TO BEGIN WITH A REFERENCE TO OUR ARCHIVES, back in 2010, inmate Ken McKay in Mission, a medium-security institution in British Columbia, asked permission to buy a thesaurus.  He was taking a course….in the day when that was not such a challenge….and wanted a copy in his cell.  The thesaurus cost $9.

Request denied.  There was a thesaurus in the prison library, and he could go through the process of having it delivered to his cell for a specific period.  Not exactly a suitable alternative, and what was the big deal about using his own money to buy a reference book?  Ken went through the entire grievance/complaint exercise.  Denied.  Denied.  Denied.  This over a book!

Ken sued.  He was represented by David Jolivet, another Mission inmate who was a paralegal and a well-practiced litigator against the federal prison industry.  They won.  The judge did not hold back in disparaging the arguments of the two government lawyers.  David pointed out too that Ken was awarded $200 for costs, and Correctional Service of Canada incurred about $3,000 in expenses to process the inmate’s grievances.

We submitted an Access to Information & Privacy request to Ottawa’s Ministry of Justice.  How much did Canada spend to defend CSC in this action?  The response was speedy.  Taxpayers spent $9,028.45.  Details of the costs were redacted for ‘privacy concerns.’

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An interjection here to note CSC’s operating allowances reported in Canada’s Public Accounts as of fiscal year-ending March 31, 2024.  The Ministry of Public Safety allotted $2,838,062,005 for CSC operations during the fiscal year 2023-2024.  CSC spent $2,797,399,845, leaving a $40,662,160 surplus available for the future.

CSC is bombarded with criticisms from inmates, advocates, agencies, the Office of the Correctional Investigator, for ignoring its obligations to provide offenders with sufficient food, proper and timely health care, universal rehab programs with meaningful job training that includes a grounding in the latest technologies.  It’s no surprise that CSC prefers to look for economies in exercising its unofficial we-don’t-care motto.  Do potential bonuses encourage penny-pinching?

CSC’s governance invites lawsuits. 

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Lawsuits.  Given how quickly Justice came back with the costs for defending CSC against Ken McKay’s action, we submitted another ATIP request, this time asking for the total amount paid to settle suits against CSC for the fiscal year prior to the request.  CSC does not answer a complaint in open court, not if the government of Canada can prevent it.  We have records for one in 1998 with a decision in 2000, and there must be others.  Nonetheless, CSC won’t risk having staff testify under oath and the Ministry of Justice does what it must to avoid calamity, settling with complainants and always attaching non-disclosure conditions.

This time the question was apparently an intrusion into privacy issues, and the information would not be made available.  There’s the option in these circumstances to appeal to the Information Commissioner of Canada, but that office is seriously backed up despite the promise of every new federal government to unclog the system.  We decided not to pursue.

On January 24, 2022, we went back to Justice again, sending another request:
“For the latest fiscal year for which you have information, what documents do you have that total the number of dollars the Department has spent/allocated to defend Correctional Service of Canada in legal actions brought by inmates, members of the public or organizations and institutions?”

In May, a response came that did not provide the information requested, but instead the ministry sent 16 double-sided pages of file numbers with brief details, identifying actions against CSC.  The information was “updated as of May 23/22” and some of the 879 files referenced the same case, but overall, these pages represented hundreds of active lawsuits against our prison industry.

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During this same period, of the many class actions against CSC, actions that were not noted in the documents above, one for the negative impacts of administrative segregation was wending its way through the years-long negotiation process to a resolution.  When the settlement was approved and the administrator began distributing the money in 2023, each of the 467 members of the class received $5,469.85.  The court ordered CSC to help members who were current inmates with the claim’s process, and it did.  In addition, there were two paths available to claim additional damages for members who had suffered egregious abuses in segregation.  This is an on-going process.

Those same Public Accounts referenced earlier show that in the 2023-2024 fiscal year, Public Safety allocated $69,438,159 to CSC in cover class action claims, but did not specify which class actions, although the segregation suit settlement is likely the major beneficiary.  The record noted that CSC had used $39,251,236 of those funds during the year, leaving $30,186,923 for future payments.

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Not to be deterred from digging for more information, we sent another request on July 7 of this year to the Ministry of Justice:
“For the latest fiscal year for which data is available, what information do you have for the total amount of dollars paid to settle lawsuits against Correctional Service of Canada?  This request does not ask for any breakout of information pertaining to any single action.”

A July 22 Justice letter confirmed it was “undertaking the necessary search of our records” and it would “inform you of the status of your request within 30 days of its receipt.”  A further Justice letter dated July 29 told us that, “Correctional Service of Canada has a greater interest in the records sought,” and it was turning the request over to CSC as authorized by a subsection of the Access to Information Act.  An undated letter from CSC arrived in September and told us that, “We have conducted a search and located records relevant to your request.  You will note that certain records have been withheld under section 26 of the Act.  A copy of this section is enclosed for your reference.  Please note in the attached release package there are links to publicly available information pertaining to your request.”

