TOEWS BACKS OFF MAKING 10-YEAR-OLDS CRIMINALS

Justice Minister Introduces Three-Strikes Bill

OTTAWA - The Conservative government plans to introduce a new law in
the coming months for harsher treatment of young offenders, but
Justice Minister Vic Toews is backing away from the prospect of
bringing children as young as 10 into the criminal justice system.

Mr. Toews, who who yesterday introduced a new bill that could lock up
three-time violent or sexual offenders for indefinite jail terms,
told CanWest News Service yesterday there is little appetite among
his provincial counterparts to lower to age of criminal responsibility.

He made his comments amid a renewed debate on how the system should
handle wayward children, after a group of Winnipeg children, aged
seven to 11, locked a disabled 14-year-old boy in a shed and set it
on fire last weekend. The boy was rescued from the burning building.

"I haven't heard a provincial attorney-general coming to me and
saying that the age of responsibility needs to be lowered," Mr. Toews
said. "They indicate it's a child-welfare issue and I have no plans
to change the law. It's their jurisdiction."

The Youth Criminal Justice Act applies to young people aged 12 to 17.

Younger children who have run-ins with the law are the responsibility
of provincial child-welfare authorities, which offer treatment in group homes.

In a much-maligned proposal in August, Mr. Toews said at a meeting of
lawyers in Newfoundland and Labrador the court system should also
handle 10- and 11-year olds because the child-welfare system in most
cases fails to treat troubled children and it's often too late to
rehabilitate them if they cannot be criminally charged until age 12.

"In most provinces, in fact, the child-welfare system is allowing
criminal conduct to continue among those types of children," Mr.
Toews told reporters at the time. "They're being used by gangs and
drug couriers to do break and enters. There are other kinds of very
serious crimes, so by the time they're 12, they're already criminals."

The new "three strikes" bill introduced yesterday makes good on a
Tory election promise.

"This is the kind of designation we need in order to prevent multiple
child molesters and other serious offenders from reoffending in ...
jurisdictions across Canada," Mr. Toews said.

His bill reverses the onus now in place regarding the burden of proof
required to have someone designated as a dangerous offender, which
carries with it an indefinite prison term.

If the bill passes, those convicted of three serious violent or
sexual offences would have to convince a judge why they shouldn't be
branded a dangerous offender. It's now up to Crown attorneys to prove
that the offender deserves to be declared dangerous.

Including 10- and 11-year-olds in the criminal justice system is not
mentioned in the Conservative party's election platform. But it
promises other harsher measures for the 12-17 age groups, including
making it automatic for youths charged with serious crimes to receive
adult sentences, and instructing judges to consider deterrence and
denunciation when sentencing youths convicted of crimes.

Mr. Toews said yesterday he will table a bill in this mandate, adding
to an already busy slate of criminal justice measures that have been
introduced in the past six months.

At a meeting last week of federal and provincial justice ministers,
several ministers lobbied for stiffer treatment of young offenders,
saying the current law, which focuses on finding alternatives to jail
for all but the most serious offenders, is not working.