Victim’s family shocked when offender sent home with ankle bracelet

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A Norfolk woman is sounding the alarm about victims who could be “coached into deals” that result in a lack of justice.

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When Jesse Gazendam, 35, was sentenced to prison in March, he had already received a reprieve: although charged with three offenses, he pleaded guilty to just one and lawyers agreed he would not serve than the mandatory minimum prison sentence and a reluctant judge. agreed that he could serve this sentence on weekends.

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“I will adopt the joint proposal, but I must tell you that it borders on unacceptable leniency,” said Justice George Gage in sentencing Gazendam in Simcoe Ontario Court for making available sexually explicit material to a minor.

Gazendam admitted to showing a teenage girl a pornographic video of animated characters having oral sex and asking her if she would like to do that.

The young victim’s family also found the 90-day joint submission lenient but, the girl’s mother said, after a year and a half of legal proceedings, she and her family were satisfied with the boy’s admission of guilt. Gazendam and three months in prison.

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“It was a lesser sentence than we had hoped for but we thought it was a form of justice,” the mother said.

So they were shocked when, after two days in jail over the weekend at the Hamilton-Wentworth Detention Center, Gazendam was approved for a GPS monitor and sent home to serve the remainder of his sentence.

“We usually hear that the justice system fails people, but that didn’t happen in our case. It was the correctional institution and the (government) of Ontario.

“People should know that there is a complete disconnect between the courts and the corrections system. »

The mother said she was told the detective and Crown prosecutor who worked on the case also didn’t realize it was possible for Gazendam to avoid jail.

“They’re going to use this sentence to decide whether or not to impose intermittent sentences in other cases, because some families, like us, might have to make deals and ultimately there would be no justice at all.”

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It is not possible to go back on Gazendam’s sentence.

The mother was informed that the matter was not in the hands of the court as it was a joint proposal which had been accepted. He was told the prison could not reverse the decision to release Gazendam from his detention status.

According to a government website on GPS monitoring, it can be used for people on a bail order, suspended sentence or temporary absence permit.

While judges decide whether an ankle bracelet is appropriate for people serving a suspended sentence, GPS monitoring was privatized and expanded during the COVID pandemic and now allows correctional facilities to decide whether to release a person who faces prison the weekend.

Factors include overcrowding at the facility and the perpetrator’s criminal and employment history.

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“It seems like crime against a child doesn’t come into it at all,” the mother said.

She complained about the system to MPP Bobbi Ann Brady, who hand-delivered a letter on her behalf to the Ministry of the Solicitor General, and is trying to raise awareness of this “major gap” between the justice system and correctional facilities.

“I may not be able to change our outcome, but I hope to help another family not be lured into making a deal that seems promising, just so offenders have options at the correctional level,” said the mother.

Although Gazendam’s lawyer requested that his sentence not include placing his name on the sex offender list, the judge denied that request, ordering him to be placed on the list for 10 years.

He will be subject to three years’ probation that includes a DNA order for the National Offender Data Bank and will not be in the presence of a minor unless he is with an adult aware of his conviction.

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@EXPSGamble

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