A flawed justice system

[blackbird]

The Canadian justice system is seriously flawed.  NCR (not criminally responsible) is a result of liberal ideology, not justice to protect society.  If we examine some cases, we find that people who are designated as "high-risk accused" are in fact being granted escorted day passes and possibly later even given complete freedom.  How does this square with protecting society?

"Allan Schoenborn: Killed his three children, ages 10, eight and five, in Merritt, B.C., in April 2008. Schoenborn was diagnosed with delusional disorder and said he killed the children to protect them from an imagined threat of sexual abuse. He was found not criminally responsible and is in a psychiatric hospital in Port Coquitlam. He has been granted escorted day passes from the facility but now faces an application from the Crown to have him designated a “high-risk accused,” which would force him to wait longer to ask for more freedom."

LIST: Canada’s prominent not criminally responsible (NCR) cases | Globalnews.ca

It is a good idea to look at some of these cases to better understand the NCR (Not criminally responsible) verdict to understand how it works.  We should realize these kind of cases eventually lead to some offenders being released back into society.  Some start as escorted day passes and progress from there.

Whatever happened to the man who beheaded someone on a Greyhound bus?  I haven't heard anything about that case for some time.

I have to say I am very much opposed to the NCR in our justice system.  I believe it is a fatal flaw in the system and leads to dangerous offenders being eventually released into society and nobody knowing for sure what the outcome will be.

Edited April 27 by blackbird

[TreeBeard]

48 minutes ago, blackbird said:

I have to say I am very much opposed to the NCR in our justice system

If someone committed crimes because of a brain tumour, causing them to act that way, and the tumour was removed, they were cured of their affliction to commit crimes, would you think they still deserved to rot in jail forever?

Edited April 27 by TreeBeard

[blackbird]

8 hours ago, TreeBeard said:

If someone committed crimes because of a brain tumour, causing them to act that way, and the tumour was removed, they were cured of their affliction to commit crimes, would you think they still deserved to rot in jail forever?

It is obvious you are sneakily trying to avoid the issue with a bizarre, invented tumour claim.  How many times have we ever heard of such a thing?  Never.   A man just drove a car into a crowd in Vancouver and killed at least nine people.   He was known to police.   Another example of what I am talking about.  The soft-on-crime liberal justice system is killing people, lots of people.

[TreeBeard]

12 hours ago, blackbird said:

It is obvious you are sneakily trying to avoid the issue with a bizarre, invented tumour claim.  How many times have we ever heard of such a thing?  Never.   A man just drove a car into a crowd in Vancouver and killed at least nine people.   He was known to police.   Another example of what I am talking about.  The soft-on-crime liberal justice system is killing people, lots of people.

It’s no different than a mental illness that can be controlled by medication.  

[blackbird]

51 minutes ago, TreeBeard said:

It’s no different than a mental illness that can be controlled by medication.  

Society can not rely on dangerous offenders taking medication.  A dangerous offender should be locked up  That is the guaranteed way to protect society.

[TreeBeard]

4 minutes ago, blackbird said:

Society can not rely on dangerous offenders taking medication.  A dangerous offender should be locked up  That is the guaranteed way to protect society.

We as a society have chosen not to punish for having mental illness.  Your entire goal is just to punish people.  Thats immoral. 

[blackbird]

Just now, TreeBeard said:

We as a society have chosen not to punish for having mental illness.  Your entire goal is just to punish people.  Thats immoral. 

Not at all.  Who says it's immoral?  The word moral or immoral is a relative term and what it means is a matter of individual interpretation.

The goal is to protect society.  If someone is guilty of a crime, they should be punished.  Apparently you don't believe in punishment for crime.  You apparently don't believe in protecting society from dangerous offenders who have mental problems either.

[User]

23 hours ago, TreeBeard said:

If someone committed crimes because of a brain tumour, causing them to act that way, and the tumour was removed, they were cured of their affliction to commit crimes, would you think they still deserved to rot in jail forever?

