Honour Killing Dept: Instead the Crown attorneys, Sandra Caponecchia and Mara Basso, accepted guilty pleas to second-degree murder. Both first- and second-degree murder bring an automatic life sentence, but in the former, parole eligibility comes after 25 years; in the latter, it is set by a judge at between 10 and 25. In the Parvez case, a judge accepted a recommendation of 18 years offered by the Crown and defence, according to Globe And Mail. But in this case, the victim was dead. The case cries out not for efficiency but for justice, both for Ms. Parvez and the wider community. The state needs to drive the point home that the killings of women and children to save personal prestige is always horribly wrong. Honour killing is a terrible misnomer. A father who kills his child, a brother who kills his sister disgraces himself and crown prosecutors called it an honour killing, a murder to erase the shame of the men in an immigrant, traditionalist family from Pakistan in which a daughter sought Western-style freedoms, such as a part-time job. If that was so, the Crown should have sought the strongest possible sentence, that of first-degree murder, based on evidence of planning and deliberateness. The brother, for instance, had asked a friend days earlier if he could get him a gun to kill his sister. The reasons for plea bargains include keeping a busy system operating efficiently, sparing a victim from testifying and obtaining a conviction on a lesser charge where one might be in doubt on a more serious charge. As
reported in the news.
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@t globe and mail, second degree murder
16.6.10
