B.C.'s justice system ranks among the lowest in the country

A new report card on provincial and territorial justice systems in Canada has found that British Columbia has some of the most disproportionately high rates of Indigenous incarcerations and the lowest rates of solving crime in the country.

The "justice report card" from the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, an Ottawa-based think tank, ranked B.C. 10 out of the 13 provinces and territories, ahead of only Manitoba, the Yukon and the Northwest Territories.

The study analyzed 2016 data from Statistics Canada and used quantitative research methods to assess the following issues: public safety, victim support, costs and resources, fairness and access to justice and efficiency.

The report found the justice system in B.C. "significantly underperforms that of most other provinces on many measures."

Solving crime and Indigenous incarcerations

It found nationally, police forces are solving less non-violent crime, but B.C. stands out from the pack.

"British Columbia actually received a failing grade for solving just about half of violent crimes, and just about one in five non-violent crimes gets resolved by the police," said Benjamin Perrin, a UBC law professor and a Monk senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute.

"It's not an exaggeration to say that if you're the victim of a crime in British Columbia, the chances of that crime actually being resolved are the lowest of anywhere in the whole country."

Perrin says B.C. also has one of the most disproportionately high rates of Indigenous incarcerations in the country. He added the province has relatively low criminal legal aid expenditures per 1,000 crimes. 

"When you combine these two things — that we're providing less criminal legal aid, and we're imprisoning disproportionately more Indigenous people — that's a really concerning combination," said Perrin.

'It's a crisis in our communities'

Doug White, the lawyer and co-chair of the B.C. Aboriginal Justice Council, says funding cuts over the last 15 years haven't helped Indigenous people who seek legal aid.

But while access to long-term legal counsel would help Indigenous defenders, the system as a whole, he says, needs an overhaul.

"These are thousands of individuals ... that are incarcerated, taken out of their families," White said. "It's really a crisis in our communities."

White pointed to the recent high-profile trials for Tina Fontaine and Colten Boushie as indicators that trust in the court system is at an all-time low in Indigenous communities. 

"It created a sense of awareness that the criminal justice system does not provide justice to aboriginal peoples," he said.

But White suggested that some progress is being made in B.C., however bleak Monday's report.

A 2017 agreement with the province, he said, could address "gross overrepresentation" by revamping how the provincial justice system interacts with Indigenous defenders. 

The handful of specialized First Nations courts across the province, he added, could provide a model for those changes. 

First Nations courts can choose to apply restorative rather than retributive justice, and focus on sentences that might include community service, sweats or healing circles.

"We've got the makings of new approaches," he said. 

Where B.C. is strong

Mike Farnworth, B.C.'s Public Safety and Solicitor General, told CBC News he's surprised B.C. didn't rank lower in Monday's report, and supported a move away from the province's "patchwork approach" to Indigenous criminal justice.

Perrin, meanwhile, said it's not all bad news when it comes to B.C.'s justice system. He said the province has made strides in recent years to address efficiency, and that is reflected in the data.

But he'd like to see that same effort put into addressing the issues of Indigenous incarcerations and solving cases of both violent and non-violent crimes.

"We really hope that this report card will spur those tough questions of how can this happen, what's being done and who is being held accountable."

With files from CBC Radio One's On the Coast