A seven-year-old Aboriginal child was assaulted by a teacher's aide at McKellar Park Central Public School in Thunder Bay, Ontario. And the local Crown Attorney claims it would not be in the "public interest" to prosecute. (Video)I'm a member of the public. The Crown doesn't speak for me.
Northwestern Lad has the full story--and all the right questions--here. But it's worth underlining the fact that the Crown once again has acted as the enemy, not the friend, of the First Nations. The resonances of the residential school system--that instrument of torture used by the Crown to "kill the Indian and save the child"--are almost palpable in this case. And even white man's law, in this case the Criminal Code, makes plain that what was done to this child was assault:
265. (1) A person commits an assault when
(a) without the consent of another person, he applies force intentionally to that other person, directly or indirectly;
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(3) For the purposes of this section, no consent is obtained where the complainant submits or does not resist by reason of
--(d) the exercise of authority.
On the face of it, the Crown Attorney who made the decision not to prosecute seems to be wilfully ignoring the very law that he is sworn to uphold. Why is that, do you think?