How could you ever prove definitively that it was the tumor and that there was no further risk? 

Lock them up in a minimum security prison for the rest of their lives. If they have already taken several other people's lives, why risk anyone else? 

 

1 hour ago, TreeBeard said:

We as a society have chosen not to punish for having mental illness.  Your entire goal is just to punish people.  Thats immoral. 

He stated that his goal was to protect society. 

"That is the guaranteed way to protect society."

[Army Guy]

On 4/27/2025 at 1:37 AM, TreeBeard said:

If someone committed crimes because of a brain tumour, causing them to act that way, and the tumour was removed, they were cured of their affliction to commit crimes, would you think they still deserved to rot in jail forever?

And if those killed where your family, would you still hold this line of thinking, 25 years per life taken...end of story...no excuses....

[Army Guy]

12 hours ago, TreeBeard said:

We as a society have chosen not to punish for having mental illness.  Your entire goal is just to punish people.  Thats immoral. 

Yes it is a punishment for a crime they commited, the whole concept with our justice system and our laws....it is also removing this person from society so this does not happen again....something you can not control or guarantee

[TreeBeard]

4 minutes ago, Army Guy said:

And if those killed where your family, would you still hold this line of thinking, 25 years per life taken...end of story...no excuses....

If they aren’t culpable due to a medical condition, and that condition can be treated, my opinion shouldn’t really matter.  Just like I might want capital punishment when someone steals my car, my opinion doesn’t count.  

Your desire for a vengeance system, rather than a justice system, shouldn’t matter.  

[Army Guy]

5 minutes ago, TreeBeard said:

If they aren’t culpable due to a medical condition, and that condition can be treated, my opinion shouldn’t really matter.  Just like I might want capital punishment when someone steals my car, my opinion doesn’t count.  

Your desire for a vengeance system, rather than a justice system, shouldn’t matter.  

Politics is nothing more than opinions, and politics is what drives our laws, and rules of behavior...so yes opinions matter. hence why we don't have the death penalty, because people thought the justice system it was not 100 % accurate or infallible. 

 

[User]

49 minutes ago, TreeBeard said:

If they aren’t culpable due to a medical condition, and that condition can be treated, my opinion shouldn’t really matter.  Just like I might want capital punishment when someone steals my car, my opinion doesn’t count.  

Your desire for a vengeance system, rather than a justice system, shouldn’t matter.  

Treated... by whom, how?

It seems you are just fine with letting a known violent person back on the streets, trusting that they will self-medicate all on their own. 

Prison is not just punishment. It is a place where people are held to keep the rest of society safe from them. 

 

[eyeball]

On 4/26/2025 at 8:48 PM, blackbird said:

I have to say I am very much opposed to the NCR in our justice system.  I believe it is a fatal flaw in the system and leads to dangerous offenders being eventually released into society and nobody knowing for sure what the outcome will be.

If doctors deem a mentally ill person is stable and able to function on their own then there is no reason not to release them.

They're patients not criminals.

[blackbird]

48 minutes ago, eyeball said:

If doctors deem a mentally ill person is stable and able to function on their own then there is no reason not to release them.

They're patients not criminals.

It is nonsense to say someone who murdered someone is not a criminal, but is a patient.  If you can't see the insanity of that claim, there is not much one can say.

Speaking hypothetically, if a person with serious mental issues murdered someone, then they fit the definition of a criminal.  Murder is a crime and there is no escaping that fact.

Dictionary definition of criminal:

crim·i·nal

[ˈkrimənl, ˈkrimn(ə)l]

noun

1. a person who has committed a crime:

    

   So if they killed someone, then they broke the law.  That meets the definition of criminal whether or not they are found by the court as being criminally responsible.

