Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to present a petition from people requesting that the House direct the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism to use his ministerial discretion to grant a temporary resident permit to Mr. Freeman on humanitarian and compassionate grounds so that he can be reunited with his family.
Mr. Freeman has spent most of his life in Canada. He has four Canadian-born children and his wife is Canadian. He had a run-in with the American justice system at a time when there was significant racial violence in Chicago. He has fully paid his debt to society, having served his entire sentence in the United States following a plea bargain with American prosecutors.
Those who have signed the petition feel that we should help him so that he can be with his family again.