John Howard Society executive director says Ottawa’s proposed victims’ rights bill distracts from the real crisis in Canadian justice, and promises yet further regress
Catherine Latimer of the national John Howard Society, has written an op-ed article in the Toronto Star arguing that the Conservative government’s Victims’ Bill of Rights smacks of medieval justice.
Latimer observes that the victims’ rights bill is a distraction from the ‘real crisis’ in Canadian justice—“the congestion and delays in our courts, together with the crowding in our prisons and remand centres, which threaten our capacity to respect fundamental principles of justice and Charter-guaranteed protections.”
The federal government’s October 16, 2013 speech from the throne, delivered by the governor-general, included a promise to introduce a Victims Bill of Rights “to restore victims to their rightful place at the heart of our justice system.”
The Sudbury Star published a story about the experiences of parents who’d lost their son to a violent stabbing. The story focuses on the many difficulties faced by victims of violent crimes and includes comments from Christine Rivard, the executive director of the Victim Crisis Assistance and Referral Service in Sudbury:
Right now people accused for crimes have more rights than victims. The biggest need right away is knowing what to expect and where to go for help. —Christine Rivard, Victim Crisis Assistance and Referral Service
Catherine Latimer’s op-ed supports help for victims of crime; she says that “just, effective, and humane responses to the causes and consequences of crime in society must include helping victims of crime.” Her argument is that the government’s commitment to “restore victims to their rightful place at the heart of the justice system” and to put the “rights” of the victims before the rights of the accused threatens to roll back more than 500 years of progress in criminal justice:
It was the hallmark of the primitive legal systems of the ancient world and medieval Europe that the wrongdoer and the person harmed stood at “the heart of our justice system.” All injuries, whether accidentally or intentionally inflicted on people, were answered by vengeance, usually delivered by the victim or victim’s family. The revenge of victims was seldom just, inspiring renewed vengeance by the criminal against the avengers. In this barbaric system of victim against victim, European justice degenerated into a chaos of vendettas.
Latimer’s point is that “proper concern for victims should never trump the just rights of the accused against the power of the state.”
We speak with Catherine Latimer.
