Quebec: the scandal of grossly massaged statistics on domestic violence

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7. Martha and Joseph Sorger, both Holocaust survivors living in Toronto, sued the Bank of Nova Scotia, one of its branch managers and a lawyer acting for the bank for failing to perform their fiduciary duties. Halfway through the 1996 trial, the lawyer for the plaintiffs tried to obtain a mistrial because Mr. Justice Joseph Potts of the Ontario Court's General Division frequently interrupted testimony, gave the impression that he had made up his mind before hearing testimony, was rude and anti-Semitic. At one point, he allegedly interrupted Mrs. Sorger's evidence by saying: "Jesus Christ, it's like pulling hen's teeth." When the Sorgers' lawyer asked for an adjournment so they could observe the High Holidays, Judge Potts replied: "You're one of those, too?"

9. In 1996, Mr. Justice Allyre Sirois of the Saskatchewan Court of Queen's Bench observed during a bail hearing for a man who beat his former girlfriend unconscious after she asked him to turn down the television set that "it takes two to tango." In 1993, at a dangerous-offender hearing, Judge Sirois referred to a prostitute who had been assaulted at knifepoint as belonging to "a different caste"; the year before, he told a woman who had been assaulted at the age of 12 that she had to accept some responsibility for the event.

10. During the 1987 trial of a Sri Lankan man accused of soliciting sexual services from a female police officer posing as a prostitute, Ontario Judge J. S. Climans advised the accused to "write back to Sri Lanka and get yourself a girlfriend. All she needs is a boat and she can come in."

Remnants of the old world...

12. Quebec Judge Raymonde Verreault cited "extenuating circumstances" when she handed down a 23-month sentence in 1994 to a man who had repeatedly sodomized his stepdaughter from the time she was 9 until 11. The victim did not have any "permanent scars" from the sexual assaults, according to Judge Verreault, because the attacker had respected the values of her Muslim faith and had "spared her virginity" by not engaging in vaginal intercourse. Besides, the girl may have encouraged the accused because she "harboured hatred" against her mother.

Mingling old & new.

In 1996, Mr. Justice Allyre Sirois of the Saskatchewan Court of Queen's Bench observed during a bail hearing for a man who beat his former girlfriend unconscious after she asked him to turn down the television set that "it takes two to tango."

Honestly, don't tell me that man had that far behaved like Francis of Assisi...why do women love thugs? Oh well...