Basically, section s.26 of the Access to Information Act says that if information requested will be published within ninety days by the government, then that is where the information must be sourced.  In other words, back to Canada’s Public Accounts noted earlier.  The release package that came with the September CSC letter consisted of 41 blank numbered pages, each printed with “withheld pursuant to section s.26 of the Access to Information Act,” in both official languages.  Nothing!

Those Public Accounts are broken down by Ministry, and CSC is under the wing of the Ministry of Public Safety.  But aside from the funds to meet CSC’s class action burden, and the operational allotments cited earlier, there is no other information in Public Safety’s lengthy list that specifically assigns legal liabilities to CSC.  It’s lumped in with categories like “claims against the crown.”

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Two points.
As difficult as it is to get a clear picture of what is paid out to cover CSC lawsuit settlements, the amount is in the millions over time.  But why aren’t the figures easily available?  And is this the same for other government departments?
Also, just why are there so many legal issues with CSC?  The one obvious answer is CSC is naughty.

Do you have a sore butt?

THIS IS THE TAG CORRECTIONAL SERVICE OF CANADA HAS EARNED FROM THIS ADVOCATE/AGITATOR AFTER DECADES OF OBSERVATION; WITH THAT COMES CSC’s UNOFFICIAL MOTTO, “WE DON’T CARE.”

CSC is Canada’s federal prison industry and operates under the Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness which assigns to it core responsibilities:-
Care and Custody that “provides for the safety, security and humane care of inmates, including day-to-day needs of inmates such as food, clothing, accommodation, mental health services, and physical health care.”
Correctional Interventions where it “conducts assessment activities and program interventions to support federal offenders’ rehabilitation and facilitate their reintegration into the community as law-abiding citizens.”
Community Supervision that “supervises offenders in the community and provides structure and services to support their safe and successful reintegration into the community.”

And then on its website, CSC’s Mandate “is to contribute to public safety by actively encouraging and assisting offenders to become law-abiding citizens, while exercising reasonable, safe, secure, and humane control.”

The Ministry of Public Safety and CSC cannot but say other than what it does.  Our federal prisons must work within the law, and its policies must comply with the socially accepted standards we expect of the public service in Canada.

The difference between what is law and what is policy and how the Service interprets both in its practices is often pronounced.  Even so, criticisms at any level, institutional, regional or national, are met with pushback references to policy and the law, as if violations are not tolerated and don’t happen.  And CSC doubles down to persistent naysayers, tenacious in its resolve to deny wrongdoing.

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The Senate of Canada’s Standing Committee on Human Rights published two comprehensive reports assessing CSC performance, one numbering over 300 pages, and encapsulated its concern  at the beginning of its interim report of February, 2019, with a judgement often reprinted in this space:
“The security features inherent to the federal correctional facilities are designed to keep people in as much as they are to keep people out.  As a result, the management of the federally-sentenced population is largely conducted away from public scrutiny.  Invisible to the general population, federally-sentenced persons are often forgotten.”

CSC, as it puts it, “also engages Canadian citizens as partners in its correctional mandate.”  These are often volunteers providing various approved services inside institutions as well as in the community.
One volunteer who worked inside prisons for 15 years had this to say about the experience:-
“The volunteer training is illuminating:  all volunteers are warned that they will be manipulated.  CSC tries to pit inmates against volunteers throughout the training.  It so bothers all the volunteers it actually works against CSC – and before volunteers even start they don’t care for CSC staff nor respect them.  Not for a minute have I thought about my safety nor has any other volunteer.”

Today’s edition could be read as an adjunct to “No criminals, no prisons” and “No criminals, no prisons – more” from May 20 and June 5 of this year respectively.  May 20 postulates that while we need a means of separating some people from society, there are over 18,000 civil servants employed by CSC for whom prison inmates are their bread and butter.  The Mandate is but one component to lowering crime rates but is relevant only when executed.  June 5 says the Mandate can work when every inmate is given the opportunity to fully engage to counter each and every impediment that led to their imprisonment.
Good luck with that!

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We’ll cite one typical random example of multiple forces uniting to oppose a CSC decision, knowing all the same that any victory will be countered by retaliatory measures, including punishing inmates who take actions against it.  The fight never ends.

Inmates Frank Dorsey and Ghassan Salah each applied in 2022 under the Habeas Corpus Act for a writ of habeas corpus to challenge CSC denials of their applications for transfers to lower security prisons.  They didn’t apply under the Charter but alleged the denial of their requests engaged four sections of the Charter.  The two inmates consented to have their applications joined for the purpose of determining a common threshold legal issue.

In June of 2022, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice dismissed their applications.  The Court of Appeal for Ontario dismissed their appeals in December of 2023.  In August of 2024, the Supreme Court of Canada granted a leave to appeal the decisions of the lower courts.  Aside from the appellants Frank Dorsey and Ghassan Salah and the respondent Attorney General of Canada, by 2025 several parties intervened to support the inmates.

