Good afternoon, Mr. Chair, and ladies and gentlemen.
First, thank you for having me here today. It's an honour, especially with my background and coming from where I have come from. I could have never imagined there would be a day where I'd be speaking in the House of Commons.
I say that because I am what we refer to as a “former”, that is, I am a former gang leader and former organized crime figure.
Currently, on the basis of the extent of my lived experience and my work in countering violence and extremism, I am now an internationally recognized subject matter expert on gang culture, behaviour and theory and the founder of the One By One Movement.
We are a think tank, consulting agency and speakers bureau and our goal is to decrease extreme acts of violence globally by utilizing data collected from our extensive and almost exclusive access to high-profile “formers” like me, as well as the access we have to the demographic we serve—most of them being active.
The One By One Movement works directly within at-risk and high-risk communities, in at-risk and high-risk environments, with at-risk and high-risk persons of various age, race and gender. We are hands-on, boots on the ground frontliners in the fight against gun and gang violence.
That said, I'm here today to address gun control, illegal arms trafficking and gun crimes committed by members of street gangs.
In my opinion, when speaking on gun control, when we hear the phrase, it should always be synonymous with illegal gun crime and illegal gun trafficking as over 80% of the gun violence we are witnessing is committed with illegal firearms smuggled in from the USA.
Understanding these numbers and that any loss of life is tragic, I think it is safe to say that very few gun crimes are committed with legally sourced weapons. The notion of banning illegal firearms as a main solution to combatting gun violence is not only false, it is offensive. This is because we, the Canadians who are suffering the majority of gun violence in Ontario, are mostly low-income and racialized communities, and the minority who have sadly lost their lives by acts committed with legally sourced firearms are not.
The current resources and efforts invested into banning illegal firearms sends a crystal clear message to the people who are facing illegal gun and gang violence on a daily basis amongst Canada's most marginalized communities that, when it comes to Canadian lives on this specific subject, the minority rules.
This government needs to ensure the message that all Canadian lives are precious. This can be accomplished by investing the same time, effort and resources into the most qualified agencies and groups that are concentrating on violence prevention and intervention initiatives with an acute focus on root causes and their risk factors that lead one to commit acts of violence. To say that banning firearms in this country will decrease violence in a meaningful way is like taking a sledgehammer to a problem that needs a scalpel.
That leads to the matter of addressing gun violence committed by street gangs. This is a major problem that is growing exponentially in the greater Toronto area. There has been a steady increase in the number of shootings related to street gangs, an increase in the brazenness of these acts and the perpetrators are only getting younger. This means that slowing the access to illegal firearms has to be a major pillar in this battle, but more importantly, there needs to be some long-term, sustainable investments made in prevention.
This means prenatal negative outcome prevention; early childhood violence prevention; youth violence prevention; and young adult violence prevention. It also means intervention: high-risk intervention; and police intervention. Lastly, it means reintegration and reinvention programs that are developed and implemented by those who truly understand the nuances of that lifestyle.
This is my expert valuation. Thank you for your time.