Supreme Court to look at victim surcharges
• The Supreme Court of Canada agreed Thursday to look at whether it’s unconstitutional to make a poor person convicted of a crime pay a surcharge that helps victims.
The case at issue involves Alex Boudreault, who pleaded guilty in September 2013 to four counts relating to various breaches of probation orders. A few months later, the Quebec man pleaded guilty to several other counts, including breakingand-entering, possession of stolen property and assault with a weapon.
In 2015, a Quebec court sentenced Boudreault to 36 months in prison and ordered him to pay a victim surcharge of $1,400 — rejecting his argument the fee infringed the charter guarantee against cruel and unusual punishment. The Quebec Court of Appeal rejected Boudreault’s challenge of that ruling last year.
The federal victim surcharge, imposed on offenders at the time of sentencing, is used to help fund programs and services for victims of crime.
The surcharge has existed for decades. But under changes brought in four years ago by the previous Conservative government, judges lost the discretion to waive the fee for those who cannot pay.
The Conservative move had prompted something of a revolt in lower courts. Judges either refused to impose the surcharge, gave them a payment deadline decades into the future or levied fines so small that the surcharge was tiny.
In turn, several appeal courts overruled those decisions.
The amount of the victim surcharge is 30 per cent of any fine that is imposed on an offender. If no fine is levied, $100 is charged for a summary conviction offence or $200 for an indictable offence. .
Some defence lawyers complained that the surcharge produced a two-tier system divided between those who can afford the surcharge and those too poor to pay.