Those intervenors include the John Howard Society of Canada, Canadian Council for Refugees, Alberta Prison Justice Society, Aboriginal Legal Services, West Coast Prison Justice Society, British Columbia Civil Liberties Association, Canadian Association of Elizabeth Fry Societies, Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers, Black Legal Action Centre, Pivot Legal Society, Canadian Civil Liberties Association, Canadian Prison Law Association, and Margaret Lee Cole, a long-serving inmate with the same issues presented in this action.
The Court’s final decision is pending.

So here we have a case few if any are likely to know, championed by a number of groups unknown to most, but it’s only one of many actions involving inmates and other organizations trying to bring CSC to heel.

And yet with all that action, we label CSC as morally corrupt and ethically bankrupt.

Why?

Don’t ask your MP.  They will run for cover.

(Ed note:  A one-person operation can come up against circumstances that demand full attention. This long publishing gap is not the first; probably not the last.)

“ORDINARY CANADIANS ARE EXPECTED TO FOLLOW THE LAW.  BUT THERE APPEARS TO BE NO EXPECTATION THAT PARLIAMENT SHOULD DO THE SAME – ESPECIALLY WHEN IT IS POLITICALLY INCONVENIENT.”

This is the closing judgement to an op-ed published in Toronto’s Globe and Mail on September 3, 2024, a contribution from Anthony Doob, professor emeritus at the University of Toronto, Jane Sprott, a professor at Toronto Metropolitan University, and Catherine Latimer, executive director of the John Howard Society of Canada.

The essay titled, “We need an inconvenient review of our solitary confinement legislation,” underscored that people charged with a crime must show up for court even if it is inconvenient.  Failure to appear can bring a charge with a new criminal offence.  Apparently, statistics show that 45 per cent of accused found guilty of failure to appear in court in Canada go to prison.   This seems not to be the case for Parliament.

Bill C-83 came into force on November 30, 2019, creating a new form of solitary confinement in federal prisons.  The government lost two major Court of Appeal cases in Ontario and British Columbia which ruled that what our federal prisons (Correctional Service of Canada) called “administrative segregation” violated the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.  By introducing the new law in 2019, the government circumvented appeals to the Supreme Court of Canada, where it would have almost certainly lost.

Legal experts who appeared before Parliament questioned whether the proposed reforms would satisfy the Charter rights that were violated under the old law.  To meet that challenge, a “rigorous review requirement” was added to C-83.

Section 40.1 (1)          At the start of the fifth year after the day on which this section comes into force, a comprehensive review of the provisions enacted by this Act must be undertaken by the committee of the Senate, or the House of Commons or both Houses of Parliament that may be designated or established for that purpose.
Section 40.1 (2)          The committee referred to in subsection (1) must, within one year after the review is undertaken under that subsection, submit a report to the House or Houses of Parliament of which it is a committee, including a statement of setting out any changes to the provisions that the committee recommends.

Note that in each subsection, the word MUST appears, not MAY or IF AND WHEN WE FEEL LIKE IT.

Dr. Doob and Dr. Sprott were members of an independent panel reviewing the use of solitary confinement for federal inmates.  Ten “empirically dense reports” were written and publicly released on the practice, and each took pains to underscore that Parliament’s plan for change wasn’t working.  The data in these 10 reports on the new regimen showed that there are problems with Bill C-83; it is not being administered properly, and the intent of the law has not been met.  Many prisoners are treated in violation of court prohibitions, and Indigenous and Black prisoners and prisoners with mental-health issues are at especial risk of inferior treatment in restrictive confinement settings.

The problems the panel observed in its appraisals are taxing it wrote, but that’s why the 2019 legislators anticipated potential downsides and required the later review.  Their purpose was clearly to consider the first few years as a trial period.

So, C-83 came into force on November 30, 2019.  The fifth year began on November 30, 2023, and that comprehensive review was to begin the day later.  The report to Parliament was to be submitted to Parliament within a year after that.

Where is it?  We submitted an Access to Information & Privacy (ATIP) request on May 11 of this year to Public Safety Canada.  We asked for a copy of that report.  A timely response came on June 13.  “Please be advised that, after a thorough search, no information related to your request exists within Public Safety Canada.”

July 29, 2025

The Honourable Gary Anandasangaree,
Minister of Public Safety,
Ottawa, ON  K1A 0A6

Re:      Bill C-83 violation

Dear Minister Anandasangaree:

Please review Bill C-83 Section 40.1 (1) & (2).

I submitted an Access to Information and Privacy request on May 11 of this year asking for a copy of the report.  A response dated June 13 tells me that, “after a thorough search, no information related to your request exists within Public Safety Canada.”

Sir, you are in violation of an Act of Parliament.  If I or anyone in Canada was in the same position, we would be charged with a criminal offence.

