By Allyson Widdis
A Centretown group is trying to wipe out a prostitution problem in its neighbourhood by convincing the courts to consider community impact statements in the sentencing of sex-trade workers and johns.
The statement would outline how communities have been hurt by prostitution so that “people can hear our concern, our pain, and our struggle,” says Angela Ierullo, of the Neighbourhood Alert group in west Centretown.
Ottawa-Carleton Regional Police Sgt. Richard Dugal says prostitution has a “profound” effect on neighbourhoods.
“When you have kids who are four years old who have been taught what to do when they find a needle and a condom, something is very wrong,” he says.
Members of the Neighbourhood Alert group have drafted an impact statement which will be presented to the Crown attorney’s office for approval early in the new year.
It will then be circulated around the community for final approval by residents.
If accepted, the statement would be read out in court whenever a prostitute or john goes to trial.
“It will bring to light to a judge or justice of the peace that (prostitution) is a lot more than the very minor offense between two people,” Dugal says.
Centretown lawyer Geraldine Castle-Trudel disagrees. She argues prostitution is “part of the fabric of downtown . . . There are certain areas of a community that are designated or known to be areas where this kind of activity goes on . . . and nobody has any problem with it.”
She says measuring community impact is difficult, because the methods of eliciting opinions are often flawed.
“Any kind of concerted effort to get community opinions expressed, in my view, has the problem of either creating opinions that don’t exist or creating pressures on neighbours to say that ‘I better go along with this because everyone else is,’ ” Castle-Trudel says.
Generally, community impact statements call for judges to impose rehabilitation along with stricter conditions of release, to make it harder for prostitutes to ply their trade in the same area or anywhere else.
“We’re not only trying to move prostitutes and johns from where our children congregate, but we’re also trying to find solutions to help get prostitutes off the street,” Ierullo says.
Community impact statements are not new.
They have been used in other jurisdictions such as Toronto, with positive results, Dugal says.
The initiative is part of a long line of community-improvement projects by the Neighbourhood Alert group.
“We’ve shut down crack houses, we’ve shut down houses that have illegal activity . . . We know we can make a difference,” says Ierullo. “We just have to be dedicated and committed . . . and we are.”