This is an updated reprise of an earlier post. What is it going to take to fix our broken justice system? I don’t want to incarcerate to the same level as our neighbor to the South, but we have to put the brakes on setting murderers free. BC’s sick justice seems pervasive in the administration of our justice system.
The Courts & Prison System Are both Failing Us. Setting murderers free and releasing violent offenders is common place.
It seems as though the courts have instituted a “catch and release” of drug dealers. And when it isn’t the courts setting murderers free and releasing gang members, it is the Correctional Service of Canada. It uses a complex and convoluted evaluation system based on points to determine the security level of the prison at which a convicted criminal will serve out some portion of his sentence. It amounts to just another hole in our justice system and one of the reasons why criminals laugh at it.
We are setting murders free or putting them in minimum security prisons. We incarcerate shoplifters in maximum security prisons. And we release drug dealers and gang members to the street to commit mayhem.
Let’s Look At The Specific Cases of Two Convicted Murders and of Khouri Green Who Will Soon Be Convicted of Murder
Case #1: Khouri Green Murdered Colin Hill After Multiple Conditional Releases
I featured the posting about Khouri Green and showed his criminal record in a previous blog, Murderer Khouri Green’s Criminal Record. If you have yet to do so, you should read it now to understand what is happening in our court rooms. The degree of leniency of our judges might be as big of a crime as any of those who come before them have committed. They are setting murderers free to murder again.
CASE # 2: Shawn William Merrick
I am talking here about a career criminal here. Merrick has some fifty prior convictions for drug and property offenses. With this record, he was sentenced to six years after pleading guilty to robbing or attempting to rob ten Lower Mainland banks. Did you understand what I said? I said “TEN”.
The Opinions of Sentencing Judge William MacDonald
Judge MacDonald, in handing down his sentence, commented, “He is in my view a seasoned criminal.”
I am talking here about a career criminal, 35 years old [at that time]. Judge William MacDonald of the Surrey Provincial Court noted he was a long-time drug addict who had been doing crack since he was 18, with “a horrendous criminal record for a man of his age”.
Judge MacDonald further commented that protection of the public must take priority. Accordingly, Judge MacDonald gave Merrick 22 months credit for time he had been in jail since his arrest. He then handed him a further six-year stint in prison.
Judge MacDonald even went on to say that Merrick’s chances of being rehabilitated were slim. In doing so, he noted that past efforts at rehab had failed. Additionally, he stated that Merrick had been kicked out of one treatment centre because of his poor attitude.
These Robbery Convictions Were Prior To Merrick Having Been Found To Have Committed A “Brutal” Murder
In July 2007 the body of Shelley Lynn DeVoe, a 44-year-old Whalley mother of two, was found. It had been discarded alongside Harper Road on Burke Mountain in Coquitlam on Sept. 22. Merrick was convicted of that murder on February 6, 2008 [while still serving time on the robbery convictions] and given an Indeterminate Sentence.
In Describing Merrick After His Escape On March 31, 2015, RCMP Pointed Out The Following
Merrick has multiple tattoos which include skulls on his left upper arm, a heart with the name “Jade” on his right upper back, a dragon on his right upper arm and a skull on the left side of his chest.
Drug Use In Prison
It was also mentioned that Merrick had sores on his right forearm and neck. Folks, having spent some fifteen years on the street, I can tell you that sores, if you live in a relatively clean environment which a prison most certainly should be and probably is, and if you are a drug addict which Merrick is, are signs of drug use, Those sores form from bacteria around drug injection sites. The sores on the neck are especially indicative of drug use. One’s neck seldom comes in contact with many physical objects within the environment, even if that environment is less than clean.
Merrick’s Escape Is Outrageous
The courts get it right, and instead of “catch and release”, finally incarcerate a man and give him a meaningful sentence. Then the Correctional Service of Canada bollixes the job. It put a known career criminal, convicted of beating and killing a woman, convicted of ten bank robberies, and forty other charges, into a minimum security prison whereat he is actively doing intravenous drugs. Thus, it instituted the catch and escape policy that the court had avoided.
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What happened to maximum security for a violent offender?
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How could a convict have an active drug addiction in prison?
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Would not the fact that a convict had an active drug addiction disqualify him for minimum security if his violent history did not?
Case # 3: This Is The 2nd Time In Less Than A Year That A Murderer And Prolific Offender Has Escaped From A Minimum Security Prison
Norman Riel escaped August 26, 2014 while serving an Indeterminate Sentence for second-degree murder and hasn’t been seen since.
Look At Riel’s Record & Realize That He Is Still Out There
He was serving a life sentence for the second-degree murder of Patrick Pugh.
Pugh was shot in the head during a home invasion at his east Vancouver penthouse in September 1994.
Riel was arrested following an undercover operation in Las Vegas in early 1995 and convicted of the murder three years later.
