Conservatives attack NDP candidate for ‘soft on crime’ record as a judge

BURNABY, B.C. — The Conservatives are attacking the NDP on crime by slamming the record of a British Columbia candidate who is a former provincial judge.

The Tories have launched a website, YouBeTheJudge.ca, that details three past decisions of NDP candidate Carol Baird Ellan and says she is helping the New Democrats bring a “soft on crime” approach to all of Canada.

International Trade Minister Ed Fast, running for re-election in Abbotsford, and Conservative candidate Mike Little, who is opposing Ellan in Burnaby-North Seymour, announced the website on Saturday.

“This election is about who has the proven leadership to keep Canadians safe,” said Fast in a statement. “Carol Baird Ellan, now the NDP’s star candidate in Burnaby-North Seymour, reflects a consistently lenient approach towards sexual offenders, including those who abused children.”

The Conservatives cited cases where Ellan gave a one-day prison sentence to a man who exposed his genitals to minors, no jail time to a man who distributed child pornography and a two-year term to a man who sexually abused his young granddaughters.

But the New Democrats countered that Fast had cited Ellan’s decisions in the House of Commons in 2006 while arguing that judges’ hands were tied by Canadian law.

“Do you know who thought Carol Baird Ellan was tough enough on crime to use as a validator? Ed Fast did,” the party said in a statement.

According to the NDP, Fast told Parliament: “Provincial court judge Carol Baird Ellan actually expressed surprise that ‘even repeat offenders don’t often get stiff prison time in B.C.’ She indicated that she was ‘bound by precedent and recommendations from experienced lawyers’ in sentencing a 36-year-old woman who had robbed a restaurant.”

Ellan, who served on the bench between 1993 and 2012, said in a statement the Conservatives were getting “increasingly desperate with their misleading attacks.”

“I was the first-ever female provincial court chief judge and when it comes to crime and policing, Canadians are looking for action but the Conservatives are just giving them a bunch of broken promises,” she said.

She added NDP Leader Tom Mulcair has promised to re-launch the Police Officer Recruitment fund and put 2,500 new officers on the streets.

Among the examples cited by the Tories was a 1995 case where Ellan gave a one-day prison sentence to a Vancouver-area sexual offender after he exposed his genitals to two minors, an offence he had already been convicted of 22 times.

The Conservatives distributed a Vancouver Province article from the time that quoted the judge as saying she should “err on the side of rehabilitation” of the man, taking into account the 51 days of pretrial time he’d spent behind bars.

She also ordered him to seek counselling and put him on probation for three years.

— By Laura Kane in Vancouver

The Canadian Press