Rumors abound in our community that the RCMP have ignored death threats given to our high school principal by a local teen. What isn't rumor is that our principal has had a tough year (as I'm sure many do), but is still fighting the good fight, and we commend him for his efforts. But his professional and personal hardships aside, what is a teeny bit more serious are these threats on his life...
We in the community have heard through the rumor mill that the local RCMP officers have dismissed these threats as "benign" after confronting the individual and giving him a stern warning and informing him of the "gravity of the situation". Personally, this is insulting. Why isn't he under arrest and in jail? He's broken the law! Twice now actually because the threats have continued. We shouldn't have to wait and see if he decides to act on those threats! By that time it's too late! According to a google search, here is the laymans legal definition for death threats:
Threaten death or bodily harm
Under the Criminal Code, it is an offence to knowingly utter or convey a threat to cause death or bodily harm to any person. It is also an offence to threaten to burn, destroy or damage property or threaten to kill, poison or injure an animal or bird that belongs to a person.
Penalties
The offence of utter death threat may be prosecuted by summary conviction or by indictment. If prosecuted by indictment, the accused person is entitled to elect trial by jury and upon conviction is liable to up to five years jail. In most cases, however, the offence is prosecuted by summary conviction, requiring a trial before a lower court justice. In this case, the maximum penalty is 18 months imprisonment.
It seems pretty obvious that this young man should be in custody and awaiting a trial. But that's not the point of this post. The question I'm asking is why? Why aren't the RCMP doing their job? Is it because they are young, inexperienced officers that are afraid to take on Inuit-White violence? Is it because they are understaffed and overworked and don't have the time and resources to deal with an apparently "minor" offense? Or is it because these things happen all the time in larger cities and they just go unnoticed? Personally I would be really scared if someone were threatening my life, and I would hope the RCMP would take these threats seriously. It certainly doesn't seem all that unreal of a possibility that these threats would be affirmed, given the drunkeness, and history of crime in these small communities.
I for one hope that our principal gets on a plane, gives Nunavut the finger as he's boarding his $1500 flight home (First thief of the north), and contacts every newspaper, blog, and RCMP head office he can to inform them about this.
Your thoughts?
-Anon
24 comments:
They may not have charged the person making the threats if no one other than the recipient heard them make the threats. I think this is pretty common anywere. I remember a cop telling us once that death threats are very rarely acted on.
If it persisted hopefully they would take more action. Was it a one-time thing? They just can't do much on a one-time occurence, and people do say stupid things in the heat of a moment, not to say that it's OK, just to say that his life is probably not in huge danger, although of course that depends on the circumstances.
Legally, there is no need for anyone but the victim to hear the threat. A charge can still be laid. In court, it might come down to which party is more credible, and I'll bet the judge would find the principal to be the more credible of the two, resulting in a conviction.
One-time or a dozen, it's still a crime. You don't get away with murder just because it's your first! And people have to be (and are) responsible for their actions regardless of factors like intoxication or "heat of the moment".
I'm sure Robert Pickton's victims never thought they were in any danger either.
I have a close association with the RCMP on a daily basis and I think they generally do their jobs very well. However, I think they might, sometimes, take the "politically-correct" route of down-playing Inuit-on-white violence. And that is what a death-threat is - violence.
Convictions for "Uttering Threats" (s.264.1 of the Criminal Cose)are very common-place in Nunavut, so I can't imagine why this case would be ignored.
Perhaps, like policemen, it's now got to the point where school principals have to accept death-threats as an expectation of the job. If that's the case things are much worse in our schools than I would have imagined.
The sad fact is that native-on-white violence is often poorly reported (or not reported at all) in the media. Thus, we get the impression, especially in southern Canada, that it simply isn't a problem.
Case in point: a school-teacher in Northern Quebec, about two years ago, had his home invaded by three young men, who proceeded to beat and stab him. The ultimate cause of death was deemed by the coroner to have been the result of a hockey stick being shoved up ... well, you get the picture!
Or the nurse who was recently gang-raped at the Health Centre on a reserve in Northern Ontario.
You have to work to find these stories in the press and they are never on the radio or television news.
I wonder why.
I think RCMP are sorely understaffed, and there are so many calls to answer that they are run off their feet a lot of the time just maintaining order. Plus, I think they are in a really difficult position - if they put someone away for what locals would think was small-time, they might have more trouble on their hands, dealing with family members. Maybe they don't see this particular case as an important use of their time because he has a history of empty threats.
I would wonder, if it is just rumour...do you know all the facts? Maybe the RCMP have a file on this guy but not enough to make a conviction with long prison time. Maybe they're building the case?
