propose an amendment to the legislation, were you aware of the sentence imposed on the person who did this to the lady?
Bloc
Serge Ménard Bloc Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC
Did the judge consider the fact that the person impersonated a police officer to be an aggravating circumstance?
Conservative
Earl Dreeshen Conservative Red Deer, AB
There were other issues that were associated with that, such as the age of the victim, and so on, so where that might have come in, I couldn't give that information, I'm sorry.
Conservative
Earl Dreeshen Conservative Red Deer, AB
Yes, it was a written decision, but I didn't build my case based on what had been read out of the decision.
Bloc
