Inclusion Daily Express -- Parole Board Says "No" To Latimer's Day Parole Bid

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Parole Board Says "No" To Latimer's Day Parole Bid
By Dave Reynolds, Inclusion Daily Express
December 10, 2007

REGINA, SASKATCHEWAN--Robert Latimer will not be getting out of prison anytime soon -- even during the day -- Canada's National Parole Board decided Wednesday.

The three-member panel said that Latimer had not shown any remorse for killing his 12-year-old daughter Tracy.

"We were left with a feeling that you have not developed the kind of sufficient insight and understanding of your actions," said Kelly-Ann Speck, the board's chairperson.

Latimer, 54, asked to be granted day parole from William Head Institution, the minimum-security prison on Vancouver Island where he is serving his mandatory 10 years of a life sentence for murdering Tracy, who had cerebral palsy and an intellectual disability. Day parole would have allowed Latimer to leave the facility during the day, but would have required him to return to the prison or a halfway house at night.

Latimer has continued to say that, while he did use exhaust fumes from his pickup truck to kill Tracy on October 24, 1993, it was a "mercy killing" motivated by his desire to not see her "continue to suffer" from her disabilities and pain.

At the time of her death, Tracy was scheduled for hip surgery that was supposed to reduce pain and discomfort. Latimer insisted that doctors said Tracy would only be able to take Tylenol after the surgery. The Canadian Supreme Court later noted that Tracy showed emotions of joy and that she liked people, and that she could have been given stronger pain medication.

Several Canadian disability groups and others praised Wednesday's decision, arguing that if the board had been lenient toward Latimer, it would have sent the message that the lives of people with disabilities are less valuable.

"As long as society can justify that it was right to kill her, then it's easier for them to deny their own responsibility," Laurie Larson, president of the Saskatchewan Association for Community Living and mother of two teenagers with disabilities, told the Regina Leader-Post.

"I'm very disturbed because it seems that it's easy for people to devalue a person with a disability and compare them to an animal that needs to be put down."

Michael Harris, a columnist for the Ottawa Sun, reasoned that murder is murder, regardless of the reasons the perpetrator gives.

"If Robert Latimer's appeal to the concept of compassionate homicide were to be embraced by the courts, as it was by judge Ted Noble at Latimer's original trial, any potential killer would be handed the license to kill," Harris wrote. "No quadriplegic would be safe in the care of an overburdened relative. No severely deformed charge of a public institution would be safe with his or her caregivers. No Alzheimer's patient would be safe from the misguided compassion of horrified family members."

"In fact, in any case where it might be argued that a victim was living with unbearable pain, one could always argue that death was better than life."

Wednesday's decision means that Latimer will likely not be able to apply for day parole again for at least two years. He will be eligible for full parole in three years.

Related:
"Latimer decision was right" (Toronto Star)
http://www.thestar.com/News/article/283852
"Support for Latimer decried" (Edmonton Sun)
http://www.inclusiondaily.com/news/07/red/1210d.htm
"Latimer is where he belongs" (Ottawa Sun)
http://www.inclusiondaily.com/news/07/red/1210e.htm
"Latimer's daughter needed more support: mother of disabled kids" (Regina Leader-Post)
http://www.inclusiondaily.com/news/07/red/1210f.htm
"Tracy Latimer's Death: Mercy or Murder?" (Inclusion Daily Express Archives)
http://www.inclusiondaily.com/news/crime/latimer.htm

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