Restorative Justice Perspective: Alana, CRIM3249

September 18th, 2008 Thomasso

I was pleasantly surprised to find out that my instructor from last semester was famous. OK, she is not Hollyweird famous, but she is on You Tube–that’s got to count for something, eh? Anyway, Alana Abramson was the very first person who planted the seeds in me for taking a proactive journey into the the world of restorative justice, and because of her I actually started practicing through volunteer programs in Corrections Canada doing restorative justice programs. She was going into prisons to work with the inmates as they start their reintegration back into the community, and I thought that was so cool.

In a way Alana is somewhat of a pioneer in British Columbia because of her academic profession and passion for helping people through these restorative Justice programs. She started some of the first full time programs that deal with offenders who are in the halfway-house programs.

I first met her back in 2003-4 through some workshops that she was teaching called Alternatives to Violence Programs (AVP), kind of an variant of restorative justice that works specifically with just the inmate population upon being released. I attended and sat in some of her sessions that she worked on in the Ferndale Correctional facility in Mission, British Columbia, and saw first hand what she was doing. So it had been four years since I last seen her.

At a last minute cancellation at Kwantlen Polytechnic University, then it was just a college, Alana took over for one of the profs who took sick, so I had her as instructor for my Class on Young Offenders last term. I think she blew a lot of students away when she walked into the classroom. First, she looks very young. Second, she is very energetic and passionate about restorative justice. Finally, she knows her stuff–she is an M.A. with honours from S.F.U. (Simon Fraser University).

Through Alana’s connections and friends we got to visit the Youth Correctional Facility in Burnaby, British Columbia, the old Welland prison for Women, and she brought many guest speakers into the classroom who gave us first hand lecturers on some of the aspects of youth crime and insights into those worlds. So here she is giving a lecture on Restorative Justice:

What do you think about Restorative Justice after hearing Alana’s video clip?

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Election Bug 2008

September 3rd, 2008 Thomasso

I remember posting a while back that I did not want to go through another federal election, even thought that current government is a minority one, I felt election fatigue coming on. Since waking up this morning I seem to be pumped for another one, I don’t know why? Yea, call me crazy. I guess I’m a little hot under the collar about the Conservatives with their stance on crime: when they say that the answer is more prisons, more laws and stiffer punishments, without even looking at the data that seem to suggest that all of the above does not work.  I thought level headed people would look at the root causes first, then act on implementing a contingency plan to combat crime. I guess I’ve spent too much time in classes?

Anyway, I think Canada is ready for change too! Just like the USA’s up coming federal election, I think Canada is getting tired of the same old spin—and that spin is spiralling downwards—out of control. We Need New Government!

I am not looking forward to the onslaught of attack ads though. I think we do need one more law, and that law should be keeping campaign adds off of the airwaves. I believe if Canadians want to blind themselves from the election, they should have a stream of media that will offer them that choice—not forced on us in 30 seconds video/sound bites every fifteen minutes everywhere! Sure, signs and meetings are OK. The last bastion of freedom from these ads is CBC Radio One; thank goodness I listen to that station, which is my favourite one,  but I do feel sorry for my friends who like commercial radio.

Anyway, I say bring it on! I would love an October Election!

Posted in Criminal Law, Criminology, Diatribe, General | 1 Comment »

Friday The 13th

June 13th, 2008 Thomasso

I just could not pass up an opportunity to post on a Friday the 13th, I mean why not? Well, lets see, so much work, so little time, have so much to say. Damn, blogging can be tough with just a 24 hour day to work with.

So let me jump right in there with both feet and talk about Bill C-61. Yes, for all those who are happy with the Conservative Government’s proposed legislation, well, I hope you are dancing in the street. Once I cut through the Government’s Spin, and I do mean SPIN, the Criminologist jumped out of me. You see, I asked myself why we need more ways to invite Canadians into the Criminal Justice system. I can see little kids with their Ipods, being inspected by the RCMP, along with any other form of contraband, and then have the book throw at them. That was my 1984 Moment.

The Copyright law sounds really great, but could it be that effective with the way the Internet works? Come on. If they can’t stop Peer to Peer file sharing now, are they going to ever stop it with this new Bill? It all sounds great but what it means to me is that someone is going to need to continually check up on what you and me are uploading and downloading, at all times. The only way I see can this working is for the police to monitor all of us and our URLs. Great, the Attack ads never talked about this during the last election? How are we going to be policed?

