CONDITIONAL SENTENCING PROBED

Answers sought to tough questions about controversial alternative

It's a sentencing option that has stirred much controversy since its
inception in September 1996. In Nova Scotia, it has kept convicted
wife-beater Vernon Hatcher, drunk driver Ralph Parker, and gambling cop
Edward Sisk out of jail. Some complain it's an easy way out, while others
say it helps criminals get their lives back on track.

It's conditional sentencing - an option that lets criminals serve their
time at home instead of behind bars - and it may be due for some
fine-tuning, says the Ottawa group in charge of sentencing reform.

"We've been looking at ways of improving the enforcement mechanism in
particular,'' says David Daubney, sentencing reform team co-ordinator for
the federal justice department. He says the group will present its
suggestions to Justice Minister Anne McLellan shortly.

"There's a fair amount of breach activity, I would say .... I think it
means that the conditional sentences are being enforced, which is important
for credibility,'' Daubney continues.

The national breach rate is 10 to 12 per cent. It's no secret that putting
a person in jail is expensive. It costs an average of $55,000 a year to
jail a criminal. Supervising them in the community costs only $4,000.

But Daubney says cost wasn't the driving factor behind the law, which only
applies to offenders serving non-violent crimes that would normally net
them less than two years in prison. He says they're more likely to get help
for what causes them to commit crimes in the first place - drug and alcohol
addiction, sexual abuse, or poorly controlled anger - in the community.

As of last August, judges had handed down 13,000 conditional sentences
across Canada for crimes ranging from fraud and first-time impaired driving
to drug-related offences. Offenders are given a list of conditions to
follow, including curfews, mandatory counselling or community service. If
authorities suspect they've breached those conditions, it's the offender's
responsibility to prove otherwise to a judge. Fail that test, and they
could spend the rest of their sentence behind bars.

Most legal professionals say they support conditional sentences as a way to
get repeat offenders out of the system once and for all. But they say the
sentences haven't been without problems. Because breaching a conditional
sentence isn't a crime in itself, it's unclear whether police can arrest an
offender if it happens, or if courts can issue warrants for them to appear
in court. It's questions such as those that Daubney's team is trying to
answer.

"It's been a real eye-opener, especially for some of the offenders who've
been through the system before and think that a conditional sentence is
going to be a cakewalk,'' says Dartmouth parole supervisor Janis Aitken.
"For some, conditional sentences are a real break and they really value
it."

"Stan" is one of those people. Two years ago, he got into a heated argument
with his mother, pushing her and throwing her TV, VCR and religious
textbooks out of an apartment window. She called police and had him charged
with assault. An alcoholic, drug abuser and habitual offender who had been
in and out of jail since he was 16, Stan was fully prepared to go to jail
again - and nearly fell off his chair when the judge gave him an 18-month
conditional sentence. He's finishing the last few months of his sentence,
and has been sober for most of that time.

"I had to get busy. If I'd been in jail, I would've just been laying
around, living off the government. I wouldn't have done anything about my
addictions, I wouldn't have taken any hard looks at the choices I've made
.... Here, I'm making things happen,'' explained the 40-year-old, who
didn't want his real name used.