First, Public Safety knows this Bill needs tweaks, along with an enforceable pathway to implementing its provisions, too.  Why is the government shirking its responsibilities?

Second, is impunity a perk of elective office?

Please do your job.  I’d like to read the review of C-83.

A response?  What might show up is an elaborate blunt to any hint of a breach and a defence of the ministry’s compliance with the Act.

What does Parliament fear?
What is under that rock?

“…..THIS GOVERNMENT INSTITUTION AND ITS MEMBERS ARE BREAKING THE LAW BY ABUSING THE VERY PRISONERS THEY HAVE A DUTY OF CARE TO PROTECT.”  So said Justice Colette Good in March of this year, referencing the “disgusting and gross display of power” at Maplehurst Correctional Complex in December of 2023, an event that was covered up for months by our Ontario government.  Judge Good went on to summarize; “Something like this should never happen in this country.”

Well, something like this happens every day in this province, albeit small scale, unnoticed and unreported.  An anonymous spokesperson for Ontario’s Ministry of the Solicitor General wouldn’t comment on the lawlessness at Maplehurst but did say that “the safety of both staff and inmates inside Ontario’s correctional institutions is of serious importance and misconduct in any form is not tolerated.”  That unnamed spokesperson is a public servant caught in a lie.

As for the videos that still exist of those two days at Maplehurst, OPSEU Correctional Division chair Janet Laverty hadn’t seen them but commented that, “In any case, videos rarely tell the whole story in context.”  Ms. Laverty knows this is a standard federal/provincial response to the relevance of prison video evidence.  It should amaze that some of us believe this pat answer stands up to scrutiny.

Before turnoverarocktoday.com, in the days of Klassen Mailing List when hard copy postings were delivered by mail, an item of timeless significance jumped out when we spotted it in the files.  This 2009 piece was sent to all Ontario jail superintendents of the day; it’s reproduced here. 

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July, 2009                        TO ONTARIO’S PROVINCIAL JAIL SUPERINTENDENTS

HOW MANY INMATES HAVE BEEN BEATEN BY GUARDS IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY INMATES HAVE BEEN INTENTIONALLY PUT IN SITUATIONS WHERE THEY WILL BE BEATEN BY OTHER INMATES IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY INMATES HAVE BEEN VERBALLY OR PHYSICALLY HARASSED WITH REMARKS BY STAFF, SUCH AS, “FUCK YOU, YOU FUCKING INMATES”, “I HATE INMATES”, “WHO DO I OWE A BEATING TO TODAY”, OR BACKHANDED/SLAPPED BY STAFF, IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY INMATES HAVE BEEN SUBJECT TO IMPLIED OR OVERT RACIAL SLURS, OR SINGLED OUT FOR HARSH TREATMENT BECAUSE OF RACE, IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY INMATES HAVE BEEN DENIED A SHOWER AND A HOT MEAL ON COURT DAYS IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY INMATES HAVE BEEN DEPRIVED OF CLOTHING AND/OR FOOD AND/OR BEDDING AND/OR HYGIENE PRODUCTS, OR PLACED IN SEGREGATION FOR NO SPECIFIED OR VERIFIABLE REASON, IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY INMATES HAVE BEEN THE THIRD OR FOURTH OCCUPANT IN A CELL IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY INMATES HAVE HAD THEIR CANTEEN ORDERS DESTROYED BY STAFF IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY INMATES HAVE BEEN DENIED THE USE OF A TELEPHONE, PREVENTED FROM CONTACTING THEIR LAWYERS, OR THE ONTARIO OMBUDSMAN, IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY INMATES HAVE BEEN DEPRIVED OF PAPER AND/OR PENCILS TO PREVENT THE FILING OF INSTITUTIONAL FORMS SUCH AS AN “INMATE STATEMENT FORM” IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY INMATES HAVE BEEN DENIED PRESCRIBED MEDICATIONS OR MEDICAL ATTENTION OR TOLD THAT MEDICATION IS A PRIVILEGE AND NOT A RIGHT IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY INFRACTIONS OF POLICY, PROCEDURE AND THE LAW HAVE JAIL CHAPLAINS WITNESSED IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK, BUT CAN’T DO THEIR WORK UNLESS THEY KEEP THEIR EYES, THEIR EARS, AND THEIR MOUTHS SHUT?

HAVE JEWS, CHRISTIANS AND MUSLIMS EACH HAD AN OPPORTUNITY TO WORSHIP IN COMMUNITY IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY INMATES HAVE RECEIVED “PACKAGES” THROUGH THE COLLABORATION OF JAIL STAFF IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY STAFF MEMBERS ARE NOT WEARING A CORRECTIONAL SERVICE ISSUED IDENTIFICATION TAG WHILE ON DUTY, OR WEARING A CORRECTIONAL SERVICE ISSUED IDENTIFICATION TAG IMPROPERLY, IN YOUR INSTITUTION THIS WEEK?

