Ottawa wants more defendants to stay in jail while they await trial. The Trudeau government tabled a bill on Tuesday to make it harder for them to be released, especially for repeat offenders.
Currently, the rule is as follows: an accused is released pending trial, with some exceptions.
A judge can decide to keep him detained during the legal proceedings, this is normally the case for those who are accused of murder or very violent crimes. It is the Crown who has the burden of demonstrating to the judge that it is preferable for the accused to remain behind the prison walls.
With its Bill C-48, Ottawa wants to change the situation by “reversing the burden of proof” in certain cases. The rule would then be detention, barring exceptions. This would put on the shoulders of the accused the burden of demonstrating why he should be released.
The government of Justin Trudeau presents the measure as a way “to counter the risk of recidivism with violence”.
The legislation basically does two things. When it is already provided that the burden rests on the shoulders of the accused — this is particularly the case for crimes related to domestic violence or crimes committed with firearms — the government wants to “expand the reverse onus of proof by adding offenses that would fall under this umbrella.
It also proposes to add a new reverse onus for violent repeat offenders who have used weapons. This would target defendants charged with a serious offense involving violence and the use of a weapon, “where he has been convicted of an offense meeting the same criteria, within the last five years”.
A bill with a “message”
The Liberal government pulled out its big guns for the C-48 announcement. No less than four ministers were gathered: the Minister of Justice, David Lametti, the Minister of Public Safety, Marco Mendicino, the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, Dominic LeBlanc and the Minister of Mental Health and Addictions, Carolyn Bennett.
However, the ministers cannot measure the envisaged impact of these legislative changes. Judges already had the ability to detain violent defendants — and did. What will this change?
Minister Lametti insisted on the “message” that C-48 sends: “a signal is sent to judges, Crown prosecutors and the public. It is also a way of framing the process”.
The objective is that the communities feel safe, he insisted, which would not currently be the case according to him.
“We need better data,” he agreed, however, when asked about it at a press briefing Tuesday in Ottawa.