Minister of Public Safety Marco Mendicino speaks to reporters as after appearing as a witness at a House of Commons standing committee on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Thursday, June 15, 2023. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick
OTTAWA – Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino said Thursday it is “unacceptable” he was kept in the dark about Paul Bernardo’s controversial prison transfer,but refused to detail on how it happened.
Reporters cornered the minister as questions swirled on Parliament Hill about why he and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau were among the last to know about it, despite their staff being informed months earlier.
He acknowledged that the fact he and Trudeau were among the last informed was a “challenge.”
The Liberal government was already dealing with fallout from the Correctional Service of Canada’s decision to move the convicted killer and serial rapist out of a maximum-security prison in Ontario to a medium-security institution in Quebec.
But further controversy erupted this week when the correctional service confirmed it told the minister’s office about the transfer in early March and again in late May once a date for the move had been set.
Trudeau’s office says he was briefed on the transfer the day it happened, while Mendicino says he only found out about it a day later.
A spokeswomen for Trudeau says the Privy Council Office alerted one of his staffers about the potential move in March, and the staffer reached out to Mendicino’s office for more information.
Audrey Champoux, a spokeswoman for Mendicino, says Trudeau’s office received the first notification.
After staff for the public safety minister heard from Trudeau’s office about it, she said, they followed up with the correctional service.
That’s when the service provided staff with initial details that she described as “generic communications products about inmate transfers.”
Speaking briefly to reportersafter appearing before a parliamentary committee, Mendicino called it “unacceptable” that he wasn’t informed earlier by his staff.
Mendicino said he he plans to issue a directive to make sure the public safety minister is personally informed when a high-profile inmate is to be transferred and that the correctional service notifies victims in advance of such decisions being made.
“As far an internal matters,” the minister said of his office, “I’ve dealt with it.”
“The short answer is, it is unacceptable and my job is to make sure that it doesn’t happen again,” Mendicino said. He refused to say whether any of his staff have been disciplined.
Opposition MPs continued to press Mendicino to resign during Thursday’s question period.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre also challenged the Liberal government to support a private member’s bill from an Ontario Tory MP that proposes to change the rules so that that convicted murderers with multiple victims must serve out their entire sentences in maximum security.
Government House leader Mark Holland said Bernardo’s transfer remains under review by the correctional service. He said despite Canadians’ understandable outrage over his transfer to a medium-security prison, it is important not to “politicize” the country’s prison system, which operates independently of government.
Bernardo is serving a life sentence for the kidnapping, sexual abuse and murders of 15-year-old Kristen French and 14-year-old Leslie Mahaffy in the early 1990s.
He has admitted to sexually assaulting 14 other women and was convicted of manslaughter in the death of Tammy Homolka, who died after being drugged and sexually assaulted.
Tammy was the 15-year-old sister of Bernardo’s then-wife Karla Homolka, who was released in 2005 after completing a 12-year sentence for her role in the crimes committed against French and Mahaffy.
Tim Danson, a lawyer for their families, said that this week marks the anniversary of Mahaffy’s abduction and murder. He said the victims’ relatives want the correctional service’s decision reversed.
Mary Campbell, a former long-time public servant who in 2013 retired from her role in the Public Safety Department, said she views the controversy around Mendicino not being informed by his staff of Bernardo’s pending transfer as a “snafu.”
She said the reason a process exists within corrections to alert the minister’s office about situations involving high-profile offenders is so as to not catch a minister off guard.
“The process should have worked just fine.”
She said Thursday that having worked for 14 ministers, she has never seen one have to issue a directive that says: “Please tell me important things.”
“I’m completely at a loss.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 15, 2023.