The legal system, which in the opinion of much of the population is seriously flawed, may say they are not criminally responsible (NCR).  The court rulings don't say they are not criminals or that they didn't murder someone.  The court is saying that according to the legal system, bought in by the Liberals, the accused person is not guilty by reason of insanity or NCR.  The faulty legal system may find in the verdict that they are not guilt of murder, but that doesn't change the definition of what the word murder means.   The court declares them not guilty.  It doesn't say they didn't commit murder.

 If someone, who is mentally ill or  not, kills someone, that fits the dictionary definition of murder.   There are two different subjects on this.  There is the court ruling and there is the dictionary definition of murder.

You seem to have difficulty in understanding the meaning of the word murder and the finer points of how the legal system works.

Also, just because they are declared by the court to be not criminally responsible (for their crime of murder) does not mean the court is saying they are safe to be released into society.  They could still be held in a mental institution for the rest of their lives.  This is hypothetical because we are not talking about an actual case.

I posted several actual cases earlier to show how the system has actually worked.

Edited April 28 by blackbird

[blackbird]

1 hour ago, eyeball said:

If doctors deem a mentally ill person is stable and able to function on their own then there is no reason not to release them.

I don't think that is correct.  A mentally ill person who murdered someone, for example, could still be a threat to society.  The problem with the system is mentally ill people who commit murder could wrongly be released into society who are still a danger to other people.  In fact I posted some examples earlier to show at least one person who has received day passes with an attendant but who is still considered a serious danger by a committee or board.  

Releasing such people cannot be based on the opinion of just one doctor who may have poor judgment and is just guessing.  No doctor can say with certainty that someone who committed murder is now safe to release.  He is not god and is unable to know how mentally ill person's mind works.  He simple cannot guarantee what the patient will do.   It is better to err on the side of caution and protect society.

Edited April 28 by blackbird

[User]

1 hour ago, eyeball said:

If doctors deem a mentally ill person is stable and able to function on their own then there is no reason not to release them.

They're patients not criminals.

Doctors are not professionals dedicated to evaluating the risk to society of crime. The ability to be "stable" or "function on their own" has nothing to do with a criminal risk to the rest of society. 

They are not just patients, or we would not be talking about this in a thread regarding the justice system. 

 

[taxme]

On 4/26/2025 at 8:48 PM, blackbird said:

The Canadian justice system is seriously flawed.  NCR (not criminally responsible) is a result of liberal ideology, not justice to protect society.  If we examine some cases, we find that people who are designated as "high-risk accused" are in fact being granted escorted day passes and possibly later even given complete freedom.  How does this square with protecting society?

"Allan Schoenborn: Killed his three children, ages 10, eight and five, in Merritt, B.C., in April 2008. Schoenborn was diagnosed with delusional disorder and said he killed the children to protect them from an imagined threat of sexual abuse. He was found not criminally responsible and is in a psychiatric hospital in Port Coquitlam. He has been granted escorted day passes from the facility but now faces an application from the Crown to have him designated a “high-risk accused,” which would force him to wait longer to ask for more freedom."

LIST: Canada’s prominent not criminally responsible (NCR) cases | Globalnews.ca

It is a good idea to look at some of these cases to better understand the NCR (Not criminally responsible) verdict to understand how it works.  We should realize these kind of cases eventually lead to some offenders being released back into society.  Some start as escorted day passes and progress from there.

Whatever happened to the man who beheaded someone on a Greyhound bus?  I haven't heard anything about that case for some time.

I have to say I am very much opposed to the NCR in our justice system.  I believe it is a fatal flaw in the system and leads to dangerous offenders being eventually released into society and nobody knowing for sure what the outcome will be.

When we have a bunch of liberal appointed leftist lieberal activist judges on the bench, what else can we expect but more breaks for the accused, and less breaks for the victim. With the mentality of a carrot, to the lieberals, right is wrong and wrong is right. And then we wonder as to why Canada is so phkd up. 👎 

[eyeball]

5 hours ago, blackbird said:

It is nonsense to say someone who murdered someone is not a criminal, but is a patient.  If you can't see the insanity of that claim, there is not much one can say.

