On July 19, 2020, as part of the march against sexual violence in Montreal, of which we were co-organizers, thousands of people gathered to demand better access to justice for all victims, but above all to join forces against different forms of systemic violence. We are not alone; these changes have been called for by several groups across Quebec for many years.
Two years after the march, it is disturbing to note that at the very last moment, these demands were buried in favor of a “solution” which maintains the field of law requiring that the denunciation of the aggressors be made to the police authorities, and this, even if the flaws in this system have been repeatedly denounced in government reports.
Although the new “specialized” court may seem revolutionary on paper, it actually unfolds in a process that remains adversarial and revictimizing for victims/survivors since the criminal law privileges above all the rights of the accused. The victims/survivors have no legal status other than that of “witnesses” and the procedure is always dissociated from its social environment, because the judge must remain impartial at all times.
The latter must indeed “be guided by the rule of law and not by public outcry”, to use the words of judge Matthieu Poliquin directly. Because if the recent conditional discharge of Simon Houle, a recidivist attacker – according to his confession – is shocking, it is not the first time that such treatment has been granted. In 1999, Gilbert Rozon obtained an absolute discharge in another case of sexual assault, a decision which also served to determine the present sentence of Simon Houle. In both cases, the need for the accused to travel had been put forward, supported by case law.
It would therefore be simplistic to attack the judge who pronounced Mr. Houle’s sanction, since he did exactly what was expected of him: apply the rules of law in their current state, rules which are not adapted several cases of sexual violence and which will not change with the establishment of a specialized court. This is what the people who took part in the “Enough is enough!” march denounced. » : because of the culture of rape, it is utopian to imagine that all crimes of a sexual nature can be brought to justice.
Each year, in Canada, more than 635,000 assaults take place. The vast majority of aggressors will never be brought to justice. They are therefore omnipresent in our communities, our daily lives, regardless of our social class, our profession or our family. They are in politics, in law, in the media: the more privileges they have, the less likely they are to face justice.
Advocating for a single model of access to justice is therefore incompatible with the urgency of exploring other avenues, both judicial and psychosocial, to respond to the denial of justice experienced by the vast majority of victims/survivors. Especially since this system does not in any way reduce or even prevent crime and tends to reinforce pre-existing power relations in society, relations that we have recently been able to observe outside of a court.
Thus, we recently learned that Hockey Canada, a publicly funded sports organization, had paid millions of dollars to cover up a story of gang rape committed by hockey players with the potential to join professional leagues. Worse still, the Supreme Court of Canada has indicated that extreme intoxication can be used as a defense in a case of sexual assault!
It is therefore not surprising to learn that, for more than 95% of victims/survivors, filing a complaint is not even on the list of options, the aggressor being their brother, their lover, their colleague, their coach or their oppressor. Breaking down systemic barriers and the culture of impunity therefore requires difficult conversations as well as significant introspection, both personal and collective. We owe it to future generations.