HOW MANY LOCKDOWNS HAVE OCCURRED IN YOUR INSITUTION IN THE LAST MONTH BECAUSE OF STAFF SHORTAGES OR EXTENDED STAFF BREAKS, AND HOW MANY VISIT DAYS HAVE BEEN CANCELLED BECAUSE OF STAFF SHORTAGES, PARTICULARLY ON WEEKENDS?

WHY AREN’T RECORDS KEPT OF LOCKDOWNS AND CANCELLED VISITS IN YOUR INSTITUTIONS?

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How much has changed in fifteen years?

To close with an illuminating note from the past, about ten years ago this writer was visiting an inmate at the Toronto South Detention Centre.  All visits at Toronto South are via video.  Once approved and with an appointment, visitors are directed to a specific numbered monitor in a large room with rows of screens.  At the designated time, the inmate appears from a station on or close to his range.  On this day, a question came up in the conversation, perhaps about canteen money, and the inmate left to get an answer from a guard in the ’bubble.’  He returned a minute later with a look of silent rage and dark angry eyes.  He had asked the question.  The guard’s response was a loud, “get away from the window you piece of f……g shit.” 

Your public service at work.

What would Doug Ford say of this?  Doug Ford would say, ‘NO COMMENT.’

DOUG FORD, ONTARIO’S FIRST MINISTER, HIS ATTORNEY GENERAL DOUG DOWNEY, AND HIS SOLICITOR GENERAL MICHAEL KERZNER KNOW PROVINCIAL EMPLOYEES AT THE MAPLEHURST CORRECTIONAL COMPLEX BROKE THE LAW.  Their response has been to decline comment.  In the end, they’ll use tax dollars to settle victims’ lawsuits, settlements that include non-disclosure clauses, and then expect the mess to disappear from media scrutiny and public interest.

Have Doug Ford, Doug Downey and Michael Kerzner committed a crime?  They probably haven’t met the standard under Canadian law, but if they were just John Q members of the public and not ministers of the Crown, what repercussions might these men face?

This space has twice brought forward the “disgusting and gross” treatment of prisoners by guards at Maplehurst on December 22 and 23 in 2023.  See “Corrections or corruptions…” from March 23 of this year, followed by “Ontario jails…a familiar refrain” on April 6.  Since then, the Toronto Star has printed three further Brendan Kennedy entries on the rampant savagery at Maplehurst at Christmas in 2023.

Detailed here are only the titles and decks of these three accounts.  They say enough.
June 2 – “A murder. Alleged human trafficking. Drugs.  These are cases that have been compromised by inmate abuse by Maplehurst guards.”  ‘This is the first accounting of the scale of disruption to the justice system caused by the violent crackdown at the Ontario jail.’
June 9 – “Hours of audio and video evidence is missing from Maplehurst guards’ crackdown on inmates.”  ‘The missing footage, which some jail staff allege was purposely destroyed, has fueled calls for a public inquire into the violent incident.’
June 16 – “Ontario government facing lawsuits from inmates over ‘unconscionable conduct’ by Maplehurst jail guards.”  ‘The lawsuits mark a widening fallout from the violent incident, which has already compromised dozens of criminal prosecutions.’

The Star published one statement from solicitor general Michael Kerzner in the June 9 article, one comment only given the numerous times he had refused to say anything.  “When it comes to our expectations of the professional conduct of everyone that keeps Ontario safe, it’s simple.  They’ll maintain the highest standard of professional conduct and when they don’t there’ll be consequences.”  Really?  That’s novel.

As bad as the actions at Maplehurst are, like the murder by guards of Soleiman Faqiri in Lindsay in 2016, these are but the extremes of what are normal daily operations in Ontario’s jails.  That should be the takeaway to rattle us all.

 July 1, 2025

Doug Ford, Premier,
Toronto, ON  M7A 1A1

Re:      Doug Ford, crime boss?

Premier Ford:

Recently, you ranted about the stupidity of a bunch of masked men running down the street to steal your car while two police cruisers kept watch on your home.  Should they be in jail?  Yes, given due process.  Bail?  Maybe.  We’re in Canada. 

Bill Blair was still Toronto’s police chief when he talked crime with host Matt Galloway on CBC Radio’s Metro Morning.  He wanted the system to “help these people turn their lives around” when offenders were locked up.  He knew our carceral networks’ programs had the substance of a soufflé.  Think about it.  Without this, we’d simply be growing a criminal class and building prison industries.

But hold on one moment, Premier Ford!  For all your broadsides condemning what we’re not doing about crime and criminals, you don’t seem to have any concerns about criminals on your payroll.  I’m referring to the Maplehurst jail guards who made a joke of the criminal code, their employer’s policies and best practices, and their oaths of office, on December 22 and 23, 2023. I’m referring also to Lindsay’s jail guards who murdered Soleiman Faqiri on December 15, 2016.

