CRIMINALS IN CANADA GET OFF EASY

To the editor:

Again and again I read about our problems in our society-thefts,
hold-ups, drugs, prostitution and so on.

Now the slogan is well we are getting bigger and the big city life
has come to our pretty little town." As if we are the only place that
has these kind of problems.

Crooks have existed since money was invented; the only thing that is
different now is how we deal with that element.

Going back to a comment made by panel members of the justice system
forum: In 1990 the prosecutors and judges were instructed to reduce
the number of individuals sent to prison, reduce sentencing.

This makes perfect sense in a money-driven society. It is clear that
drugs and crime pump millions, if not billions in to the underground
economy. As long as the crooks are on the street almost everyone
makes money: The bad guys of course with selling drugs, the business
with selling luxury items, the lawyers are busy, the insurance
companies raise fees every time a crime is committed in a store, and
the judges do there job.

Someone even came up with the idea to count time before sentencing as
double time, so when someone actually gets time" it can be written
off as time served, get the individual back on the street, so the
business doesn't suffer.

What we achieved with this minimum sentencing" is that the jails are
full of petty criminals serving weeks, maybe months of jail time. But
what the politicians actually wanted-to reduce operating costs-did
not materialize. Now we have this counting days before the trial as
double and house arrests that is OK too-the bad guy is out of the
hair of the penitentiary system and can deal drugs out of the home now.

To really solve our problems takes a politician with guts and
backbone. Look at a recent court case, I think it was in Bali-20
years for dealing drugs. That was lenient" as the individual was a
foreigner. If she would have been a citizen, she would have lost her
head. I would like to see some of their crime statistics.

Helmut Somogy i

Lake Country