My daughter was killed on April 15, 2018 by an impaired driver. She had been crossing a road in a marked, lit up crosswalk and was blindsided by an F-150 pickup truck.
The time it took for our offender to be eventually convicted was torture for our family. It was a long, drawn-out process. It took two and a half years for the offender to plead guilty. A month following the sentencing of our offender, he applied for day parole. We had just barely made it through the sentencing hearing, after waiting two and a half years in complete devastation. Our lives were bankrupted of every imaginable morsel that you can think of. Then we get to sentencing. He gets three and a half years and then a month later applies for day parole. I literally wrote one victim impact statement for sentencing and a month later was writing a brand new statement for parole.
There is no support. Victims and their families are left to find advocates outside of the court processes. They are left to find advocacy and help from people outside of our own institutions. I don't see the help for victims and their families that I see for the offenders.
The current legislation creates unfair hardship for victims and their families because they aren't even recognized as victims of a violent crime. We were considered victims of a motor vehicle incident. They aren't recognized as victims of a violent crime by the courts or by provincial services for victims. That is causing even more undue hardship to victims and their families.
There needs to be a bill brought forward for victims' rights that would allow victims and their families to be recognized for the damages and suffering that they endure. It is time to change the narrative for victims and their families. It is time to change legislation and the entire way that impaired driving is regarded, so families don't have to keep living through this in the name of justice.
I think a number of things could be changed in our system to provide better support for victims and their families. The accused—the offenders—are provided free counselling as soon as they enter a guilty plea. There's no free counselling for victims and their families. We have to find that on our own. If you don't have the resources, if you've lost your job or you can't afford to pay for your own family anymore or keep a roof over your head, you can't afford therapy. It's a hardship that doesn't have to look like this for victims across the board. Families wouldn't have to suffer like this if we had better supports available through victim services.
The time it takes for matters to go through the courts is unnecessary. If the courthouses had better triage of their matters and actually had a person who was looking at the matters that are set down for trial by the Crown, we would be able to triage the courthouse files and get matters out of docket. We're taking too much time at the courts and it's actually costing innocent people and the families who are waiting.
Thank you for your time.