Discussion · Private Members' Business
James Bezan Conservative
“I want this bill to pass. It is about compassion for victims' families, not just being tough on criminals. Killers who kidnap, assault, and murder people are never let out of prison anyway. This bill lets judges delay parole so families do not have to keep reliving their pain at hearings.”
“Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Cowichan—Malahat—Langford for taking on the bill and bringing it forward this far and for his passion and compassion for the families of victims who were brutalized persons. When I first drafted this bill back in 2012, it was with the realization that Clifford Olson was dying in the hospital and talking about how he used parole board hearings to retraumatize the families, to revictimize the families at these ongoing, unnecessary parole board hearings, and how it impacted families like the Rosenfeldts. Also at that time was the Tori Stafford case, and I knew her family would have to go through two separate parole board hearings because of the killers in that situation, Terri-Lynne McClintic and Michael Rafferty. That was really the nexus for drafting the bill. Could the member speak to the fact that this is not about being harder on the criminal, the murderer, the people who kidnap our kids, torture them, assault them, sexually assault them and murder them? This is about empowering the courts and being compassionate to the families so that they would not have to go through all these unnecessary parole board hearings, because the people who commit these types of heinous crimes never do get released.”
Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Cowichan—Malahat—Langford for taking on the bill and bringing it forward this far and for his passion and compassion for the families of victims who were brutalized persons. When I first drafted this bill back in 2012, it was with the realization that Clifford Olson was dying in the hospital and talking about how he used parole board hearings to retraumatize the families, to revictimize the families at these ongoing, unnecessary parole board hearings, and how it impacted families like the Rosenfeldts. Also at that time was the Tori Stafford case, and I knew her family would have to go through two separate parole board hearings because of the killers in that situation, Terri-Lynne McClintic and Michael Rafferty. That was really the nexus for drafting the bill. Could the member speak to the fact that this is not about being harder on the criminal, the murderer, the people who kidnap our kids, torture them, assault them, sexually assault them and murder them? This is about empowering the courts and being compassionate to the families so that they would not have to go through all these unnecessary parole board hearings, because the people who commit these types of heinous crimes never do get released.