Crack addict Christian Franche: 'I'm not a criminal'

Christian Franche is a poster boy for the abject failure of Canada's:
» Drug enforcement strategies,
» Sadly inadequate prison treatment programs and,
» Misguided legislative crackdowns on crime and criminals.
Franche whimpered about his drug addiction, when he appeared in an Ottawa courtroom in January 2003:

A 20-year-old Ottawa man begged for help yesterday before being sentenced to six years in prison for a violent home invasion involving two senior citizens. "I'm not a criminal, I'm just a drug addict," Christian Franche sobbed in court. "I never meant to hurt anybody." The accused pleaded guilty to a slew of charges relating to the Oct. 2, 2002, robbery of Kenneth Healy, 69 and his 76-year-old wife Harriet at their Regina St. home in Lincoln Heights.

(Ottawa Sun, Jan. 28, 2003)

Six years was a stiff sentence for a first-time federal offender and a young man of just 20, the kind of person who the courts would considerable redeemable. Franche had staged three home invasion robberies in Ottawa to get cash to feed his crack cocaine addiction. In the attack described above, he showed the man a gun the victim didn't know was a toy. Later, he menaced the couple with a knife as he paraded them around their house hunting valuables. The sentence was meant to send a strong message of deterrence and it would give Franche time to get treatment while behind bars.

So what happened after he went to prison?

In September 2003, exactly eight months after Franche's teary performance in court, he was caught in the penitentiary with two packages of crack cocaine smuggled in by a female visitor (presumably his girlfriend or wife, though that identity is blacked out in a parole document – all of his parole records appear below). He was convicted of possession and, the drug treatment program he was taking was interruped because he was tossed into segregation. A stiff prison sentence had clearly not scared Franche off from drugs. The parole board wasn't impressed, at a hearing in 2006:

You told the Board today that [the woman] brought the drugs into the institution for you, but that she did so because you had told her that your life would be in jeopardy if she refused. This is indicative to the Board that you are willing to go to any extreme, or to potentially harm any person, in order to satisfy your need for drugs.

Franche eventually completed some substance abuse counselling while behind bars, but the board noted the prison couldn't give him the help he needed.

The final program report notes that you require a high intensity program to address your substance abuse addiction, but due to the lack of such a program, your participation in the Offender Substance Abuse Pre-Release Program was deemed appropriate.

That's bureaucratic doublespeak for, 'We're giving you the stop-gap program that we have available just before the penitentiary gate swings open and we kick you to the street.'

Franche was freed on statutory release (automatic, early release after serving two thirds of the sentence) in March 2007, with the usual orders to behave and particularly to stay off drugs.

His release was revoked and he was thrown back behind bars in January 2008 after he failed to meet a parole officer as scheduled. He also was arrested for assaulting a fellow tenant of the apartment where he lived. Franche was freed on statutory release again in October 2008, which brings us to last week, seven months after his release.

Heavily armed tactical squad officers burst into the home where Franche was living in Kingston, Ontario, and found a knockoff of a deadly AK-47 assault rifle and ammunition. They also found some marijuana, a digital scale, a cellphone and some cash. Franches faces eight weapons-related charges and one charge of possession of stolen property.

So the circle is complete, and Franche hasn't been deterred, or adequately treated and society really isn't any safer, despite the hundreds of thousands of dollars that have been spent catching, prosecuting and jailing this one minor bad guy.

Yet the federal government is moving swiftly with measures to stiffen sentences for gun crimes and drug crimes.

This Government is taking the necessary steps to crack down on crime and to ensure the safety and security of our neighbourhoods and communities.

[full release]

A stiff sentence didn't inhibit Franche the first time round. Tougher sentences for drug crimes won't deter him since he's primarily a drug consumer, yet his violence is borne of drug addiction. And stiffer sentences for gun crimes aren't going to stop someone with a powerful addiction. His record shows that he hasn't hesitated to consider the consequences in the past when his addictive urges drove him to commit violent crimes. The government's own advice, including this report in 2006, found that it isn't possible to draw a link between mandatory minimum sentences and reduced crime rates.

In the U.S., tough drug laws are being rewritten because they've been a failure.

And what happens to Christian Franche?

If he's convicted of new gun charges, he'll likely face a stiff penalty and he'll be shipped back to federal prison – back to the kind of place where they don't have the drug treatment programs he needs and where refusing to smuggle crack for a cellmate might earn you a shank in the back. After a few more years of that, Franche will be thoroughly institutionalized, maybe he'll be angrier and a little more desperate.

Then he'll be released again.

The document below contains five separate decisions by the National Parole Board involving Franche, between 2006 and 2008. When you see "Page 2" in the top right corner, it signals the start of a new decision.

Read it all