Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Honourable members of this committee, I want to begin not with numbers, but by reading an excerpt from a letter to the editor published in the Moncton Times & Transcript on November 2 of the year 2005. It reads:
Dear Editor: I’m writing this letter because I believe the community should know. I’m currently at the New Brunswick Youth Centre serving a rather long sentence for petty crimes. When the judge sentenced me, the community went way to go! One less troublemaker on the streets. Do they not realize this place makes youth worse not better? Since I have been here, I’ve become a more angry person. I have learned way more about how to commit crimes and not get caught…
That letter was written by Ashley Smith, who less than two years later died at Grand Valley Prison by self-strangulation in a death that was later ruled a homicide by the inquest verdict in 2013.
I start with her voice because she can't bring it to you. She was in custody as a youth for primarily administration of justice offences. That's what kept her in prison. That's what kept her in youth facilities, and that's what led, on her 18th birthday, to the transfer application being made to bring her into adult corrections custody, at which time she entered as maximum security.
As you may recall, the index offence that brought her into custody was throwing apples at a postal worker, but through the journey of the correctional process in the youth system, she got over 800 disciplinary infractions that would not necessarily have constituted crimes had she not been in custody. One example is failing to return a hairbrush in a timely fashion. As a result of these 800 disciplinary infractions, she ended up with over 150 convictions for administration of justice-related offences.
I'm here to support in principle provisions that simplify processes in order to prevent the continuation of these kinds of administration of justice offences being disproportionately levied, particularly against marginalized, vulnerable girls, as Professors Doob's and Sprott's 2009 book, Justice for Girls?, has articulated statistically.
The case of Ashley Smith has been brought to national attention because it has become associated with issues of mental health in custody and with issues of solitary confinement. In my own Ph.D. research, I contend that the missing piece of what the public has failed to appreciate in that case and failed to understand is that the foundation of the bridge between throwing apples at a postal worker and dying in adult prison is laid by these administration of justice offences.
Accordingly, the idea of codifying the principle of restraint for release and bail decisions, proposed section 493.1, which is in the legislation for your consideration, is something I would support. I support the idea of requiring special consideration for indigenous people, and I note also that “vulnerable groups” is worded expansively there, and I like that. Ashley Smith was not an indigenous person, but she was vulnerable. She was a child in care. She was in social services custody and rendered vulnerable as a result.
I support the alternate process for dealing with some alleged breaches of bail, and I'm particularly interested in and support the creation of the proposed section 4.1 of the Youth Criminal Justice Act that allows, where there's a failure to comply, to deem extrajudicial measures to be adequate.
This legislative proposal that you're considering, I agree, is not perfect. I agree that it is tinkering; however, I don't think that's a reason to not do it. I think this is today's step right now, and I think broader and greater systemic change is necessary, but in the spirit of making bail and making administration of justice offences fairer and simpler, this is exactly one of the things that needs to happen as a result of the death of Ashley Smith.
Thank you.