The Internet is a buz with Bill C-61 talk. It has being a while since I seen so much activity geared towards one topic, and I think it is good. People need to be exposed to politics like this. This is healthy for Canadians because it get people involved. Hey, voter turnout may go up because of this…

Will Bill C-61 become law? Who knows. So far when the House of Commons goes through the process of creating laws, the watering down varies from session to session. Now it is up to the Liberals and Senate to pick thought this.

Of course there are some who are just are tickled pink, and there are some who are very happy that their issues are being addressed through this copyright legislation. Some publishing firms are probably delighted with the proposed Bill. I can understand the Music Corporations who are upset the Internet has stolen their profits away–or so they think…. And I can see the US Movie industry sitting back with a big smile on their faces, all hoping that illegal file sharing of their products will carry a stiffer penalty and get people back into the theatres. Might even slow it down some too?

Is my College/University Library going to suffer? I use a lot of reference material when writing papers, and it sometimes means that I need to photocopy pages from book and journals–will this end as we know it and put students at risk of violating and receiving a criminal convictions with $500.00 (or more) find?

I’m writing my MP. Although I never voted for the guy. I think he needs to hear from Canadains like me. He must know that there are more than just corporations in this country, there are also people in it too. Everyone that I have talked to since the Bill was persented two days ago thinks that this is a bad one. Not becuase it helps out the artists and companies that creat the content, but becasue it criminalizes most offences associated with cpoyright violations.

Posted in Criminal Law, General | 1 Comment »

Poly…, What?

May 1st, 2008 Thomasso

I have been busy. I managed to do some cleaning around the place, but not as much as I would have hoped because the two week break is not long enough. Monday I am back in classes, so all my free time will be taken away. And so the fourteen week cycle starts over again.

I managed to squeeze in some recreational reading. I just finished a book called “The Secret Lives of Saints: Child Brides and Lost Boys in Canada’s Polygamous Mormon Sect” 2008, by Daphne Bramham. I thought it would be a good read because of all the attention that polygamy is getting in the media in the last couple of years. I like the term, “British Columbia’s Dirty Little Secret,” because it sums up the rhetoric of how this concentration of media frenzy is getting. In BC there is a (several) group(s) of people, mainly several families who are practising polygamy–a crime within the Canadian Criminal Code. The Criminal Code clearly defines and outlines what is polygamy. So, the question that is bagging to be asked is why has the BC Government not laid charges under the Criminal Code against the polygamists? I invite you to read the book and invoke the court of public opinion for yourself as it appears the answer it far more complicated than that a simple editorial from a news paper can offer.

Awe–yes, upgrading. In the Unbuntu Linux world, the biannual upgrade is now upon us: read the news release. We are now being ushered into version 8.04 (Long Term Support). Just when I thought you could not get a nicer smoother looking desktop, 8.04 surprised me with the look and feel aspects of its next generation of art designs and elegance. The Ubuntu team really put a lot of effort into this edition with a smarter and tighter looking GUI. I was happily surprised with the news about 8.04, and I am very enthusiastic about running this new version on my desk-top. Yes, eye candy is the pleasure of people who spend way too much time in front of the monitor….

The only issue I have with the upgrade, moving to 8.04, was the amount of files I needed to download. This is mostly a personal problem because I have over 2100 files of software that also needed to be upgraded along with the new OS version too, so a good four hours of downloading was needed to complete the task. Please note also that I have a 10mB +/- download rate connection, a lot more that a normal residential connection would have, so it could have been worse.

Now I have a couple of days left to enjoy before the peace and tranquillity is broken because of dead-lines and homework. The best part of summer classes is that it all takes place during summer, and this means not dealing with driving on snow! Think positive-right!

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Tom’s Crime Report for Fort Langley

November 19th, 2007 Thomasso

Yes, I decided to get off my butt and tally up all my data that I have being collecting for the last couple of years of crime in Fort Langley. These are my own data sets, partly collected from the RCMP’s UCRs (Uniform Crime Reports) and data collect from Courts Services British Columbia along with the Community Policing and Crime Stoppers. I only collected data for my area, excluding Langley Township and Langley City because they are somewhat separate from our little hamlet.

How accurate is this? Not very because I know that there is a huge dark figure, meaning: crime that goes unreported. It is estimated to be at 58 percent for the dark figure in Western Canada.

So here is what some Criminologist do for fun while they hibernate during the winter months…. I divided up everything into two categories: Property Crimes, and Assaults. This graph only shows property crime that has being called in by police, and some form of insurance was claimed against it. Assaults covers all assaults that police have issued either in summery convictions or indictable offences.