You, your attorney general Doug Downey, and your solicitor general Michael Kerzner couldn’t comment on Maplehurst because of ongoing investigations.  Then you couldn’t talk for the same reason even though the two investigations were complete.  Now you can’t talk because of the pending class action and numerous lawsuits. 

What should disturb you most is the events in Maplehurst and Lindsay represent the extremes of standard daily practices in your Ontario jails.  Mr. Kerzner’s, “They’ll maintain the highest standard of professional conduct and when they don’t there’ll be consequences,” rings hollow.

Charles H. Klassen

cc:       Messrs. Michael Kerzner and Doug Downey.

 

Expected outcome?  Nothing!  Check the record.

But first……

IN MEMORIAM:
Paul Saliba began a challenging quest for justice in early 2017 when a visit to his incarcerated son at Bath Institution west of Kingston was cancelled after a confrontation with prison guard Darin Gough.  Paul was not willing to let Correctional Service of Canada deny him a public courtroom accounting of CSC staff wrongdoing.   He persisted through numerous government-initiated delays, just as a patient court admired his tenacity.  He once said he was certain CSC was stalling, waiting for him to die.
Paul Saliba died on December 11, 2024.
He asked his son to carry on with the lawsuit but its future is doubtful.  Yes, CSC will do what it must to prevent any employee from giving sworn testimony.
R.I.P.
….search “Paul Saliba” or “Darin Gough.”

CANADA’S FEDERAL PRISONS HOUSE A CONSTANT OFFENDER POPULATION OVERSEEN BY THE ALL BUT AUTONOMOUS AUTHORITY OF A LARGE BODY OF CIVIL SERVANTS HEADED BY AN EXECUTIVE TEAM AT CORRECTIONAL SERVICE OF CANADA’S OTTAWA NATIONAL HEADQUARTERS THAT RUNS INTERFERENCE TO LIMIT EXTERNAL SCRUTINY AND OVERSIGHT.

Benjamin Perrin is a law professor at the University of British Columbia and was Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s lead criminal justice advisor in support of tough-on-crime solutions. Now a proponent of tough-on-crime is stupid-on-crime, he has authored Indictment: The Criminal Justice System on Trial.

The Globe and Mail published his op-ed, “From ‘tough on crime’ to a new transformative vision for Canada’s justice system,” back on September 29 in 2023.  He wrote, “We need to abolish traditional prisons and jails, and only separate people from society as a last resort.  For the limited number of people who need to be separated, we need rehabilitation and healing centres, instead of archaic jails and prisons.”

This perspective is anathema to Correctional Service of Canada.  Its national headquarters almost certainly partners with other Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) components to underscore the potential threat prison reforms are to public service jobs.  This prompts civil servants in government ministries to discourage their political bosses from probing CSC operations by trivializing the gloomy reports of committees, inquests, commissions of inquiry, and the Office of the Correctional Investigator, for a start.  As a further buttress, The Union of Canadian Correctional Officers (UCCO-SACC-CSN) stresses the risks reforms have on community safety.

Prioritizing the security of the organization over the execution of its mission leaves offenders in CSC’s charge with a “they don’t care” mantra that is reinforced by the often patronizing or curt daily interactions with prison staff and exchanges with local, regional, and national management.  No doubt there are many within CSC’s ranks who do see good purpose in their work, but the environment’s totality sees the chaff rising to the top.

Correctional Service of Canada pays token homage to its prescribed mandate through CORCAN, an agency within the Service that is primarily responsible for providing job training and employability programs to offenders.  These are practical and constructive offerings but are limited to only a small number of the incarcerated.  Just so, what rehabilitative programing CSC touts is not readily at hand, often circulating from one institution to another, and open to few inmates.  CSC does better than simply pay lip service to its stated purpose, but it tends to focus on the negative while justifying the scanty provisions for “encouraging and assisting offenders to become law-abiding citizens.”.

CSC Commissioner Anne Kelly publishes an “update for offenders and their families” almost weekly.  It is circulated and posted in every institution and is available online.  She is the cheerleader for the federal prison service, leaving the inmates under her charge wondering if she’s ever been behind the high walls and barbed-wire fences.  Commissioner Kelly ignores the system’s shortcomings and her office’s battles with the legal challenges that plague CSC and instead plays to a blinded public.

One exceptional example of CSC’s retention planning is its purposeful limits on the use of computers in general and an outright ban on internet access.  A recent lawsuit challenging CSC’s policy “argues that the internet ban and overall technological deprivation behind bars undermines the correctional service’s mandate to prepare prisoners to successful reintegrate in society,” according to a Toronto Star report on the legal action.

Lawyer Paul Quick represents the John Howard Society and the complainant prisoner in this suit.  “In 2024,” he says, “if we want people to find work, to find housing, to lead stable and positive lives, they need internet access and basic digital skills.  If we take these things away, we take away opportunities for a law-abiding life.”  He adds, “We don’t just imprison people’s bodies now, we imprison their minds and waste their lives.  In doing so, we also make it harder for them to re-enter the community.”

