Michelle Gudbranson standing in front of the Indian Metis Friendship Centre. (Ian Gustafson/paNOW staff)

By Nigel Maxwell

Navigating the waters

Local aboriginal court worker strives to create fairer system

Jun 15, 2021 | 5:00 PM

Leading up to National Indigenous Peoples Day on June 21 paNOW is featuring Indigenous professionals, storytellers, entertainers, artists and others. Stay tuned for more throughout the week.

Prince Albert’s Michelle Gudbranson is an aboriginal court worker and has for the past three years been working out of the Indian Metis Friendship Centre (IMFC). Prior to that she was working at Sandy Bay for almost ten years.

The job of the aboriginal court worker is to assist Indigenous people, charged with a crime, navigate through the legal waters through various levels of support whether it be at meetings, or making supportive connections to other agencies in the community.

“I believe our court workers give our clients a fair voice and make sure they get the fair treatment and sentencing within the court process,” Gudbranson said.

Further to that, Gudbranson explained many of their clients don’t understand the big legal terms and so in many cases require assistance reviewing disclosure or where the crown may stand in terms of a sentencing position. The clients come through the doors at the IMFC are not facing jail sentences and also don’t qualify for legal aid.

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“In the eyes of legal aid they make too much money and that’s because quite a few of our clients have applied for Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB),” she said.

With respect to job challenges, Gudbranson explained they have three court workers in Prince Albert, and as they cannot provide legal advice, the best they can do is try to provide as much support as possible for the clients, who will eventually face trial on their own.

“If we even had one lawyer in Prince Albert who would basically take on our clients and say ‘we will do it pro bono and we will assist your client through the trial process,’ would be an ideal one for us,” she said.

Gudbranson said another challenge they face is that unlike Regina or Saskatoon, Prince Albert does not have a special court to handle cases related to mental health or domestic violence. And while efforts have been made by agencies such as Prince Albert Grand Council to address the void, the province has said Prince Albert just doesn’t have the numbers to support the request.

“In our opinion, our numbers are very high.”

When asked what she enjoys most about her job, Gudbranson replied it was being able to help people, adding she and the other two court workers will go out of their way to make sure clients can meet and succeed at the conditions imposed on them.

“If there’s any point of the sentence where they don’t think they’ll be able to do it, then we’ll go back to the crown and negotiate,” Gudbranson said. “We don’t set anybody up for failure.”

What should people know?

Gudbranson believes the community knows who they are and what they do, but added she does think the community fully understands that their services extend beyond city limits and that the aboriginal court workers travel to a number of other communities including Wakaw, Carrot River, Montreal Lake, and Nipawin.

“I dont know if the community considers what we as aboriginal workers do as a benefit until they are faced to need the services we provide.”

For more local stories celebrating National Indigenous History Month and Peoples Day click here.

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nigel.maxwell@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @nigelmaxwell