It's not just a claim. If they're NCR due to a mental illness, the law is saying they're not criminals. You just don't get it.

To make the law work the way you want will require some pretty fundamental changes to our Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

[eyeball]

5 hours ago, blackbird said:

I don't think that is correct.  A mentally ill person who murdered someone, for example, could still be a threat to society. 

Sure but if their doctors have assessed them and have determined to the best of their ability they're no more of a threat than anyone else then there is longer any reason to not let them go.

The real threat to society is the inadequate funding that's allocated for mental health, at all levels.

That's not a patient's fault and it's no excuse for punishing them for it. That's the clear signal they our justice system is sending but it's up to us to listen.

[herbie]

You are arguing again with people who think the idea of NCR is merely a 'liberal' attempt to provide criminals an excuse.
Who spread the misinformation (or more correctly an outright lie) that the minimum time until parole eligibility is the sentence.
Who truly believe harsher punishment is the only solution to stop criminals.
That more laws will decrease the number of lawbreakers.

A truly hopeless endeavour.

[eyeball]

5 hours ago, User said:

Doctors are not professionals dedicated to evaluating the risk to society of crime.

That's right, psychiatrists are professionals mostly dedicated to evaluating the risk a patient has to themselves. They pass their evaluation on to other professionals whose job it is to evaluate risks to society and how to integrate people back into society.

No doubt it's a pretty thankless job, even more so without adequate funding and tools to make it more effective.

[User]

35 minutes ago, eyeball said:

That's right, psychiatrists are professionals mostly dedicated to evaluating the risk a patient has to themselves. They pass their evaluation on to other professionals whose job it is to evaluate risks to society and how to integrate people back into society.

No doubt it's a pretty thankless job, even more so without adequate funding and tools to make it more effective.

So you agree then, there should be more involuntary commitment for people who have mental issues where we have to trust they are taking their medications and won't just stop and start killing and attacking people?

[blackbird]

55 minutes ago, herbie said:

You are arguing again with people who think the idea of NCR is merely a 'liberal' attempt to provide criminals an excuse.

quote

16 (1) No person is criminally responsible for an act committed or an omission made while suffering from a mental disorder that rendered the person incapable of appreciating the nature and quality of the act or omission or of knowing that it was wrong.   unquote

Not Criminally Responsible Due to Mental Disorder - Criminal Law Notebook

If the defence claims NCR as a defence, he has a good chance of having his client getting off on NCR.

The defence I believe must admit that the accused committed the crime in order for the NCR defence to become a valid claim in court.

When the defence makes the NCR claim, the onus is on the prosecution to prove that the accused was not suffering from a mental disorder that rendered the person incapable of appreciating the nature and quality of the act or omission or of knowing that it was wrong.

This puts an extremely difficult burden on the prosecution.  It then becomes no longer a question of guilt or innocence, but it places an impossible burden on the prosecution.  The question of appreciating the nature and quality of the act or knowing that it was wrong is almost impossible to prove.  Justice is destroyed.

To prove guilt in such a case almost requires a prosecutor to be able to read the accused person's mind at the time of the offence.  Is this justice?  No, of course not.

In a murder trial where NCR is being used, the justice system is turned completely upside down.  It is no longer a normal trial to decide if the accused is guilty of murder.

It becomes an abstract kind of debate about opinions of psychiatrists as to the accused person's state of mind when he committed the crime.  This is very subjective and depends on who has the most convincing opinion.  This is a rejection of the historic principle of being held responsible for committing murder.

 

Edited April 29 by blackbird

[eyeball]

2 minutes ago, User said:

So you agree then, there should be more involuntary commitment for people who have mental issues where we have to trust they are taking their medications and won't just stop and start killing and attacking people?

If it's what experts determine is the best course of action and there's a lot more funding to facilitate it safely and provide treatment.

Otherwise we should also be willing to err on the side of patients rights. Locking people up should never be taken lightly.