Prison violence leaves Ottawa with growing legal burden: ‘It’s an awful lot’
HALIFAX — Canada’s prison service faced 1,200 legal actions at the end of last March — a figure the federal prison ombudsman says is enough to keep an entire law firm busy.
“It’s an awful lot … they are paying about $10 million in legal fees, which is quite high. It’s equivalent to a small to medium-sized law firm,” said Ivan Zinger, the correctional investigator of Canada.
The figures, released by Correctional Service Canada to The Canadian Press, are a sign that the rising violence that Zinger documented between 2005 and last year — such as deaths, inmate-on-inmate assaults, and guards’ use of pepper spray — need to be further addressed, he said.
“That’s an awful lot of energy devoted to fighting lawsuits and I’m of the view some of that energy could be better channelled by developing a strategy to reduce the number of issues raised in the lawsuits,” he said during an interview.