In response to anonymous...
I think native-on-white violence isn't reported as much because "whitey" has already done so much damage to native/non-white cultures that it's like an unspoken taboo to do further harm. Shedding this negative light on native peoples by reporting crimes by some of them, the media seems to feel it's in poor taste or something. As if they think "Native groups have already been through so much, let's just sweep this problem under the rug too".
peekay, but I'm not sure how the example of Robert Pickton helps you make your point.
On what reserve was the nurse gang-raped? That's just awful, as is the murder of the teacher in Northern Quebec, hadn't heard about that either!
"Are we safe"
Only if your willing to take the law into your own hands. The assholes who make threats, break in and vandalize are for most part underage.
In past 28 years I have spent in Nunavut, I have seen the procsecution
of crimes where the accused is underage take a steady plunge. I don't think there even is a juvenile facility in Nunavut.
In would rater keep a baseball handy and answer questions later
This reminds me of a story I was told back in high school, long before I became a teacher. Perhaps it is apocryphal, perhaps. There was always the rumour that our high school English teacher (an amateur boxer) finally had had enough with a few young punks in his class. He was teaching in a small portable and so one afternoon after class, he pushed all the desks and chairs over to one side of the class and invited 2 or 3 of the worst offenders to show him how tough they thought they were. According to the story, the four of them had a good ole' smack down right there in the middler of the class and after that old Mr. Sherry never had any troubles with the clowns again.
Even if this never happened, we always remembered it. Mr. Sherry was a great guy and an awesome teacher. Unlike a lot of kids today, we actually had respect for our teachers.
Ok so even if the RCMP do arrest this guy, the court system in Nunavut will only give him a slap on the hand. People here get nothing for beating up their wives. So maybe we should be looking into why the Nunavut court system gives out such lenient punishments?
And I know this doesn't justify the death threats, but they do tend to hand them out like candy up here. I don't think some people realize what they are saying exactly.
Good point anonymous #4.
The Nunavut court system is a joke. Children are abused in all the ways possible and the abuser is allowed back in the home. B&E's are committed, wives are beaten, power is misused, alcohol is abused, drugs are trafficked and how many people are there in jail serving time for their offenses? I'm not sure the total when you include those in federal correctional facilities but Baffin's was designed for only 60 inmates according to a Nunavut Legal Services Study. So, ya not enough.
So the bigger problem may be in the legal proceedings and correctional facilities, not the RCMP. But then again, one could make the argument that there would be a greater need for jail space if the RCMP were arresting more people. Hmmm...around comes the circle.
Arresting more people won't make more space in the Iqaluit Jail or change if someone even goes to Jail. The RCMP can only detain people and collect information. Everyone seems to think they are also Judge/Jury/and executioner.
True, but no one will see a judge if they aren't arrested first.
And even at that, that's only if the case isn't sent off the courts docket to "community justice" as many of them are.
I do not entertain the idea that RCMP did not charge this man b/c the victim was white. It's just not plausible to conclude a file because the color of the victim's skin. RCMP members are often threatened and so are the lives of their families; these individuals are charged and end up with a suspended sentence in court and given six months probation. I have yet to see anyone get jail time for an uttering threats charge. So, to reasonably think this man should be in jail awaiting trial, give your head a shake, most individuals don't see the inside of a jail cell for causing serious bodily harm to their wife. Instead, they to, are put on probation with the requirement they receive written permission from their probation officer in order to have contact with the victim. Now that's justice people...???
Finally, if the principle wanted to press charges, this teen would be charged for his crime. The police have little descretion when the victim insists charges be laid. Perhaps the "rumour" is just that, a rumour.
There is a juvenile facility in Iqaluit, I beleive it holds 8 young offenders (females are not allowed, they have to go to Inuvik). I won't mention where most of the young offenders come from, but from reviewing stats in the territory, one could easily guess. I'm guessing Elaine will know the answer.
The incident in question did involve a kid who after getting suspended multiple times over the years finally got expelled. Shortly thereafter he walked into school and made quite the scene yelling and insisting that he be let back in school (this was supposed to have been followed up by an individual being hired to watch the school door in case he returned - for the protection of students and staff. I'm not sure if this was followed through with or not). So this semester he calls the school and again insists that he be let back in and if he wasn't re-enrolled he would show up at the school with a gun.
The principle, who was directly threatened in the conversation, was informed by one of the two officers that he shouldn’t be concerned because it’s the quiet ones to worry about.
