3 - Friday, September 20, 1985 - North Shore News

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Tide Table
For Pt. Atkinson

Time Ht Ft.
Friday 20 0420 3.1
1200 13.7
1640 11.2
2135 13.9
0520 3.2
#326 13.9
1805 11.9
2215 13.2

Lifestyles...........49
Mailbox.............7
Real Estate.........13
Sunshine Girl... .....54
Travel.............12
What's Going On... ..53

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Saturday 21

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WEATHER:

Mostly cloudy Friday

Sunday 22

afternoon. Saturday, a
mixture of sun and —
- cloud. Highs 14-18.

0625 3.5
1445 14.2
2010 11.9
2330 12.4

Death penalty
to protect innocent _

THE LONG arm of Canadian law is coming up
short for citizens concerned about safety and

justice.

In a Tuesday night public
meeting organized by Citi-
zens United For Safety and
Justice (CUSJ), retired

-RCMP superintendent Bruce.

‘Northorp said he was sick of
the half-truths “funneled
through various media and

barked by’ prisoners’: rights”

groups that decried the ef-
fectiveness of Capital
punishment. .

“Tonight I am here to tell
you the truth,” © Northorp
told the approximately 30
North Shore residents who
turned out to Delbrook
Community Centre to hear
his message.

CUSJ is .a- victim rights
society . with’ 3,000 -paid
members across Canada
formed in 1981 in Duncan,
B.C. by the ‘surviving family
of Lise Clausen, a 15-year-
old girl murdered by a con-
victed sex offender.

: Guiding. philosophy of
cusj,. according to
Clausen’s mother Inge, is
“that the punishment should
fit the crime: Somewhere
along the line the rights of
the victims and their rela-
tives have been forgotten by
the court system.” _.-

“: Northorp, a 33-year
RCMP veteran, prefaced his
speech by telling the au-
dience that he had, in the
course of his career, negoti-
ated. with convicted killers.
He.-knew how their minds
worked, “he said, he knew
how the system worked.

“But lam not a hawk, ”
Northorp. added.

VIOLENT CRIME

"He told the audience. that
crimes of violence in Canada
shad risen over.38 per cent
from 1971 to. i983; crimes
against. property had risen
over 54 per cent in.that.same
period, .

Statistics .such. as those
taken from..a-July 5, 1985
Maclean's’ magazine article,
which reported. the murder
rate in Canada ‘as dropping
from 2.7 per 100,000 people
in 1976’ to 2.53 -per. 100,000
people in 1982, were true,
Northorp said. but . not
complete.

Abolition of the death

By TIMOTHY RENSHAW |

penalty, he maintained, had
actually begun in 1963 when
the, commutation ‘of execu-
tions by Canadian ~ parlia-
ment became standard pro-
cedure: ‘“‘Between 1963 and
1976 not. one person
sentenced to-death was ‘ex-
ecuted no- matter how
chelngus th the murder commit.
te ” .
Northorp: added that from
1967, when the death penalty
was abolished for all but the
killers of police officers and
prison - guards, to 1976,

‘homicides of police’ officers

and prison guards ‘repre-

sented less than one per cent
of Canada’s total.

Using charts compiled
from Statistics Canada fig-
ures, Northorp pointed out
that the homicide rate in
Canada from 1963 to 1976
had more than doubled.

Factors ranging from shif-
ting murder trends to im-
provements in technology
and medical care had further
muddied the statistical
waters, Northorp said.

According to Northorp,
serial killings were on the in-

‘crease, and with them the

growing numbers of missing
bodies:. ‘‘Homicide rates
would be much higher if
those bodies were found.” -

Attempted murders, which
Northorp said were not fig-
ured into homicide statistics,
had risen 850 per cent: since

1962.

Northorp reitertated that
he was not a hawk, that he
agreed with parole for de-
serving offenders, ‘‘but the
question remains: what is a
just penalty for the David
Shearings, the Clifford
Olsons? Do we realiy want
to rehabilitate these people
and release them back onto
our streets again?”’

Urging the audience to get
involved, to learn the facts,
to become squeaky wheels,
Northorp quoted the defiant
words of a contract killer he
had negotiated with in a
1978 hostage taking incident:
‘Right now I got life and 64
years, do you think I care?”’

“Well 1 think we should
give that person something
to care about,’’ Northorp
said, ‘‘his life.’’

NEWS photo Mike Wakefield

RETIRED RCMP superintendent Bruce Northorp expresses the sincerity of his convictions in
his September 17 address to Citizens United For Safety und Justice. In his 40-minute address
to the citizen’s rights group, Northorp called for the return of capital punishment and at-
tacked the proponents of its continued abolition as purveyors of half-truths and misleading

statistics.

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