What the policy must be in all federal prisons for every inmate, at every security level, is the opportunity to be fully engaged for the five business days each week.  The institutional part-time jobs already at hand, multi-disciplined relevant job-training including work on prison farms where they exist, tasked exposure to the latest technologies and access to online educational programs, mental health and addiction remedies that go far beyond what is now in place, counter-institutionalization initiatives, prison-based cultural/social/lifestyle community orientations, and full-time interfaith resources are all a start.  Add “off-hour” gym, yard, recreational avenues as necessary life-skills elements.

What we have now are thousands of inmates who are over-warehoused, underfed, lethargic, wary, anxious and temperamental, often needing better healthcare and positive feedback from their institutional overseers.

Correctional Service of Canada must lower its barriers to third-party oversight as part of a realignment strategy to bring practice into line with policy first and then update policies to reflect a compliance with its mission statement.  Those committees, inquests, and commissions have justifiably serious concerns.  It’s well past time for CSC to stop hiding in its fortress.

Will they?  No, CSC would rather have a stable prison industry.

IT IS THE FIRST RESPONSIBILITY OF EVERY EMPLOYEE OF CORRECTIONAL SERVICE OF CANADA TO PUT THEMSELVES OUT OF A JOB.

Recall that the target when sitting for an exam is perfection, an illusive improbability but the goal, nonetheless.  Disregard candidates looking to be average; that’s a cop-out.  So, move that assumption of the pursuit of perfection away from the study hall and into a real-life environment. What is our purpose when a person who has committed a criminal offence is separated from society and placed into the hands of the Correctional Service of Canada for a period of confinement?

Well, CSC has an answer in its mission statement, which reads, “the Correctional Service of Canada, as part of the criminal justice system and respecting the rule of law, contributes to public safety by actively encouraging and assisting offenders to become law-abiding citizens, while exercising reasonable, safe, secure and humane control.”

CSC can’t control who or how many end up under its “reasonable, safe, secure and humane control.”  Law enforcement and the courts decide that on our behalf.  Our prisons must accommodate.  But it’s a bit like the adage of closing the barn door after the horses have escaped.  Prisons are our answer when we fail to prevent wrongdoing by insisting on government policies to ameliorate the root causes of criminal activity.

Some argue that our reactionary status quo is fiscally more responsible than pro-active community initiatives, although we do offer token supports to neighbourhood strategies aimed at diverting vulnerable populations away from criminality.  Conservatives though are particularly aligned with the notion that putting more people in prison for longer periods and making confinement conditions harsher is a crimedemic solution.  That concept imagines a political advantage, but magnifying lawlessness to justify draconian responses is not only expensive, it also fails the smell test, and constitutional law to boot.  Is it really cheaper to keep doing what we do?  Does what we do substantively benefit society?

Okay, so back to our opening premise.  Correctional Service of Canada ends up with thousands of men and women in its custody, men and women it will actively encourage and assist to become contributing members of the community according to its mission statement.  This is an operation with over 18,000 employees and about 14,000 offenders under its control.  CSC is publicly funded, provides compensation, benefits, and job security to its workers.  Persons who have committed crimes are its bread and butter, its raison d’être.

No criminals, no prisons.  No 18,000 civil servants.  A reality check says we will always need a means of separating some people from the rest of society, perhaps for a lifetime.  As it is now, crime and our response to it costs billions a year, tears at the fabric of our communities and tragically impacts the people in them.  What if we could reduce crime?  What if we looked at the criminal constituent as lost and misdirected societal assets?  Correctional Service of Canada’s role is only one component of any blueprint to lowering crime rates and its job is to turn around the lives of offenders by executing its mission statement.  That has been a part of its mandate for decades.  How well is it doing?

There’s the rub.  CSC Commissioner Anne Kelly and her spokespersons will list the opportunities inmates have in the system to improve their prospects after release to the community.  What Commissioner Kelly and her spokespersons don’t say is how limited those opportunities are, how restrictive their application is, what is omitted, and why the differences between policy and practice are not addressed.   And how do you square job security with turning lives around?  Therein lies a basis for thoughtful reflection.

The Senate of Canada’s Standing Senate Committee on Human Rights undertook a two-year study of what it titled “Human Rights of Federally-Sentenced Persons.”  The committee issued a preliminary report of findings in February of 2019 and following additional analysis and audit it released a 300-plus page final report in June of 2021.  The opening paragraph of the introduction to this final report reads, “Federal correctional facilities are frequently hidden from sight.  They operate behind barbed wire fences and concrete walls.  They are designed to keep people in, but their security protocols often keep people out as well.  These conditions allow the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) to operate with limited external scrutiny and oversight. Once incarcerated, federally-sentenced persons, who comprise some of the most disadvantaged people in our society, rely and depend on the CSC to respect and safeguard their rights.  Nonetheless, since the 1970s to present day, reports by the Correctional Investigator, parliamentary committees, inquests, and commissions of inquiry have underscored the CSC’s inability to meet this obligation.”

