Facing a nationwide backlash, the Parole Board of Canada has reversed its shameful decision and will allow the families to attend Paul Bernardo’s hearing next week after all.
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But the lawyer for the families of the two teenage girls murdered by the notorious sex killer and serial rapist says the decision comes too late for the French family to make suitable travel arrangements. Their request for a short adjournment was denied so Tim Danson said Donna French will have to participate virtually.
Debbie Mahaffy, though, will be in the hearing room at the medium-security La Macaza Institution in Quebec to face her daughter’s killer and deliver her victim impact statement in person.
Bernardo, a designated dangerous offender, is serving an indeterminate life sentence for the kidnapping, sexual assault and murder of Leslie Mahaffy, 14, and Kristen French, 15, in the early 1990s near St. Catharines.
He was also convicted of manslaughter in the December 1990 death of his then-wife Karla Homolka’s 15-year-old sister, Tammy.
This will be Bernard’s third bid for parole — and the first since the outcry that followed his shocking transfer last year to medium-security.
The Bernardo case made headlines yet again this week after Danson revealed the parole board had informed the victims‘ families they wouldn’t be able to attend the Nov. 26 hearing because they were “unable to ensure safety and security of all hearing attendees.“
This despite there not being an issue when they attended Bernardo’s parole hearing at Millhaven, a maximum-security prison.
“It was nothing short of gut-wrenching to experience the painful and heartbreaking reaction of Debbie Mahaffy and Donna French when they learned that the PBC was prohibiting them from representing their daughters (and themselves), and denying them the right to confront Paul Bernardo, in person, through the reading of their Victim Impact Statements,” Danson wrote the heads of the parole board, Correctional Service of Canada as well as the Public Safety minister.
“This was truly a shock to their system. It was bone chilling — an insult so deep and hurtful that, (figuratively speaking), it set victims‘ rights back to the stone age,” he continued. “Relegating victims, against their will, to the impersonal, detached coldness of a computer screen is simply cruel.”
In a statement to Canadian Press on Wednesday, the parole board said it takes a wide range of factors into consideration when scheduling hearings, including the board’s “ability to accommodate all observers in an institutional hearing room, to ensure the safe proximity of all attendees during the hearing, or operational considerations such as hearing management.“
Following the outrage sparked by his widely-publicized letter, Danson said the parole board initially offered to allow them to travel the 700 km to La Macaza and deliver their victim impact statements in the room with Bernardo — but then they’d have to leave and watch virtually from another room — an offer the lawyer rightly condemned as offensive.
Late Thursday afternoon, Danson learned he and the families will now be allowed into the hearing room from start to finish.
So for nothing, these poor victims have been put through the ringer yet again.