Ian Mulgrew: Judge fails to provide reasons for decision, 10-year custody battle back to Square 1
“The issues in this case are not complex … Providing responsive reasons for judgment ought not to have been difficult.”

A B.C. couple going through a thorny custody dispute for the past decade are now facing a new family law trial because the judge failed to provide reasons for his 2018 decision.

Forget about the squabbling parents, think of the emotional damage to the now-adolescent boy who was a toddler when provincial court proceedings began in 2009.

In the case anonymized with initials as O.R. v M.G. to protect the child, M, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Frits Verhoeven said with “great reluctance” he could find no other solution.

“With respect, the trial judge did not provide sufficient reasons for judgment, and the record itself does not allow for meaningful appellate review of the decision,” Verhoeven wrote. “The reasons contain no statement of issues, no reference to legal principles applicable, no review of the evidence and no express reference to factual findings.”

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Ian Mulgrew: Eby aims for major progress in rooting systemic racism out of justice system
Analysis: But, the B.C. attorney general admits, elimination racism will probably take more than his lifetime

B.C. Attorney General David Eby tried not to sound churlish in his support of the suite of federal measures aimed at addressing systemic racism in the country’s legal system.

Who can blame him? The federal announcement was filled with fine-sounding rhetoric; but the province gets to provide the services and pick up most of the tab.

Federal Attorney General David Lametti on Thursday unveiled a package of measures to address the staggering over-incarceration of Black and Indigenous peoples — amending the Criminal Code and the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act to repeal mandatory minimum penalties for certain drug, firearm and tobacco offences and adopting more holistic, community-based sentences and diversion programs.

But judges can’t keep people out of jail if they don’t have housing, access to mental health and addiction treatments and social supports.

“I don’t want to overstate the impact of yesterday’s announcement, but I don’t want to understate it either,” Eby said. “This is important work that needed to be done.”

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Ian Mulgrew: Federal changes to criminal law target systemic racism in legal system
Analysis: Minimum sentences for a range of crimes have disproportionally affected Indigenous and Black persons in Canada

The federal government took aim on Thursday at eliminating systemic racism in the legal system that is blamed for significant and widespread over-incarceration of vulnerable minorities.

Ottawa hopes to stop the unjust jailing of Black and Indigenous persons and help drug users avoid conviction by ending many mandatory minimum prison sentences, broadening conditional sentence guidelines and urging prosecutors and police to divert more cases away from court.

There was no shortage of back-patting rhetoric from Liberal ministers about the multi-faceted package of measures dubbed “bold and appropriate action” to address “the greatest challenge facing Canadians” … “a reset of the justice system.”

The Liberals maintained the individuals who will benefit are not “a menace to society.”

“Some people like to talk tough on crime, let’s instead be smart on crime,” Public Safety Minister Bill Blair said.

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Ian Mulgrew: Money-laundering facts belie accusations
“There is no way that we have the financial capabilities of competing with other markets, whether it’s Australia, Las Vegas or elsewhere.”

Testimony on gaming is coming to an end at the Inquiry into Money Laundering with the main accusation in tatters that B.C. casinos were well-oiled machines for cleaning Dirty Money.

At worst, they may have been money-pits for proceeds of crime from crooks who liked to gamble, or those who borrowed money from criminals — both mostly losing the ill-gotten gains.

Attorney-General David Eby’s drive against a so-called “Vancouver Model” of organized crime with tentacles linking casinos, China, fentanyl and nefarious sleight-of-hand is sputtering in the face of facts.

By 2016, B.C. casinos were leading the global gaming industry in terms of anti-money-laundering measures.

The launching of a police investigation in 2015 together with new measures meant suspicious large cash transactions “fell off a cliff,” the inquiry heard.

Some players were prohibited from using cash, others had their use of cash restricted, players were also encouraged to use playing accounts, asked to declare the source of their funds, and B.C. Lottery Corp. investigators interviewed them about questionable activity.

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Ian Mulgrew: Suspicious casino cash a drop in a lake, former B.C. regulator testifies
Doug Scott also tells the Cullen commission that there was no capacity in the B.C. RCMP to investigate money-laundering

Wonder why the B.C. gambling regulator didn’t act a decade ago when some thought a tsunami of dirty money was beginning to swamp casinos?

The bureaucrat in charge of B.C.’s Gaming Policy and Enforcement Branch considered it a ripple — tens of millions, perhaps, but still less than one per cent of the casinos’ annual $6 billion rake.

“In relation to the total buy-in, I did believe it to be small,” Doug Scott told the Cullen commission into money-laundering, referring to suspicious cash. Scott, a deputy minister, was manager of the enforcement branch from 2011 to 2013.

“It wasn’t the fact that it was small that made me think we didn’t need to take action,” he said, referring to his response to the potential threat. “What informed me … was (it was) small relative to the $6 billion or so.”

Even though he believed some of the suspicious cash was the proceeds of crime, the former Mountie didn’t think the RCMP cared — as there had been no enforcement and no prosecution for money laundering or proceeds of crime and ta dedicated enforcement unit had been disbanded in 2009.

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