Equality under the law is the cornerstone of liberal democracy. But judges across the country are now factoring race into sentencing.
Edward Smith didn’t think the color of his skin had anything to do with it.
He was 23, and he’d come to Canada in 2005 from West Africa. Now, he lived with his mother and sister in Edmonton, the capital of the western province of Alberta.
Racism—overt or systemic—didn’t make him take part in an armed robbery of an Airbnb in July 2019, he said. He’d decided on his own to help his cousin, who had told Smith that the people staying at the Airbnb had robbed him and that he was trying to get his money back. Smith agreed to help, but he didn’t want any guns involved. So they compromised: they’d bring a gun, but it would be unloaded.
… While Thomas acquitted Tesfai in the 2018 case last August, he remained in custody after a later arrest in the fall of 2021 for possessing a gun after he was shot near Parliament and Wellesley streets.
When Peter Khill awoke to the sound of banging outside his home at about 3 a.m. on Feb. 4, 2016, Crown prosecutor Sean Doherty said on Monday, “He went and got his shotgun, not his phone to call 911.”
