St. Thomas Police Chief Marc Roskamp confirmed last week that James Alexander Brown, 43, of St. Thomas, has been designated a Dangerous Offender by the court, in a case that grew out of a domestic violence incident. It’s one of the most serious labels in Canadian criminal law, and it’s rarer than most people realize.
A Dangerous Offender designation comes from a part of the Criminal Code that lets courts label the most serious repeat violent offenders an ongoing danger to public safety. A judge can only apply it after someone is convicted of a serious violent offence, and only after expert assessors and the court agree the person is likely to keep being dangerous. In most cases it comes with an indeterminate sentence, meaning there’s no fixed release date. Any future release runs through the Parole Board of Canada, and offenders stay under supervision for the rest of their lives even if they are eventually released.
It’s a rare legal tool. A Public Safety Canada handbook for criminal justice professionals, drawing on a study from the 1990s, put the total number of people ever designated at only a few hundred across the whole country, and found over 90 percent of them were convicted of sexual offences, which makes Brown’s case unusual within that group. The same handbook found fewer than one in ten Dangerous Offenders are ever released on parole, even after decades in custody.
In his statement, Chief Roskamp said “every person has the right to feel safe and to be safe in their community,” and that the designation “sends a clear message that the safety of our community and the protection of future victims remain the highest priority.” He credited St. Thomas Police investigators, Crown Counsel, and Victim Services for their work on the case.
Sources: Statement from Chief Marc Roskamp, St. Thomas Police Service · High-Risk Offenders: A Handbook for Criminal Justice Professionals, Public Safety Canada
Edited by Anthony Zruna · About the LocVox Newsroom
