Criminal punishment must be a deterrent

Re Reintegration is a good goal, Editorial, Oct. 1 Marco Muzzo’s criminal irresponsibility snuffed out four human lives and seriously injured two others, both of whom might also have been killed by this person who — it cannot be emphasized enough — deliberately chose to drink and drive.

It is true that “a cornerstone of our correctional system is a focus on reintegrating prisoners into society.” But at other corners of our judicial architecture are found the granite principles that the punishment must fit the crime, and that the punishment for that crime must be of sufficient severity to dissuade others from engaging in similar behaviour. Two years of incarceration, or four months per life taken or person maimed, is indeed a travesty, amounting to little more than a temporary inconvenience in the life of this self-centred, privileged playboy, who had the financial means to fund the best legal defence money can buy, but not, apparently, to have paid for a limo to ferry himself home.

Like the Star’s editors, I am all for reintegrating prisoners back into society, but only after they’ve been properly and thoroughly integrated into the correctional system first. This is to ensure that others with an overinflated sense of entitlement are not left with the impression they can get away with murder. Edward Ozog, Toronto