WE MUST CURB THIS SOCIAL PLAGUE

RCMP Commissioner Had It Right The First Time -- Marijuana Grow-Ops Are A
Danger To Society

Cops are notoriously close-mouthed when it comes to discussing crimes under
investigation. That's why it was interesting to see RCMP Commissioner
Guiliano Zaccardelli use the killing of four RCMP officers in Alberta last
week to denounce marijuana grow-ops as "a plague on our society."

The four men were killed, so far as we know, by a lone gunman with an
assault rifle at a farm near Mayerthorpe where police had found evidence of
a grow-op and stolen-vehicle parts.

In the hours following the tragedy, everyone seemed on message -- from
Zaccardelli and Public Safety Minister Anne McLellan on down to police
officers on the beat: Grow-ops are often not just small-time Mom and Pop
operations, but part of a dangerous and lucrative cross-border trade
involving drugs of all kinds, weapons, stolen property, laundered money,
motorcycle and Asian gangs and other elements of organized crime.

Now, as advocates of more liberal marijuana laws are on the
counter-offensive, and it looks as if the cautious steps at
"decriminalization" by the government might be in jeopardy, the RCMP
commissioner is backpedalling. The new message appears to be that
Mayerthorpe was an isolated incident, perpetrated by a cop-hater who just
happened to have a few pot plants on his property -- our social plague has
been shoved into the background again.

We were told at first that those four Mounties "paid the highest price to
fight this fight" against grow-ops. Now we're led to believe they were
standing around, with minimum body protection and weapons undrawn, as
unsuspecting targets in an ambush. How is that supposed to comfort the
families they left behind or support other members of the force?

Of course, Zaccardelli, in condemning grow-ops initially, was acting on
limited information. We all know that -- there are still many details
missing. But those who seem to think making pot-growing and trafficking
legal will solve everything are trying to make the most -- or least -- of
those "20 plants" found by Mounties at the Mayerthorpe farm.

The Edmonton Journal has reported that 280 plants had been seized on the
day of the killing along with other growing equipment and a generator worth
$30,000. There have also been suggestions that the operation was part of a
wider one involving other properties, and that the gunman was not alone.

The sergeant in command of the Mayerthorpe detachment has been reported as
saying there were two investigations at the farm: one into the grow-op and
one into allegations of an automobile "chop shop." The RCMP commissioner's
latest contrition is misplaced: He had it right the first day.

The New York Times carried a front page story on Saturday reporting that
U.S. authorities are using the Alberta killings to push for greater border
protection against B.C. bud and the criminal traffic in cocaine and weapons
of which it's a part.

American law enforcement officers are dismayed at the way the courts treat
drug smugglers in this country. Couriers for known major Canadian criminal
organizations are prosecuted and are incarcerated south of the border. But
after a year, they can request a return to Canada, which, if granted, earns
them much lighter sentences in this country.

Typically, U.S. drug enforcement agents say, they find the same Canadian
drug smugglers operating in the U.S. soon after they've been returned to
this country to face reduced sentences. Why? According to Robert Prior,
B.C. regional director of prosecutions with the federal Justice department,
"Canada just has a different philosophical view to the use of jail than the
United States."

"The only offence we are completely agreed on is murder," he says.
"Otherwise, it's very different."

A lot of Canadians, and not just police officers, have complained about the
lenient sentences handed out by courts, and not only for drug offences.
Justice Minister Irwin Cotler has said he's loath to prescribe minimum
sentences in legislation because judges tend to use them as maximums.

The judges have heard the criticism and responded, not by passing stiffer
sentences, but by mounting a public relations campaign to tell the public
it shouldn't be swayed by media accounts of trials and trust them to make
the punishment fit the crime.

Carol Baird Ellan, chief judge of the B.C. Provincial Court, says just
because a case becomes a media flashpoint doesn't mean a sentence is incorrect.

As for drug cases, she says, prosecutors have to prove the link between
grow-ops and organized crime, their prevalence in the community, prior
offences, profit and damage to property: "Judges cannot assume those
factors exist."

Of course they can't. But the public is fed up with the damage done to
lives and property by marijuana grow operations and with the seeming
inability of the courts to put perpetrators behind bars for a good long time.

For a while, after the Mayerthorpe killings, it looked as if our lawmakers
could be persuaded to deal with the issue seriously -- McLellan was talking
about increasing penalties and police powers to deal with grow-ops.

But then the pot advocates began whining about being "demonized," the RCMP
commissioner began back-pedalling and the initiative seemed lost.

It shouldn't be. Grow-ops are a social plague. They require tough medicine
and judges who are tough enough to prescribe it.