Keeping a closer tab on parolees

By Scott NeufeldFriday, March 2, 2007 http://www.dailycourier.ca/article_1001.php

Correctional Services Canada is hoping a new position at its Vernon office will allow them to more diligently pursue parole violators.An RCMP officer will now be working full-time at the Vernon corrections office and will track down parolees all over the B.C. Interior. The only B.C. police officer currently working with corrections is in Vancouver.“This will help to not only monitor parolees, this will improve communications between the police and corrections,” said Lisa Bayne, community engagement co-ordinator for Correctional Services Canada. “We’ve been doing it in Vancouver since October and it’s been remarkable.”

An escaped parolee was charged this week with killing Jerry Drake’s father, Jeffrey, murdered in August 2004. Jerry said the new position is an encouraging step. “I think that’s a positive move, I’m glad it is happening,” he said. “I’m sure what happened could have been prevented had that been in place.”Drake has lodged several complaints against the Vernon RCMP about their decision not to warn the public that parolee Eric Fish had not returned to his halfway house for six weeks and was out in the community.“My actual complaint was that the police were negligent in not informing the public that Eric Fish was at-large in the community,” he said. “(The police) are supposed to be coming up with an answer by the end of the month.”

The family of Bill Abramenko – Fish has also been charged with his murder – has launched a civil suit against the police.Although parolees are unlawfully at-large for a few days on occasion, Cpl. Henry Proce of the Vernon RCMP said the public is almost never notified. He said once a person reaches the parole phase of their sentence they’ve gone through the “hoops and hurdles” of the corrections system and are not considered a huge risk.“There are a number of parolees in the community,” Proce said. “We have people in the community that are on lifetime parole.”Proce said the new liaison between the RCMP and Corrections will mean the police will be even more diligent in tracking missing parolees. “If Eric Fish went (unlawfully at-large) under the same circumstances today . . . we wouldn’t do a whole lot different,” he said. “We track them a little more diligently now and communicate more closely with corrections.”