Late last month, a six-year-old boy waiting for a bus in Halifax was attacked and stabbed repeatedly in a completely random assault committed in broad daylight. The suspect, 19-year-old Elliott Chorny, was described by her own mother in a Facebook post as a “severely unwell person” whose family had tried for years to put her in treatment or custody in a bid “to try and protect the community.”
Chorny was also free despite having just been charged with another allegedly violent assault, against a psychiatrist at a Halifax day hospital.
Although the Halifax stabbing became national news, its details are far from atypical. It seems like every week in Canada yields a violent crime committed by a suspect who could conceivably have been in custody. The system also routinely releases violent offenders despite a high likelihood that they will harm more victims.
Below is just a cursory sample of such cases. To give a sense of how often this occurs, all of these are just from the last six weeks. And the list is far from comprehensive.
Freedom for a neo-Nazi who stomped a random handicapped man to death
In 2010, 47-year-old Calgary man Mark Mariani paused briefly in an alleyway to empty his colostomy bag; a consequence of his Crohn’s disease. This caught the attention of two white supremacists who were spraying graffiti nearby. They were members of the group Western European Bloodline, and had multiple neo-Nazi face and neck tattoos. Without provocation, both of them proceeded to fatally kick and stomp Mariani; the brutally beaten man was able only to crawl to his car before dying.
Just 15 years later, one of those white supremacists, Robert Reitmeier, has been granted unescorted absences from William Head Institution, a Victoria-area minimum security prison compound often described as one of the country’s most comfortable. It’s the same prison where, in 2019, two inmates were able to easily escape the prison by walking around its fence. They proceeded to murder a nearby homeowner.
Immediate bail for an Albertan who allegedly attacked his two children with a knife
This case received a mention from Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, who described it in a social media post as “a sicko who attacked two children with a knife has been released back out on bail thanks to Liberal catch-and-release laws.”
Many of the details of the case have been sealed by a publication ban in order to protect the identity of the victims, who are the young children of the accused. But an eight-year-old and a seven-year-old in Grande Prairie, Alta., were attacked by a knife – the former suffering a severed esophagus.
With one of the children still in hospital, their alleged attacker was released on bail and was reportedly back to uploading video game livestreams within two days of the assault.
Court rules that jail for man who bludgeoned ex to death is “cruel and unusual punishment”
This is a bit different from the other cases on this list in that the violent offender remains in custody. But in a late January decision, B.C. Supreme Court justice David Crossin ruled that it’s “cruel and unusual” punishment to expect first degree murderers to serve 25 years in jail before obtaining parole.
The case surrounded Luciano Mariani, who broke into the Vancouver Island home of his ex-girlfriend in 2021 and – in a meticulously pre-planned attack – bludgeoned her to death with a baseball bat.
Crossin ruled that since a mass-murderer would also serve a 25-year sentence, it was unfair to expect the same of someone who had only killed one person. Of course, mass-murderers used to serve longer sentences; 25 years for every person they killed. But this was slapped down by the Supreme Court of Canada in 2022 on the grounds that it constituted “cruel and unusual punishment.”
Bail for suspect in a vicious near-fatal group attack of a young woman
Last September, a trio of quad riders outside Westlock, Alta., were suddenly approached by a severely bloodied woman screaming for help. In a scene the riders would compare to a “horror movie,” the woman had shredded clothes, puncture wounds all across her back, and a laceration at the back of her neck that was several inches wide.
Police believe that four boys, all under the age of 18, had taken the woman into the woods, stabbed her repeatedly and left her for dead. On Jan. 23, one of those accused boys was granted bail, despite pleas from the prosecution that he was a flight risk and was likely to reoffend.
Released child attacker charged with new attacks on children
Starting in mid-February, multiple children in Toronto’s west end reported near-identical encounters of a strange man tapping them on the shoulder before telling them to “accompany him to an unknown location.” In three instances, children escaped the man by screaming to attract attention and then either pushing him or running in the opposite direction.
The accused in these incidents is 34. When Petrini was 18, he snatched a nine-year-old boy off the street in Brampton, Ont., under circumstances very similar to those described above. The boy was then subjected to six hours of sexual assault, including repeated anal and oral rape.
Freed just eight years after the crime, Petrini has repeatedly violated the terms of his supervision order, including being found in the possession of a phone containing cartoons of children being orally penetrated. In one Parole Board review, it was determined “that no appropriate program of supervision can be established that would adequately protect society from the risk of your reoffending.”
Regardless of the number of violations, Petrini has continued to obtain release; each one being accompanied by a police warning that he is likely to seek out new victims.
Bail for a man accused of attacking and sexually assaulting strangers
Leikeze Cheruiyot, 22, is accused of two particularly horrifying sex assaults that occurred in the Hamilton area between 2022 and 2023.
In July 2022, he is accused of ambushing a woman who was out for a walk on a forest trail, binding her wrists and sexually assaulting her until the attack was interrupted by a passerby. A year later, in August 2023, he is accused of breaking into the home of a sleeping 74-year-old woman and sexually assaulting her for an hour.
Cheruiyot was given bail on Feb. 10. Only after the Crown brought a bail review to the Superior Court of Justice was it revoked 17 days later.
Notorious child rapist and “dangerous offender” granted unescorted leave from prison
Corey Newton was convicted for sexually assaulting 11 children in the Niagara Region between 1996 and 2002 – although he has admitted he had as many as 30 victims. He targeted boys between the age of 8 and 14, and specifically sought out children from dysfunctional families – entering into relationships with single mothers for the singular purpose of abusing their sons.
To psychiatrists, Newton showed no remorse, and accused the justice system of trying to “screw me over.” For all this, Newton was declared a “dangerous offender” in 2006, a rare status that is often incorrectly understood to impose a permanent prison sentence.
This month, a CBC story reported that Newton has been repeatedly given unescorted absences out of prison. As per Correctional Service of Canada protocol, the public has not been informed of the absences, or even told where they’re happening.
Another dangerous offender granted community release
Child sex offender Harvey Venus, 38, also a dangerous offender, is considered a “very high risk to reoffend” and has a history of obtaining release only to swiftly violate his release conditions. His record also contains instances of him completing a sentence for a child sex assault, only to be arrested and charged for another child sex assault.
One of his first crimes was committed at age 19, when he broke into the home of a 14-year-old girl and tried to cut off her clothes with scissors as she slept. One of his most recent involved dating a single mother in order to gain access to her 16-year-old daughter – Venus needed only to go by an alias to conceal his history of sex crimes.
In late February, despite his dangerous offender status, Venus was granted another round of leave privileges, with a Parole Board of Canada document saying it would give him “an opportunity to reconnect with community and pro-social peers in a controlled manner so as not to jeopardize public safety.”