Lorne Gunter: Lahey does easy time thanks to Canada’s lax child porn laws

CANADA
National Post

Lorne Gunter

The fact that former Nova Scotia Catholic bishop Raymond Lahey is again free from jail is an outrage. That he spent just eight months in custody for possessing violent child pornography is appalling, not so much for what it says about our legal system, but for what it says about the low priority we as a society place on protecting our children from sexual predators.

It’s hard to find flaws in the strict legal reasoning employed by Ontario Court Justice Kent Kirkland, who decided Wednesday to release Mr. Lahey on time served. The disgraced cleric had been in jail since pleading guilty last May.

Lahey showed genuine contrition for his actions. He told the court Tuesday, before his sentence was handed down, “I know I’ve done wrong, not only something illegal, but something that goes against the moral principles I believe in.” And he promised to use his notoriety to encourage others with pedophilic desires to seek help, “not just because this is something illegal, but because ultimately it is unhealthy, because it destroys relationships, and above all, where it involves pictures and stories of children, because it causes genuine harm to them.”

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