COMMUNITY COURT OFFERS BEACON OF HOPE IN BATTLE AGAINST PETTY
CRIME

If your car gets broken into, chances are the person who smashed your
window and ripped you off has done it before. Chances are they've done
it many, many times before.

According to the provincial government's working group on street
crime, the addict who smashed up your car could easily have done the
same to 19 other cars that same day.

And your thief will keep on breaking into cars every single day until
he gets caught.

When he's caught, he'll get hauled into court. He'll probably be
released with a promise to appear another day. The judge will attach
conditions. He might be required to get drug treatment or see someone
about his mental illness.

Then, he'll walk out onto the street, looking for a way to pay for his
next fix.

Three-quarters of the crime reported in Vancouver is property crime --
most of it vehicle-related.

Seventy per cent of Vancouver's street criminals are chronic repeat
offenders. Those are people who have been charged with at least five
offences in one year. They've been arrested and released with no
lessons learned.

The working group was created because Victoria heard what police and
citizens have been telling them for years: Our justice system is
failing utterly to stop the rampant street crime that plagues our
major cities.

Justice is a revolving door for street criminals. Our courts operate a
catch-and-release program for chronic offenders, when they should be
getting them off the street and changing their behaviour before
setting them free.

As a result of the working group report, Victoria will establish
B.C.'s first community court in September.

Many seem to think the new court will go easy on criminals. It
won't.

The community court will specialize in chronic offenders.

It will recognize that chronic offenders don't reform, because the
need to feed their drug habit trumps any lessons they learned from
getting arrested.

Many of them also struggle with a mental illness on top of their drug
problem. The odds of them changing without help are small indeed.

The court will bring together addiction workers, social workers and
police.

Instead of just requiring a promise to appear later, the judge will
deal with them on the spot.

Instead of making them promise to show up for drug-or mental-health
treatment at some later date, they won't be allowed to leave the
building until they get some.

This court won't be the easy way out for chronic offenders. My bet is
that street criminals will quickly start looking for ways to avoid
having their cases heard there.

Hopefully they won't succeed.

The guy at my local glass-repair shop is awfully nice. We're on a
first-name basis.

I wish it was because our kids played soccer together.

Instead, it's because I've too often made the mistake of parking my
car in Vancouver.