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JUSTICE IN CANADA IS NOT BLIND

Canadians would like to think that justice is fair and impartial.  That is, that justice is blind and applies equally to all citizens.

Unfortunately, this is not the case.  Our justice system is neither fair nor impartial.  Justice is not blind in Canada.  Rather than applying the laws impartially and uniformly, Crown Prosecutors, who have the responsibility to prosecute those accused of violating a law, are allowed a very broad discretion – far too broad – in the laying of charges against an accused.  As a result, some very significant cases have deliberately been derailed by Crown Prosecutors.

This was illuminated, in January 2008, with the retirement of Paul Culver, the Chief Prosecutor in the Toronto area.  His office is arguably the most important prosecutor’s office in Canada since it is where many precedent setting cases take place.

Mr. Culver reflected on his career, which began in 1975, in the Globe & Mail, (January 16, 2008).  He stated that his office, in addition to murder, fraud etc. cases, was also responsible for what he called “social prosecutions” cases.  He proudly stated that he was responsible for staying the charges against Morgentaler in the 1980’s.  (Because of its volatile and highly political nature, Ontario’s Attorney General, Ian Scott, however, was also involved in the staying of the charge in the Morgentaler case.)  Culver stayed the charges in the homosexual bathhouse raid in 1999 and the lesbian bathhouse raid in 2000. 

Mr. Culver also stated that he was the prosecutor who withdrew the charges in the 1993 child pornography case against artist Eli Langer who drew pictures of young children having sex with naked, sexually aroused adults as well as pictures of children having sex with each other.  Although the court upheld the child pornography law in that case, the charges against Mr. Langer were stayed by Mr. Culver, and Langer’s pictures, previously seized by the police, were returned to him and exhibited in a local art gallery.  That is, the prosecution dropped the charges against the artist and proceeded, instead, to put only the law before the court.  Because of the testimony from the “expert” witnesses (artists protecting their own freedom to create) these shocking pictures were held, unbelievably, to be not pornographic. The pictures were subsequently published in a pedophile magazine “Men Loving Boys”, published by NAMBLA, the North American Man-Boy Love Association.  Although Mr. Culver did not refer to it in his interview, he was also responsible for staying charges against homosexuals charged with public indecency for walking nude in the Toronto Gay Pride Parade in 1997.  The charges against them were stayed by the Chief Prosecutor on the ludicrous grounds that the homosexuals were not nude at all since they were wearing shoes.

In his role as Chief Prosecutor, Mr. Culver was not required to consult either the Attorney General or Solicitor General when he made these monumentous decisions to stay charges on these social/moral laws.  Clearly, because of his consistent practice of refusing to pursue Criminal Code violations of the social and moral laws prohibiting abortion, child pornography, homosexuality/lesbianism etc., Mr. Culver allowed his personal views on these issues to override his responsibility as a public servant to impartially enforce the law.  Mr. Culver should have been removed from his public office years ago for failing to carry out his responsibilities appropriately, and for his abuse of office.