Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to our witnesses on this panel for your valuable input into this important study.
Mayor Davis, I'm going to begin by asking you a question.
I also bring greetings from your member of Parliament, Larry Brock, who's a regular member of this committee.
You've heard today that we've heard from some individuals who seem to take the approach, “Nothing to see here. There's no problem.” Incredibly, I heard a witness say there is no catch-and-release. I don't know what you call it when someone is caught and then released, other than catch-and-release.
Screaming from the headlines, in your own community, I see a release from the Brantford Police Service just today, Thursday, March 23, 2023. They say there was a home invasion robbery, and, “Investigation revealed that four male suspects, armed with firearms, entered [a] residence...assaulted, robbed, and forcibly held two...victims before fleeing the scene in a vehicle driven by [another] suspect.” Of the five suspects, four are in violation of a number of judicial release orders, including multiple firearms prohibition orders.
This is at the crux of the problem your community is rightly talking to you about and my community, in New Brunswick, is talking about. We're not talking about a vast number of offenders. We're talking about a small number of offenders who come into contact with the system, are irresponsibly let out on bail when they should be held in the interest of public safety, and then go on to commit another crime.
The Toronto Police Service provided us with statistics about individuals who are arrested on a firearms offence, receive bail, are arrested again while on bail for a subsequent firearms offence, and receive bail again.
When you talk about a revolving door—and I agree with you 100%—I wonder if you can expand on that. You may not want to go into details, but speak to this issue I just raised. Is this the type of thing your community is concerned about?