What I am saying is that we can change the law to make sure that the ability for the police to prove these things.... The threshold for these things could be reduced. We could make changes around thresholds for video evidence to be submitted.

In most cases there is clear video evidence of folks stealing. It's so blatant. In many cases, we get a conviction. The individual I was mentioning off the top was convicted 43 times. The challenge is in between. It's the same with the fellow who stole the 25,000 dollars' worth of fuel. He was eventually arrested and convicted on another series of crimes, and he went to jail, but he was back out on bail committing more crime in the interim. He was arrested, and he was released the next day. In the intervening months, he committed several more crimes, and then, by the time he was put in jail, he had been charged and committed more crimes, though, again, it was bundled together and pleaded out, pleaded guilty. We see this ongoing.

The police get very frustrated with these individuals, because they see that they are not at all concerned about the ramifications of the justice system. The police work very hard. The police spend a lot of resources to arrest these guys and to build a case, only to see the bulk of the work get bundled and pleaded out. They built cases for 148 charges; he was convicted of 43 charges, and the rest were dropped due to pleading out. That is fundamentally the problem. We need to make sure these guys are being reformed. We need to make sure they are brought to justice.

There needs to be punishment for the crime. Then there needs to be reformation, so that they are not just being released back out on the street in order to continue their life of crime. That has been the revolving door that our communities are extremely frustrated about. The police are extremely frustrated about it, and the Liberals are fundamentally responsible for it. They are the government of the land. They are responsible for legislating. They are responsible for judicial appointments. They are responsible for funding the court system. They are responsible for all of these things.

Arnold Viersen

$592,855.00