(Montreal) The incarceration rate of Inuit in Quebec jails is 15 times higher than the provincial average, according to data from the Quebec Ministry of Public Safety.
Posted 10:22am Updated 12:13pm
Jacob Serebrin The Canadian Press
According to these statistics, approximately 4.5% of the Inuit population living in Quebec was imprisoned in a provincial jail for a one-year period ending March 31, 2022.
This rate is almost double that of any other Aboriginal group.
David Boudreau, an attorney with the Legal Aid Bureau who has worked in northern Quebec for more than five years, believes the high incarceration rate is due to a “scandalous lack of resources.”
He says programs aimed at preventing crime or diverting offenders from the justice system are not often available in Nunavik, where the majority of the province’s Inuit live.
Mr. Boudreau specifically cites the lack of sex education programs or services that allow people to heal from trauma. “That causes the never-ending cycle of aggression,” he laments. There are many sexual assault cases in Nunavik courts, but the care programs offered to offenders in southern Quebec are not available to people living in the north, the attorney adds.
The only help available to residents is often provided by social workers, not all of whom have the professional skills to deal with these issues. As a result, Inuit convicts must serve their sentences in prison rather than under house arrest. Only a few will receive a suspended sentence.
“Judges are very sensitive to the lack of resources, but it is beyond their power to solve this problem,” stresses Me Boudreau. You have to work with what you have. There is a lack of political will to set up programs that would reduce the crime rate. »
Inuit make up less than 0.16% of Quebec’s population, but made up 2.45% of inmates in provincial jails for a year ended March 31, 2022.
They also make up 12.4% of Québec’s Aboriginal population, but make up 35% of the Aboriginal prison population in Quebec prisons over the same period, according to federal and provincial data.
Mylène Jaccoud, a professor in the University of Montreal’s Department of Criminology, says Inuit are “over-represented” in provincial prisons.
She recalls that the James Bay and Northern Quebec Convention, signed in 1975, had granted autonomy to the Inuit, but their process of self-determination was less advanced for them than for certain First Nations, such as the Crees.
“The Cree took charge of their administration of justice in a way that the Inuit did not. For me, that makes a big difference,” launches Pre Jaccoud. To illustrate this phenomenon, she points out that the vast majority of Nunavik police officers are non-Inuit. As of May 2022, the Nunavik Police Service had only 4 Inuit officers out of 88 they employed. The region’s population is 90% Inuit.
Police refused to give The Canadian Press an interview.
Another problem: There are no prisons in Nunavik. In Amos, more than 1,000 km from Kuujjuaq, the region’s largest city, inmates often have to serve their sentences.
In 2022, a class action lawsuit was filed against the Quebec government on behalf of more than 1,500 Inuit prisoners. According to the lawsuit, the Inuit’s rights are systematically violated when they are transferred to prisons far from their community.
The lawsuit also criticizes the government for a system that prevents detainees from receiving bail hearings within the time limits set by the Criminal Code, leading to excessive and unjustified pre-trial detention.
The Makivik Corporation, which represents the Inuit in negotiations with various levels of government, has not called back The Canadian Press despite our numerous calls. The office of Minister for Relations with First Nations and Inuit, Ian Lafrenière, referred the questions to Public Safety Minister François Bonnardel, who declined to comment.