Riel’s record includes weapons charges, uttering threats and living off the avails of prostitution. [He’s a career criminal, a pimp, a bully and a murderer and he was in minimum security.]
The Real Problem Is Not The Low Security Level Of The Prison. Instead, It Is A System That Allows Violent Career Criminals And Murderers To Be Put In A Minimum Security Prison
The Correctional Service of Canada says it is going to investigate how these two escaped. I can save them all that money for an investigation. I can tell them how they escaped. They escaped because the
jailers sent a boy to do a man’s job. They should have incarcerated them in a prison with more security.
“The Best Predictor Of Future Behavior Is Past Behavior”
They escaped because the Correctional Service of Canada has some idiotic idea that it can evaluate ‘risk” by a point system without even taking a common sense approach of looking at the individuals’ record, and if it claims it did look, then it obviously had the wrong person looking.
What does the Correctional Service of Canada think is going to happen when you place such individuals in a minimum security prison? Ask your ten year old kid what is going to happen when you put a high risk, career criminal into a minimum security prison, I assure you that he will give you correct answer.
When The Courts Get It Right, The Prison System Fails Us
The courts need to stop putting every drug defendant back on the streets. The prison system needs to realize the incarceration needs of serious criminals. It needs to stop allowing violent, high risk, career criminals to go to minimum security. It needs to stop setting murderers free by failing to guard them. These high risk offenders will probe and investigate the level of security and then try to escape when they find a hole.
This is not rocket science and the courts and people like Mayor Stew Young of Gangford are responsible for the multitude of drug dealers on the lower island. At the same time, the prison system is responsible for the fact that you cannot feel 100% safe. It sets up a guaranteed failure rate by NOT assuring that violent criminals stay behind bars to serve their sentences.
If I Were A Cop, I’d Throw Up My Hands In Frustration And Wonder Why I Arrest Criminals. Why should cops catch criminals when the courts seem bent on setting murderers free and giving bail to violent offenders.
I don’t like getting a traffic ticket of some nature, but I can tell you this. When those cops are out there arresting gangsters and hunting down these two escapees they are suddenly my best friends because I find myself needing them. Whether you realize it or not, you need them too.
The Courts And The Prison System Are Broken. They are setting murderers free to pray on us.
The insanity in our justice system needs to stop. Judges need to stop relying on “Legal Precedent“. Additionally, the Correctional Service of Canada needs to actually start evaluating the convicts rather than relying almost wholly on a point system that obviously doesn’t work. From my perspective, the cops are the only ones actually doing their jobs. Everybody else is setting murderers free.
UPDATE:
Merrick Captured – Riel Still At Large
FROM: CTV Vancouver
Last Updated Thursday, May 14, 2015 7:43PM PDT
“Mounties have captured a convicted murderer who busted out of prison in March then allegedly committed a string of robberies in Metro Vancouver.”
“The RCMP said 43-year-old Shawn Merrick was arrested without incident late Wednesday night in Langley. Officers spotted him hiding on the roof of a home from the Air 1 helicopter.”
Don’t You Wonder If He Is Still In A Minimum Security Prison
“Merrick has since been taken back to prison to serve out his sentence for second-degree murder and robbery. He’s charged with six fresh counts of robbery.”
“He escaped the minimum security Mission Institution on March 31, triggering a public warning that he should be considered armed and dangerous.”
“Mounties believe he committed six robberies in Surrey and Langley before he was caught.”
Some 42% of inmates are convicted killers at minimum security prisons. That a statistic from the Union of Canadian Correctional Workers, as of August 2014.
In a minimum security prison, the perimeter of the institution will be clearly defined but not normally directly controlled. This is where they keep murderers and other repeat, violent offenders; are you kidding me? If putting them in minimum security isn’t setting murderers free, I don’t know what you would call it.
A Special Warning To You. Until you get involved, BC will continue setting murderers free.
These situations are only going to get worse until the systems are corrected. And they will not be corrected until you raise your voices loud enough to be heard. Sir Edmund Burke said it best, “The Only Thing Necessary for the Triumph of Evil is that Good Men Do Nothing.“
Don’t be a good man doing nothing.
My voice is limited; yours is limitless.
Participate in the discussion at the bottom of the page and share this article on social media with one of the links below. Make yourself heard!
Awesome article. Mr.Merrick has shown no remorse for killing my mother and had made no attempt to better himself through the programs offered in jail. And after getting recaptured after his escape the added on the days we was at large minus a day so….what escape and we give you a day off your original sentance. Idk I’m rambling it still makes me mad. Good article thanks again.
Thank you, I am happy you appeciated it and am sorry for your loss. Our BC judges never look at the real victims such as you, but seem to view the criminals as though they are the victims. It’s disgusting.