Here is the data sets I used. For Property Crime listed here, I have to make references between the amount of incidences and the number of claims made my insurance companies because in some cases the claim was reported a number of time. So for each month the whole number represents the total number of property crimes done during that period, just skip the decimal due to the calculations.

For assaults, the easiest of all data to collect, these represent the actual numbers of assaults that went reported to the police for my specific area. Again, like property crime, there is a dark figure, but a lot lower than the one associated with property crimes, but it is there. Also, because of Fort Langley’s size, and proximity to larger urban areas, there is crime spillage from these areas that greatly affect crime here.

Posted in Criminal Law, Criminology, General, Photographs | Comments Off

Victims and the Media

November 11th, 2006 Thomasso

Today’s topic is about the victims of heinous crimes, and why they are powerless in justice system. I had the opportunity to view the first days of a murder trial taking place in Vancouver. I will not write about the actual events that took place from that trial, that would be another crime unto its self, but I want to make a comment regarding some observations that I made while I was sitting in the public gallery listening to both the Crown and Defense make their starting arguments. What I saw, were the friends and family of the victim, strategically positioned in the front three rows of the courtroom, all wearing T-shirts that had the photo of the victim’s face on them. They stood out amongst the suits, ties and robes that inhabit the Bar. Obviously, this was a stark and constant reminder to get the Judge’s attention.

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Busy, Busy, Busy

March 25th, 2005 Thomasso

Unbelievable how busy I have being in the last couple of weeks! I cannot understand why all of a sudden the scheduling of my little old life has hit fever pitch and yet, with my well planed layout, I find myself scrambling to understand why the pieces are not fitting together like they should? I do know one thing, when I travel new territory, like this one course I’m taking right now, I realize that knowledge does not come easily. Oh sure, I read the textbook and compile the notes. I write everything I can from the lectures and read them over religiously. Yet, for some reason, I’m struggling to achieve what I would consider the appropriate grade from the fruits of my labour. My last exam was a little disappointing to say the least. Yes, I passed it OK, academically, but not to the reciprocating effort I put into it. I guess my recall of details is slipping in my old age?

I have made a new pack to myself, or in some sense, remade an old one. I have decided to lighten my employment a little to allow myself to have more time with my studies. I may even go one step further and reduce my full time status with my main source of employment and go part time: period. I need to find that magic medium in keeping my goals alive.

Well anyway, I’m keeping up with my assignments and projects. I can still recover somewhat with this course. It is not over yet. Focusing on this next assignment may be the key here. This paper is worth twenty five percent of the course and I have calculated that I can achieve a recoverable mark and still maintain my GPA overall. Thus hope still exists!

Posted in Bitching about work, Criminal Law, Criminology, Diatribe, General, Homework and deadlines, Law and Order, University classes | Comments Off

One Year without Credit: Nice!

February 11th, 2005 Thomasso

One year since I cut up my credit cards, closed my Bank Accounts and change the way I look at out our monetary system. Today, is somewhat the unofficial date in which I undertook that great step into a world unknown and feared by almost every person in the Western world. We are adapted to the world of Banking and the concept of capital. We now place value on everything with the common currency and regulate ourselves in such away that we must profit or gain in the sum of this capital. To step away from that, for most, this would be unthinkable. We would question this move as we can only function with the use of these financial institutions. I say, bull-pucky! Read on….
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Posted in Bitching about work, Criminal Law, Criminology, Diatribe, General, Social Justice, Social economics | 2 Comments »

Exciting Neighbourhood I Live in?

January 22nd, 2005 Thomasso

Back on Thursday, I was psyching myself up for the super late class, 7PM to 10PM, trying to get an hour or two rest because the next morning I had to get up at 4:15AM for work. So, as I was forcing myself to sleep, I guess I must of really dosed off because during this time, the police had to be called out to one of my neighbours who’s party (on a Thursday night?) got out of hand. The description I got was, my home was surrounded by police cars and cops everywhere. But remember, I was out like a light bulb! When I got up to leave for class, I noticed nothing? But it gets weirder…
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Posted in Bitching about work, Criminal Law, Criminology, Diatribe, General, Homework and deadlines, Social Justice, University classes | 2 Comments »

The Dreaded G.P.A. Syndrome

November 23rd, 2004 Thomasso

Great news —- I just did my calculations for my G.P.A. and for those of you who Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Criminal Law, Criminology, General, Homework and deadlines, University classes | 2 Comments »