(rdnewsNOW/Josh Hal)

By Josh Hall (Twitter: @Vancan19)

tackling rural crime

Calkins calls for stiffer sentences for rural crimes

Jun 16, 2019 | 12:20 PM

An Alberta MP wants to see stiffer penalties for those convicted of a crime that takes place in a rural area.

Blaine Calkins, Conservative MP for Red Deer-Lacombe, says rural residents are right to be fed up with the seemingly revolving door utilized by criminals.

Calkins’ private member’s bill C-458 proposes that the Criminal Code of Canada be amended to add ‘evidence that an offence was directed at a property or person vulnerable due to their remoteness from emergency services’ become an aggravating circumstance when judges get to sentencing.

Calkins and his Conservative colleagues, including Red Deer-Mountain View MP Earl Dreeshen, were disappointed with the two-page report brought back by a Liberal-dominated committee which assessed and they say essentially rejected the recommendations made by the Calkins-led Rural Crime Task Force formed in 2017.

“I’m tabling this bill now because the public safety committee didn’t offer any real solutions in their two-page report on the study of rural crime. I find this to be an appalling lack of sensitivity, and victims in rural areas deserve better,” Calkins said.

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He, along with Dreeshen, local UCP MLAs Ron Orr and Devin Dreeshen, and several area crime watch advocates, announced the private member’s bill at Red Deer County councillor Richard Lorenz’s farm on Saturday.

Lorenz said he’s been lucky not to have been directly affected by crime, but neighbours haven’t been as fortunate.

“We always wonder when it might happen, and people don’t think of the fact that if somebody breaks in and steals something, my rates go up, so I’m paying for it, and the other person who stole it gets slapped on the hand and is back out,” lamented Lorenz.

“A person with a welding truck had it locked in his shop, but forgot to take the keys out, so they broke in, stole his truck, and the insurance company says they’re not helping him because he left the keys in. It cost him $20,000. That’s what the private citizen gets dealt and it’s not fair.”

Red Deer County Councillor Richard Lorenz (left) and Red Deer-Lacombe MP Blaine Calkins at Lorenz’s County property on Saturday. (rdnewsNOW/Josh Hall)

Lorenz added that trust has gone out the window.

“Today, you see somebody walking own the road for exercise, but you wonder or second guess if that somebody is looking for a vehicle,” he said. “We’re all on edge out here, and the friendly neighbourhood atmosphere is gone because all of a sudden you don’t trust anyone.”

According to the findings of the Rural Crime Task Force documented in an October 2018 report, rural Alberta crime rates were 38 per cent higher than urban crime rates in 2017.

The report made 14 conclusions including the need for additional RCMP, stronger articulation of defense of person and property rights, increased funding for mental health and addiction services, and targeted reforms to the prison system.

The report, which Calkins noted contained zero feedback from the Liberals’ 55 rural MPs, concluded that effective crime reduction measures for rural areas should include adequate police resources, partnerships with the community, robust victim support, and a justice system which inspires public confidence.

Should he not be able to move the bill before the end of the current Parliamentary session, Calkins says he will re-table it if and when he is re-elected this fall.