VIGILANTE FATHER DUG HIS OWN GRAVE

THE philosopher Confucius wrote it hundreds of years ago: If you are
setting out to take revenge, first dig two graves.

Kim Walker may or may not have had revenge on his mind when he gunned
down his daughter's boyfriend, but when he put James Hayward in a
grave back in 2003, he certainly was digging a grave for himself.
Because the jury convicted him of second-degree murder last week, the
judge had no choice but to sentence him to life in prison, although
with the opportunity for parole after 10 years have been served. It's
the minimum allowable sentence.

Walker felt he was protecting his daughter from a drug addict's life,
which generally becomes an existence of unrelenting misery ending in
an early death. His solution was to get rid of her drug-dealing,
drug-using boyfriend.

Outside the Yorkton, Sask., courthouse following the conviction and
sentencing, Walker's daughter Jadah declared her father a hero. "He
saved my life," she said. "He did what he had to do." If being a good
parent just means being willing to sacrifice your own life for your
family, Kim Walker surely passes the test. He'll come out of jail an
old man, even with the minimum sentence.

On the question of whether he "did what he had to do," obviously the
law disagrees with the Walker family. For many Canadians who have
followed news reports of the trial, what makes this particular story
so tragic is the law's interpretation of Kim Walker's act of
violence, compared with the almost casual violence that we read about
every day.

The day after newspapers carried the story of Walker's conviction and
sentencing, and while Jadah was telling reporters that her father
saved her life, in Grande Prairie, Alta., Stephen Curtis Smith was
being convicted for bludgeoning his girlfriend to death with a tire
iron. Drugs, alcohol and an extended argument led to the horrible
early death of Bonnie May Weir, at the hands of a man who even the
defence counsel admitted had been a drug user and drug dealer since his teens.

"This is a classical drug- and alcohol-induced scenario," said
defence lawyer David Abbey. Smith has struggled through life and had
been addicted to drugs since he was a teen, Abbey said. He sold drugs
to support his habit. But as we invariably hear about addicts facing
serious jail time, Smith, 30, has tried to turn his life around. His
lawyer pleaded: "He is not an individual we should be throwing away.
He is an individual with promise." Thus, with credit for the time
already spent in custody, Smith's seven-year sentence, not for
second-degree murder, but merely for manslaughter has only four years
left on it.

Parents, court observers and, no doubt, not a few drug dealers have
to notice a discrepancy here, even if the courts don't. "The death of
Ms. Wier is an example of the ultimate act of cruelty -- the ending
of a life before its time," Justice G.W. Paul said during Smith's
sentencing hearing on Friday. No ending more cruel than being bashed
to death with a tire iron, except perhaps being shot five times, in
the eyes of the law.

Who suffered more in the ultimate cruelty of their deaths?
Ultimately, it doesn't matter. What was in the heart of the killers
seems to be more of the deciding factor in whether an early death is
worthy of life in prison or merely seven years.

Smith, the lifetime drug addict and drug dealer for many years, could
kill in blind rage with less culpability than the father who (at
least in his own heart) could find no other recourse to save his
daughter from the clutches of the kind of person who drug dealers
become. Blind rage is deplorable, but a calculated decision to kill
is worse. All lives are valuable, but the law is valued above any
individual person; you cannot take the law into your own hands. If
you think you can, first dig two graves.