New Conservative Bill Seeks New Criminal Penalties for “Mischief,” Not Just Vandalism, Near War Memorials
If only there was a way for the news media to search through this country’s voluminous laws before writing a story. Oh wait, there is.
This week Conservative MP David Tilson’s private members’ bill gets to third reading. You can read about it in a local paper and, better yet, over at CBC, which says the following:
Bill C-217, tabled by David Tilson, sets up harsh punishments for vandalizing war memorials.
This is yet another in a long string of ways in which the Harper regime is trying to play up its great love of the military, despite the fact that its cavalier mismanagement of the military’s procurement programs, in particular, now easily exceeds even the depths of incompetence plumbed by the Chretien Liberals. This summer it emerged that Minister Peter MacKay’s office was apparently unable to run even a simple truck purchase contract in anything like a reasonable time. That contract was said to be “urgent” in 2006; it still hasn’t been signed.
Anyhow, the war memorial vandalism law. As it happens, it’s already illegal to vandalize a war memorial, or pretty much any other public structure, as you may recall from the infamous urination episode a few years back. Under Section 430 of the Criminal Code, penalties for destroying or damaging property range from summary conviction to jail time, with no mimimum sentence but a maximum sentence of ten years in prison.
What Tilson’s law actually does is carve out specific coverage for war memorials (as opposed to other structures), and then set up minimum sentences for them: a minimum $1000 fine for a first offence, a minimum 2 weeks in jail for a second offence, a minimum 30 days in jail for the third offence. CBC was impressed by the 10-year maximum penalty, but that was already in the act. So the first question, I suppose, is: why are war memorials alone receiving special treatment? All part of the Conservatives’ faux-he-man militarism, I suppose.
Somewhat more disturbing than this, though, is that the section of the Criminal Code being amended here isn’t a vandalism law, it’s a mischief law. In Canada, the mischief law includes vandalism but is also conceived of considerably more broadly. I’m sure you can imagine (particularly if you have experience with protests) what other non-vandalism-related activities might fall under section 430, now amended with special minimum punishments for war memorials:
Everyone commits mischief who willfully
(a) destroys or damages property;
(b) renders property dangerous, useless, inoperative, or neffective;
(c) obstructs, interrupts, or interferes with the lawful use, enjoyment or operation of property; or
(d) obstructs, interrupts, or interferes with any person in the lawful use, enjoyment or operation of property.
I’m not entirely sure what would constitute a lawful enjoyment of a war memorial, but I’m sure Vic Toews would be happy to explain.
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Purple Library Guy
Huh. How do you render property “neffective”, anyway?
You know, looking at the law, theoretically it not only makes all demonstrations and marches of any sort illegal (they’re bound to get in someone’s way or happen where someone would otherwise feel like standing, sitting, walking, looking at a view not containing protesters and other lawful uses and enjoyments of whatever property they’re happening on), it makes a whole host of things illegal that wouldn’t normally occur to us. For instance, it’s obviously mischief to take the last picnic table in a park, because you’re interfering with the ability of the next person who comes along to enjoy use of that property by having a picnic in the park.
(Mathematically, this would mean that nobody can use any of the picnic tables. Since you can’t use the last one, then whoever took the second-to-last is interfering with your ability to enjoy . . . and so on until you reach the first)
I mean, if you wanted to get really ridiculous, no matter where you stand or walk in any more or less crowded public space, you’re bound to be in somebody’s way somehow or occupying some spot that’s in some way desirable to others and therefore in violation of the law.
Sixth Estate
I don’t know, but that clause is generally the clause used to prosecute vandalism. It’s just that the mischief law — and thus the new war memorial law — isn’t JUST vandalism.
As I understand it, mischief is the catch-all law used to arrest protesters in a variety of situations ranging from just being very bothersome to police (but not actually damaging or physically threatening anything) all the way up to acts of actual vandalism. Which is why it seems to me that the new war memorial law could be used against not just vandals but also protestors.
Forming a human chain around the war memorial in downtown Ottawa, for instance, would appear to be an act of criminal mischief, especially if that chain was blocking the reservists with their toy guns when they march up and down the square during the summer. That’s just a hypothetical. In theory it would already be criminal mischief. It’s just that now there are minimum sentences for it. The maximum sentence, and thus the range of possible sentences, remains unchanged.
Beijing York
Doesn’t this bill also have provisions to make wearing masks to a demo/protest illegal?
Sixth Estate
That’s actually a separate bill. They’re being reported together so it’s kind of confusing.
In that case, wearing a mask while committing an illegal activity is already illegal. It’s the same thing: taking an act that’s already illegal, heaping on more penalties, and in the process muddying the water just enough that it’s unclear whether some actions which were previously legal (or at least not prosecuted) will now be prosecuted as criminal offences. In both cases, all of which is kind of in a grey area anyways, because both many but not all demonstrators and many police routinely skirt the edges of legality anyways these days.