(Ottawa) Concerned “that Justin Trudeau’s criminal justice system allows monsters like Luka Magnotta and Paul Bernardo to be released from the maximum security prisons in which they should be locked up”, five elected officials are calling for an emergency meeting of a parliamentary committee.
“It is now clear that, under the Justin Trudeau government, it is right to release the most dangerous and sadistic killers from maximum security prisons to allow them to enjoy the freedoms and comforts of a medium security institution “, argue the five MPs – four Conservatives and one Bloc member – in their letter.
“These sadistic murderers enjoy the freedom and luxury of low-security prisons, while the families of their victims and the communities they terrorized remain irremediably scarred by their crimes,” continue the elected officials, demanding a meeting “of emergency” of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security.
We learned earlier this week in the pages of Toronto Sun that Luka Magnotta, who killed and dismembered a Chinese student in Montreal in 2012, had been transferred from a maximum security establishment to that of La Macaza, in the Hautes-Laurentides, with medium security.
He therefore joined the serial killer Paul Bernardo, whose transfer had caused incomprehension and plunged the Trudeau government into embarrassment in the summer of 2023.
“ [Luka] Magnotta continues to serve an indeterminate sentence in a secure facility. Our fundamental objective is to ensure the safety of the public, and that is exactly what we continue to do,” explained Kevin Antonucci, spokesperson for Correctional Service of Canada (CSC), in an email.
” In this case, [Luka] Magnotta was transferred in 2022 to a medium-security facility, where there is a well-defined perimeter, high fences, close surveillance at all times and armed officers who patrol,” he said. he added in the same statement.
Conservative MPs and Bloc MP Kristina Michaud wish to hear testimony from Liberal ministers, government representatives, the correctional agency as well as all other witnesses deemed relevant to the committee.
Bickering around an ice rink
Earlier this week, conservative MP Frank Caputo made a video of around seven minutes, with anxiety-inducing music in the background, to recount his visit to the La Macaza establishment. “I found myself face to face with Paul Bernardo. You won’t believe the conditions this guy lives in,” he says at the opening of the video shared on social media.
PHOTO ADRIAN WYLD, THE CANADIAN PRESS
Earlier this week, conservative MP Frank Caputo made a video of around seven minutes, with anxiety-inducing music in the background, to recount his visit to the La Macaza establishment.
The main reason for his indignation: the presence of a hockey rink on the site of this establishment, which according to him is more akin to a “university campus” than a prison institution. “Inmates can take their skates and play hockey; there are hockey nets and everything. If they want to go there in the evening, there are lights,” describes the elected official from British Columbia.
The video has so far been viewed more than 520,000 times.
Hoping to increase the meter, her Ontario colleague Michelle Ferreri invited host Joe Rogan to take an interest “if he wants to learn more about Canada”, with a copy to Elon Musk and the controversial psychologist Jordan Peterson on the X network.
For clarification purposes, Correctional Service Canada noted by email that “at present, there are no functional hockey rinks or tennis courts used by inmates at La Macaza Institution.” , and that “although there are rink boards in place at the establishment, there has been no ice over the past two winters.”
“Recreational activities offered to offenders help make institutions safer for the people who live and work there, by ensuring that offenders spend their time in a productive, controlled and healthy way. The equipment and infrastructure, like most other aspects of a correctional environment, are more rudimentary in nature,” it was also explained.
A “lax” framework, believe the deputies
The transfer of murderers like Luka Magnotta and Paul Bernardo is, according to the elected officials who called for a committee meeting, the result of the An Act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act and another Act (Bill C-83), which received royal assent in June 2019.
This provides that SCC “must ensure, to the extent possible, that the penitentiary in which the inmate is incarcerated constitutes an environment where only the least restrictive restrictions exist for the inmate,” taking into account a series of factors.