MANDATORY MINIMUM SENTENCE AGAIN RULED CONTRARY TO CHARTER

O.K. I'm having some trouble with this one. A B.C. judge has ruled that the three year mandatory sentence for firearm possession is unconstituional. Apparently it contravenes the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. O.K. as I definitely view my perspectives as left of centre that would mean that I necessarily support the Charter unconditionally. Well maybe. There are all kinds of issues here that I find confusing. The individual involved had no criminal record, was gainfully employed but was caught entering a restaurant with a loaded gun in a bag. The newspaper article in Saturday's Waterloo Region Record titled "Prison sentence law violates charter" doesn't clarify what on earth he was doing/intended to do etc..

To further complicate things for me is the following quote from the article "This breech is caused by the arbitrary gap between the maximum sentence of one year in summary proceedings and the minimum three year sentence when proceeding by indictment.". Further we are advised that "Summary offences are generally less serious, while indictable offences are considered more serious...". What the hell: the same charge of possession of a loaded firearm can proceed via two different methods with two different sentencing outcomes? Now that is seriously ridiculous!

On the one hand I shudder when I hear of disparate sentences from different judges for identical criminal charges but on the other hand there can be legitmate reasons involved. If a judge is sentencing an individual with a long violent history possibly including firearms then society clearly needs protection from that individual. Conversely if an individual with no history of violence and no criminal record is found with a loaded gun should they automatically receive a three year sentence without some investigation as to what occurred? Did they literally pick it up off the ground five minutes earlier? Did a naughty but loved blood relative hand the gun off to them in desperation and the "good" relative was then on his way to the police station or the nearest landfill/dumpster etc.. to get rid of it? Had the up to this point, on the straight and narrow individual, just received a death threat to himself or a loved one? While a number of these scenarios could readily be interpreted as making a bad decision; that alone should not be a one way ticket to jail for three years.