Christopher Nardi - POSTMEDIA - Friday
© Provided by National Post
Canada’s prison watchdog says he is consistently disappointed by the government’s responses to his reports, which keep revealing significant and systemic problems with the country’s correctional system.
“It’s been two years in a row now that I’m very disappointed with the response of the Correctional Service of Canada,” federal Correctional Investigator Dr. Ivan Zinger said during a press conference marking the release of his office’s latest annual report.
“Absolutely, I’m very disappointed.”
In his 2020-2021 report, Zinger’s office once again found “serious shortcomings” in the Correctional Service of Canada’s (CSC) work ensuring “secure and humane” detention conditions for prisoners. It also contains 20 recommendations covering six investigations concluded in the past year.
One exhaustive review by his office found that use-of-force incidents — meaning events during which correctional officers used force to subdue an inmate — has jumped in recent years, and that Black, Indigenous and People of Colour are disproportionately the target of uses of force.
This, despite the department putting forward a new “Engagement and Intervention Model” that aimed to reduce the use of force by correctional staff.
“Since 2015-16, there have been 9,633 documented use-of-force incidents. Despite the overall decrease in admissions to federal prisons and decreases in the prison population, the number of use-of-force incidents has increased steadily over the last five years,” Zinger’s report notes.
“While concerning, these increases are particularly troubling given that they coincide with the introduction of strategies aimed at reducing uses of force.”
During the press conference, senior policy adviser Leticia Gutierrez said that Black and Indigenous people accounted for over half of all cases of use-of-force incidents despite representing just over one third of the carceral population.
“Based on the rather compelling evidence from our investigation, we conclude that force is indeed disproportionately used against Black and Indigenous persons in federal corrections in Canada. And that race is significantly and uniquely associated with the application of force in federal prisons,” she explained.
Zinger said he was “particularly concerned” by those findings and recommended that CSC address the “systemic prejudice” within its department and make public all changes to policy and practice it may put in place to address the “over-representation of these groups.”
His study didn’t identify exactly why Black and Indigenous people were overly targeted by use of force, but he theorized that it could be that correctional staff are “ill-equipped” to de-escalate situations, “cultural barriers” or “unconscious bias.”
Another troubling study by his office found that conditions for incarcerated women have worsened since a “ground-breaking” report aimed at better adapting the correctional system for women was published 30 years ago.
© THE CANADIAN PRESS, file
“It’s been two years in a row now that I’m very disappointed with the response of the Correctional Service of Canada,” federal Correctional Investigator Dr. Ivan Zinger said during a press conference marking the release of his office’s latest annual report.
“Absolutely, I’m very disappointed.”
In his 2020-2021 report, Zinger’s office once again found “serious shortcomings” in the Correctional Service of Canada’s (CSC) work ensuring “secure and humane” detention conditions for prisoners. It also contains 20 recommendations covering six investigations concluded in the past year.
One exhaustive review by his office found that use-of-force incidents — meaning events during which correctional officers used force to subdue an inmate — has jumped in recent years, and that Black, Indigenous and People of Colour are disproportionately the target of uses of force.
This, despite the department putting forward a new “Engagement and Intervention Model” that aimed to reduce the use of force by correctional staff.
“Since 2015-16, there have been 9,633 documented use-of-force incidents. Despite the overall decrease in admissions to federal prisons and decreases in the prison population, the number of use-of-force incidents has increased steadily over the last five years,” Zinger’s report notes.
“While concerning, these increases are particularly troubling given that they coincide with the introduction of strategies aimed at reducing uses of force.”
During the press conference, senior policy adviser Leticia Gutierrez said that Black and Indigenous people accounted for over half of all cases of use-of-force incidents despite representing just over one third of the carceral population.
“Based on the rather compelling evidence from our investigation, we conclude that force is indeed disproportionately used against Black and Indigenous persons in federal corrections in Canada. And that race is significantly and uniquely associated with the application of force in federal prisons,” she explained.
Zinger said he was “particularly concerned” by those findings and recommended that CSC address the “systemic prejudice” within its department and make public all changes to policy and practice it may put in place to address the “over-representation of these groups.”
His study didn’t identify exactly why Black and Indigenous people were overly targeted by use of force, but he theorized that it could be that correctional staff are “ill-equipped” to de-escalate situations, “cultural barriers” or “unconscious bias.”
Another troubling study by his office found that conditions for incarcerated women have worsened since a “ground-breaking” report aimed at better adapting the correctional system for women was published 30 years ago.
© THE CANADIAN PRESS, file
A segregation cell at the Fraser Valley Institution for Women in Abbotsford, B.C.
“Nearly all of the problems identified thirty years ago (inadequate infrastructure, oversecuritization, lack of programming and services, poor community reintegration practices) remain significant areas of concern today, some have deteriorated even further and all are contributing factors to poor correctional outcomes for many women,” Zinger’s report reads.
In fact, the most significant change for women in the federal carceral system over the past three decades has been the sheer increase in their numbers.
In 1990-1991, there were 170 new federally incarcerated women in the country. By 2019-2020, that had jumped to 562, the report found.
In response to the report, CSC put out a statement noting that it took the issue of use of force “very seriously.” To that point, it committed to carry out its own review of those incidents and how they involved “diverse sub-populations,” including BIPOC people and those with mental health needs.
“Nearly all of the problems identified thirty years ago (inadequate infrastructure, oversecuritization, lack of programming and services, poor community reintegration practices) remain significant areas of concern today, some have deteriorated even further and all are contributing factors to poor correctional outcomes for many women,” Zinger’s report reads.
In fact, the most significant change for women in the federal carceral system over the past three decades has been the sheer increase in their numbers.
In 1990-1991, there were 170 new federally incarcerated women in the country. By 2019-2020, that had jumped to 562, the report found.
In response to the report, CSC put out a statement noting that it took the issue of use of force “very seriously.” To that point, it committed to carry out its own review of those incidents and how they involved “diverse sub-populations,” including BIPOC people and those with mental health needs.
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It also committed to conducting an audit of its “culture” to further fight racism within its department, and that it was working to address all the other issues highlighted in the report.
Zinger said he was wholly unsatisfied by the department’s response, which he says is basically committing to redo the work his office just completed.
“The response that I got is … defensive and inappropriate. They simply don’t accept the findings of our investigation,” Zinger told reporters.
He says their response should have been to create “an action plan, drafted right now. It should have started as soon as they got my report.”
His disappointment doesn’t stem just from this year’s report. Last month, National Post reported that the department still had no idea how many inmates are victims of sexual violence in prison, two years after Zinger concluded that it’s a pervasive problem.
The federal correctional investigator added that he sees a glimmer of hope with new Public Safety Minister Marco Mendocino, whose mandate letter orders him to address many of these issues already.
“I think where there’s a disconnect, and even I would say cognitive dissonance, between what those mandate letters from the ministers say and what (CSC) is actually moving in terms of trying to address my recommendations,” Zinger concluded.
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