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FIRST READING: Fifteen days, fifteen identity-based criminal sentences

Roughly every day, a Canadian criminal is getting a reduced sentence because of their race

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FIRST READING: Fifteen days, fifteen identity-based criminal sentences Back to video

The Supreme Court of Canada had barely convened for its fall session when it upheld a decision ruling that a Nova Scotia man who badly beat his girlfriend should receive a reduced sentence because he is Indigenous.

His badly beaten victim is also Indigenous, but in a 5-4 decision, the court ruled that an Indigenous man’s right to be spared “excessive imprisonment” outweighed an Indigenous woman’s right to be spared from “unacceptably high levels of violence and abuse.”

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Such decisions are no longer anomalous in the Canadian legal system. It is now stated Canadian law that criminals must be treated (and punished) differently based on immutable factors such as race or country of origin.

If a criminal is Indigenous, they are provided with a Gladue Report itemizing the various traumas of their marginalized background and how it reduces their “moral blameworthiness” for crime.

If they are black, they are given an Impact of Race and Culture Assessment, which breaks down how “systemic racism” influenced their decision to break the law.

If they are a non-citizen, a judge may consider the “immigration consequences” of a conviction and assign a lighter sentence than would be received by a citizen who had committed the same crime.

Add all these together, and roughly every day a Canadian court is in session, someone is being considered for a reduced sentence because of their race, background or country of origin.

To prove it, we combed through 15 days of rulings on CanLII, an online database of Canadian court decisions. Specifically, a period running from Sept. 23 to Oct. 15; omitting weekends and holidays, it represents a block of 15 court days.

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In that time frame, there were at least 15 examples of decisions involving identity factors. Fifteen days and fifteen identity-based judicial decisions.

The examples are below.

Ontario Superior Court of Justice, Oct. 15

Mouchamar Animer was convicted of trying to traffic crack cocaine through the mail; he’d been caught attempting to send drugs to what was described as a “vulnerable northern Ontario community.”

The Crown sought four years, but Animer received a sentence of “two years less a day,” with a judge somewhat ironically claiming that Animer’s moral blameworthiness was reduced in part because he’d grown up in a vulnerable Toronto community afflicted by drugs.

Born in Chad, Animer was eligible for an Impact........

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