The committee’s report made 71 recommendations covering all facets of the prison experience.  Yes, this was in 2021, but how many of those recommendations have been considered or implemented?  After those decades of Correctional Investigator reports, the committees, inquests, commissions, and this Senate study, is CSC better equipped today to meet its mandate?

More to come.  Stay tuned.

No vigilance, no democracy.

…..THE DRUMS BEAT FOR JUSTICE!

Review “Soleiman Faqiri/Kenneth Lee” from March 10^th with the letter to Michael Kerzner, Ontario’s Solicitor General.

An answer to that letter arrived in the second week of April from an assistant deputy minister.  It’s reprinted unedited.

April 9, 2025

Dear Charles Klassen:

I am responding to your letter of March 9, 2025, addressed to the Honourable Michael Kerzner, Solicitor General, regarding the Coroner’s inquest in the death of Soleiman Faqiri.

As you know, coroner’s inquests are an opportunity to examine the circumstances of a specific death and potentially develop recommendations to prevent further deaths.

No one is on trial at an inquest and the jury cannot make findings of guilt or blame or imply responsibility on any person(s) or agency, organization or other entity.  The inquest is intended to make the facts of a death public and to identify, if possible, how deaths might be prevented.

Additionally, inquest juries are prohibited from making any finding of legal responsibility or expressing any conclusion of law.  Their role is not to assign blame, to free from blame, nor to state or imply any judgement in their recommendations concerning the death.

As you are aware, the inquest into the death of Soleiman Faqiri heard from 28 witnesses and examined 61 exhibits which informed their verdict.  The 57 recommendations developed by the jury were thoughtful and reflected the facts and evidence presented during the 12 days of the inquest.

The Ministry of the Solicitor General continuously works to revise policies and procedures to align with the best evidence and practices.  Inquest recommendations directed to the ministry are thoroughly reviewed and we respond to the Office of the Chief Coroner directly with the final response by the required date.  Inquest recommendations remain one of the important mechanisms to enhance health and safety and help prevent further deaths in custody.

It may interest you to know that when allegations of serious misconduct/wrongdoing are made against correctional employees, volunteers or service providers, a full investigation is conducted by the Correctional Services Oversight and Investigations Branch.  If the allegations are suspected to be of a criminal nature, it is the responsibility of the police to lay charges.

Further, it may also be of interest to know that the government is investing more than $500 million to modernize correctional services through new hires and infrastructure improvements.  New hires include social workers, nurse practitioners, mental health nurses and addictions counsellors, as well as other staff that will help support individuals with mental health and addiction issues.

There is a long history of positive changes that have improved public safety for Ontarians as a result of inquest recommendations.  These include changes in areas such as hospital procedures, surgical protocols, road safety, how police and the courts handle incidents of domestic violence, changes to legislation relating to child and family services, pool safety, the medical treatment of patients in psychiatric facilities, and workplace safety.

Thank you for expressing your concerns about this matter.

Sincerely,

Daryl Pitfield,
Assistant Deputy Minister
Institutional Services.

Copy to Michael Kerzner.

There’s a lot of content here, but is it substantively relevant?
It deserved a reply.

May 2, 2025

Daryl Pitfield, Assistant Deputy Minister,
Institutional Services,
Toronto, ON  M7A 1Y6

Re:      Your 132-2025-974
Soleiman is not going away  

Dear Deputy Minister Pitfield:

Thank you for your April 9^th response to my letter of March 9^th to Minister Kerzner concerning the Faqiri inquest.  I appreciate your time in detailing information, and grant you speak for the minister and the ministry.

I’m familiar with the facts, data, and particulars you provided.  Canada’s carceral industries have been in my ballpark for decades.  Unfortunate but not unexpected was your sidestepping the relevant points I raised on March 9.

You did not address the two jury recommendations of import: namely, the appropriate placement of persons with mental health issues, and the matter of third-party oversight of jail operations.

Why there were guards in Soleiman’s cell is at the core of the circumstances that led to his death.  The 28 inquest witnesses did not include John Thibeault, the only civilian eyewitness, but then he was an inmate whose credibility was easily dismissed.  None of the CO’s who had their hands on Soleiman testified either. 

I know why they were there, you know why they were there, the minister knows why they were there, as do thousands in the community.   All the same, the question cannot be asked.  Staff cannot be placed under oath.  Pandora’s Box cannot be opened.

The government dodged a bullet.  Too bad for accountability.  Too bad for Soleiman.

Nonetheless, your letter was a welcome ministry perspective.

You have my best wishes.

Charles H. Klassen

cc:       Michael Kerzner

Every day in provincial jails, guards gather in an inmate’s cell where there is no audio/visual coverage.  Perhaps they’re having a union meeting.  Maybe they’re looking at the inmate’s stamp collection.

What do you think?