Release on bail: it's seldom an easy decision

Seldom have we seen so many articles in the daily press dealing with the issue of bail being granted to accused persons.

Particularly in an era when there is a heightened awareness of violent crime and when terrorism seems to be lurking almost everywhere, a lot of people feel our courts are being overly lenient in allowing suspects out of jail before they face trial.

Those concerns increase every time we hear of a crime being committed by someone who had been released on bail or was on parole.

Of all the bail hearings currently going on in Canada, the ones getting the most media attention are undoubtedly those being held in Brampton for the 18 Ontario Muslims alleged to have been planning to use huge amounts of "homebrew" explosives to blow up targets in southern Ontario, particularly in Toronto and Ottawa.

Even after the horrors of Sept. 11, 2001, we saw terrorism as something entirely foreign to Canada and Canadians, yet less than five years later we not only see courts a few minutes' drive from here having to deal with the subject, but find local connections to the process.

First it was the alleged involvement of a son of Dr. Farouk (Frank) Ghany, a urologist with offices in Orangeville and Mississauga. The son, 21-yearold Ahmad, became the first adult member of the alleged conspiracy to be granted bail.

More recently, we learned that some of the same bail hearings are being dealt with by John Creelman, a former mayor of Mono and warden of Dufferin who now serves as a full-time justice of the peace.

We dare say Creelman, whose expertise lay in the area of political science and municipal planning, expected that most of his time would be spent dealing with traffic tickets and perhaps an alleged breach of a provincial statute.

Whatever the case, he has been in the news as having to preside at hearings for at least two of the 18 alleged conspirators and having only last week granted bail to one of them, a 17-year-old whose identity is protected by the Youth Criminal Justice Act.

In that case, the youth was released on a $137,000 bond after spending two months in custody and having had his earlier bids for bail rejected. His parents were in court when Creelman read out the bail conditions, which include the $137,000 in guaranteed sureties from his parents and four other family acquaintances, plus requirements that he:

 remain in his parents' house at all times, unless accompanied by one of his six sureties;  not leave the province;

 must not use the Internet.

 use the phone only to speak to his sureties, the authorities or his lawyer, and

 surrender all his travel documents.

The youth was the fourth of 18 coaccused to receive bail, the others having either been denied it or are waiting for their hearings or decisions. In all four cases, the conditions of release have been similarly strict.

So what are we to make of such releases, particularly in light of the fact that in all cases publication bans have prevented the media from disclosing any of the particular allegations against the accused?

Well, for one thing, we must bear in mind the protections that the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms offers an accused person, and in particular the pre-Charter right, expressed in its section 11(d) "to be presumed innocent until proven guilty according to law in a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal."

Under our law, an accused person must be granted bail unless the Crown can prove that his or her detention is necessary for at least one of three reasons set out in s. 515 of Criminal Code:

For the purposes of this section, the detention of an accused in custody is justified only on one or more of the following grounds:

(a) where the detention is necessary to ensure his or her attendance in court in order to be dealt with according to law;

(b) where the detention is necessary for the protection or safety of the public, including any victim of or witness to the offence, having regard to all the circumstances including any substantial likelihood that the accused will, if released from custody, commit a criminal offence or interfere with the administration of justice; and

(c) on any other just cause being shown and, without limiting the generality of the foregoing, where the detention is necessary in order to maintain confidence in the administration of justice, having regard to all the circumstances, including the apparent strength of the prosecution's case, the gravity of the nature of the offence, the circumstances surrounding its commission and the potential for a lengthy term of imprisonment.

In our view, the law on bail is as it should be, with one possible exception.

We think it should be possible, in the event of an accused person being released after a hearing that is subject to a publication ban, for the media to summarize the allegations against the accused and the court's reasons for granting bail, as well as the conditions of release.

Orangeville Citizen