I agree with the author of the post, he should leave town for his own safety. Perhaps someday when this territory grows up someone in his position will be offered some sort of protection, but until then 'everybody for themselves' I guess.
To satiate your curiousity...I found info on the number of charges in each community, but not specifically young offenders, and it is only for 2006. The highest number was Iqaluit, followed in decreasing order by Kugluktuk, Cam Bay, Baker, Rankin, Arviat, Taloyoak, Pang and Hall Beach. The rest are under 200 charges. Grise Fiord, Chesterfield Inlet and Repulse are the lowest with 25 or lower.
And another tidbit...the rate of recidivism for youth released from the Iqaluit Young Offenders facility is 73%! The rate of recidivism for adult males released from the Baffin Correctional Facility is 51%!
Kugluktuk is a very close second, despite the fact that the population there is one-quarter of that in the big "city" of Iqaluit. I think this says something about the theory that exposure to "white" culture may be to blame for all the crime.
But let's put this into perspective: Nunavut is a dangerous jurisdiction, and it is even more dangerous for the Inuit than for the non-Inuit. The Inuit are victimized (by other Inuit) at a rate far greater than "white" people are victimized. We all lose out because of alcoholism and drugs and because a culture of violence has been allowed to flourish by a weak and ineffective legal system.
And those recidivism figures would sound very low to anyone "in the business".
I've also been told that "return rates" for youngsters from Kugluktuk to the facility in Iqaluit are nearer 95% - probably, in part, because they get treated better there than they are at home.
So, in the end it comes down to "where are these kids parents"? A criminal record in Nunavut is not something that people are afraid of. Crime has become accepted in many homes and many teenagers don't care what the consequences of their actions are. Is there a way to change people's attitude towards life or is it a lost cause.
You're right. There is no social stigma attached to being convicted of a crime when 50-percent of your peers also have criminal records. This is the reality in many of our communities.
No strategy or institution is capable of rehabilitating a criminal. Rehabilitation is a myth, plain and simple. People change if THEY want to change, not because someone else wants them to. And they DON'T need help to change - if they are truly serious.
That is why probation, conditional sentences and even jail are all ineffective. At least jail has the advantage of keeping the die-hard shit-heads away from the rest of us, albeit for a too-short period of time.
Another point to ponder - anyone ever read the Youth Criminal Justice Act? It's legislated in Canada (not just Nunavut) that young people aren't charged the first, second, third time they get into trouble. Assuming this student is under 18 and he doesn't have a long history, the cops didn't really have a choice on this one but to warn him... Also, as Elaine said, the court system up here is a joke - even if he was charged, as a youth (or adult for that matter), he wouldn't get anything for it. Guys that beat the crap out of their wives only get probation.
guys that beat their wives still get elected as MLAs in nunavut
The government often tries to make us think they are "getting tough with crime" by imposing strict sentences. These laws are written by lawyers, however.
Case-in-point: Bootlegging, one of the most reprehensible crimes in Nunavut, carries a penalty of a $5,000 fine OR up to 18-months in jail. Sounds tough?
Actually a sentence of one-day in jail (the culprit's court day) is a legal sentence. Ironically, in a jurisdiction where alcohol is a major factor in crime, this is a "sentence" that is imposed more often than not.
What a screwed-up "system"! No wonder the crime rate is so high!
So true, bo-bo...having tough sentences is great in theory, but it only works if you actually sentence the accused. SO SO SO many court cases are dismissed or postponed (some for years) due to lack of evidence, lost paperwork, accused not showing up for court, witnesses backing down, etc.
I saw one court case where the accused was being charged with drug trafficking. He didn't show up for court because he was in a drug rehab program...somewhere. Case was dismissed. "Oh, he's going to quit doing drugs? Super. Okay, well I guess we'll just forget about all the marijuana he brought into town this year."
Ridiculous.
Unlike some of the other communities the commentators are from, in my community the RCMP do a fantastic job. They seem to have no problem maintaining a level of control. I think the biggest problem with the violence is the fact that the wheels of the justice system move to the next phase so slowly and when they do they seem to do very little. Bureaucracy is a terrible thing. I would certainly relish the opportunity to take part in a Northern Canada version of "Walking Tall" but in this day and age we have to rely on the justice system to perform its mission. Unfortunately that howling noise you hear isn't the wind. It is more likely than not the wheels of the justice system coming to a grinding halt. I certainly don't blame the RCMP. They do what they can with the resources they are given, at least in my community. Just a little reminder to all those people that have come to Nunavut to work, "If it was an easy job, everyone would be doing it". Keep smiling, keep happy, and keep a baseball bat by the bed and door like I do
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