Mr. Speaker, here are the disturbing facts surrounding the recent sentencing of three convicted rapists in Montreal. Found guilty of gang raping and sodomizing a pregnant teenager, they were sentenced to two years less a day. The court was told the men held a 17-year old girl captive for more than 12 hours, repeatedly assaulted her, and at one point dangled her over an apartment balcony to deter her from reporting the incident. One of the rapists was the father of the victim's unborn child, a gruesome circumstance which apparently prompted her to have an abortion.
In announcing the sentence the judge said the crown attorney's recommendation for prison terms of 10 to 12 years was grossly exaggerated. He also said that while the rapists' actions were deplorable, the victim had no signs of provable violence.
In my opinion there is no such thing as a non-violent rape. There is no such thing as torture without pain. As parliamentarians—