Yukoner's case headed to high court
The attorney general of British Columbia is taking a Yukoner's case to the country's highest court, challenging the breadth of a law which says First Nations people deserve special consideration when being sentenced.
The attorney general of British Columbia is taking a Yukoner's case to the country's highest court, challenging the breadth of a law which says First Nations people deserve special consideration when being sentenced.
In March, a B.C. Court of appeal justice reduced Frank Ladue's three-year sentence for breaching a court order to one year.
Ladue, formerly of Ross River, was convicted of the breach after he was caught using cocaine and morphine while at a halfway house in downtown Vancouver.
The B.C. attorney general is challenging that reduction, saying special consideration in the form of a shorter sentence is not appropriate for long-term offenders, regardless of their heritage.
Ladue was deemed a long-term offender by Yukon territorial court judge John Faulkner in 2003 – a result of his third conviction for sexually assaulting a woman while she was unconscious from drinking.
He was released from prison in 2006, but kept lapsing back into drug and alcohol use, and getting sent back behind bars. He has not committed anymore sexual offences since his conviction in the Yukon.
In 2009, Ladue was sentenced to three years in prison for his latest lapse, but appealed the heavy sentence.
In reducing Ladue's sentence by two-thirds, Justice Elizabeth Bennett said the lower court judge failed to take into account Ladue's troubled past – starting with years of physical, sexual, emotional, and spiritual abuse in residential school – and his First Nations heritage.
Under the Criminal Code of Canada, sentencing judges must give special consideration to Aboriginal offenders, who are grossly over-represented in the jail and prison systems.
But the B.C. attorney general's office is challenging Bennett's decision to apply that section of the law to a breach of a court order by a long-term offender.
The attorney general is also seeking to have the Ladue case heard at the same time as the case of Manasie Ipeelee, an Inuit man who was sentenced to 30 months for breaching a court order under almost exactly the same circumstances as Ladue.
His sentence was never reduced, but the Ontario Court of Appeal granted him an appeal on the same basis as Ladue, prompting the Ontario attorney general to challenge the decision.
The Ipeelee case is scheduled to be heard on Oct. 18, 2011.
Comments (3)
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Anonymous on May 17, 2011 at 10:19 pm
As my fellow readers and letter writers prove, they have more sense than what lawyers are trying to attribute to Yukoners. For some reason, the lawyers for Boucher and Lange argue that typical, ordinary Yukoners do not have enough intelligence to analyze various actions and words to determine a person's state of mind. As well, they argue one's past history of violence must only be taken from proof of criminally charged offenses not accounts of actual instances that did not result in charges. When are the rights of the victim going to take on a little bit of importance. They killed someone.
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Chilkoot on May 16, 2011 at 5:46 am
This man raped a woman when she was unconscious. Not once not twice but three times. Get over it and take responsibility for your actions, stop blaming the white man for all of your wrong doings..Enough already.
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JC on May 14, 2011 at 5:15 am
The whole justice system in Canada has become insane. I'm white and spent 3 years in a Catholic residential school as a young child. At least 50 % were native children sent there because of multiple kinds of abuse in their communities. I and the others weren't abused in any way. But it's easy to make accusations against others who aren't around to respond to the charges. If this man is a criminal, it isn't because of his troubled past, but because of his rebellious nature. He is responsible for his own actions and the pain of others. Sending him and others like him back out to cause others more pain and hurt isn't the answer. Lock him up until he learns to behave. Without repentance and restitution, there is no justice.