An Alberta judge granted bail to Skye Atoa, 50, despite the shocking nature of the charges he faces, which include human trafficking and child sexual assault.
If you want the real answer, it’s probably more that the underfunded justice system didn’t have space to hold him. When it comes right down to it, we deeply underfund our legal system which creates choke points that result in violent offenders being back on the street, while low level, non-violent offenders sit in cells for months waiting to have their case heard. Having a properly funded system that does its job efficiently costs money though, and we have acquired the American allergy to taxes, even when they objectively benefit our health and safety.
Couldn’t we provide bail or something for those low level offenders so we have the space for high level offenders? This seems like the situation could be significantly improved without major reform.
Judicial priorities are largely set by statute. We’d have to do a lot of revision to a legal framework that nerfs judicial discretion for "efficiency and then provides for too few judges to exercise what discretion is left.
If you want the real answer, it’s probably more that the underfunded justice system didn’t have space to hold him. When it comes right down to it, we deeply underfund our legal system which creates choke points that result in violent offenders being back on the street, while low level, non-violent offenders sit in cells for months waiting to have their case heard. Having a properly funded system that does its job efficiently costs money though, and we have acquired the American allergy to taxes, even when they objectively benefit our health and safety.
Couldn’t we provide bail or something for those low level offenders so we have the space for high level offenders? This seems like the situation could be significantly improved without major reform.
Judicial priorities are largely set by statute. We’d have to do a lot of revision to a legal framework that nerfs judicial discretion for "efficiency and then provides for too few judges to exercise what discretion is left.