Mandatory sentence for firing gun struck

The Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that a mandatory minimum sentence of four years for firing a gun at a house is unconstitutional on the basis it could amount to cruel and unusual punishment.

In a companion judgment Friday, the top court said two other minimum sentences, both involving armed robbery offences, do not represent excessive punishment and are therefore constitutional.

The Supreme Court also affirmed and developed the framework for weighing challenges to the constitutionality of a mandatory minimum sentence under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms provision against cruel and unusual treatment or punishment.

The first decision came in the case of Jesse Dallas Hills, who pleaded guilty to four charges stemming from a May 2014 incident in Lethbridge, Alta., in which he swung a baseball bat and shot at a car with a rifle, smashed the window of a vehicle and fired rounds into a family home. Hills had consumed large amounts of prescription medication and alcohol and said he did not remember the events.

He argued the minimum fouryear sentence in effect at the time for recklessly discharging a firearm into a house or other building violated the constitutional prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment.

A judge agreed and Hills was sentenced to a term of 3 1⁄2 years, but the Alberta Court of Appeal overturned the finding of unconstitutionality and the sentence was increased to four years.

In allowing Hills’s appeal, the Supreme Court said the mandatory minimum sentence was grossly disproportionate, given that a young person might fire a paintball gun at a house as part of a game.

“The mandatory minimum cannot be justified by deterrence and denunciation alone, and the punishment shows a complete disregard for sentencing norms,” Justice Sheilah Martin wrote on behalf of a majority of the court.

“The mandatory prison term would have significant deleterious effects on a youthful offender and it would shock the conscience of Canadians to learn that an offender can receive four years of imprisonment for firing a paintball gun at a home.”

In any event, the Liberal government repealed this particular mandatory minimum sentence, along with several others, after the appeal was heard.

In the companion judgment involving two other Alberta cases, the Supreme Court said mandatory minimum penalties for a pair of armed robbery offences did not amount to cruel and unusual punishment.