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Man found with guns and drugs after calling in overdose has sentence overturned due to Good Samaritan Act (www.cbc.ca)

submitted 2 years ago by sik0fewl@kbin.social to c/canada@lemmy.ca

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Paul Eric Wilson’s eight-year sentence was overturned by the Appeal Court under the recently enacted Good Samaritan Act.

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[-] kn33@lemmy.world 75 points 2 years ago

Good. We can't give people reasons to not call EMS.

[-] Pxtl@lemmy.ca 27 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

I mean he still went through a horrible ordeal. So they still have a reason not to call EMS. Unless the cops who arrested him face some consequences, they'll just keep doing this. "Arrest 'em all and let the courts sort 'em out" is not a good strategy.

edit:

Hawkins said this legislation is different from other Acts in that it "relies on trust."

"Drug users have to trust that the police aren't going to arrest them at the scene. They have to trust that the legislation is going to protect them, and so this decision from the court is a strong signal to them that they can trust that protection and they should trust that protection," he said.

The responding RCMP officers (edit2: also the prosecutors, and everybody else who was involved in this guy's detention and trial and knew the circumstances of his arrest) violated that trust. Will they face consequences?

[-] jerkface@lemmy.ca 4 points 2 years ago

They could have easily investigated and recorded and simply sent the information along to the AG to decide if an arrest is appropriate.

[-] Pxtl@lemmy.ca 12 points 2 years ago

Anybody in the process could've stepped in so much earlier. Did nobody in the process of taking this guy downtown and booking him in for trial did nobody say "oh shit he was arrested while calling in a medical emergency cut him loose!". This should've been handled long before the lawyers got involved.