Humboldt, Guilt and Grace

When a transport truck blew through a stop sign in Saskatchewan and ploughed into a bus, killing and injuring a hockey team from nearby Humboldt, it seemed that all of Canada responded. On our court of nine homes someone made sure each household had a hockey stick by the front door in tribute to those who died. The crowd-sourcing fundraiser brought in more than 15 million dollars to share amongst the bereaved and injured, a staggering amount.

This past week the driver of the truck, Jaskirat Singh Sidhu, pled guilty to the many charges brought against him, stating that he wanted to take responsibility and spare the families a trial. This man is 29-years-old and married. He will undoubtedly do time in prison and his life is shattered as well.



CBC reporter Robyn Urback wrote an opinion piece after Sidhu's plea reflecting on the reality that we have all made mistakes behind the wheel of a vehicle, although certainly not of this magnitude -- thank God. He was not impaired at the time of the crash, nor was he distracted, and he has no criminal record. He's not another Marco Muzzo who also pled guilty to killing  three young children and a grandparent while driving drunk and was given a ten-year sentence. Urback offers this:

An extended prison sentence for Sidhu would serve no similar, tangible functions. It won't remind people to take better care on the road; the deaths of 16 people should have already done that. And the torment Sidhu will live with forever will absolutely be more of a punishment than whatever time he spends behind bars. But he may serve time regardless, and perhaps necessarily so, if for no other reason than to maintain the public's collective faith in the justice system. When something horrible happens, we want to see that someone is held responsible, even if that someone simply made a terrible mistake.

While some Broncos parents are still angry with Sidhu, which is absolutely natural, others have shown remarkable forgiveness toward the man who killed their children. Perhaps the rest of us ought to heed that lesson in grace and understanding. We've all made mistakes — even you, dear keyboard warrior, who has nothing to lose by admitting that now (and certainly not your freedom for up to 14 years). 

I commend Urback for broaching such a difficult subject. We have institutions to incarcerate criminals called penitentiaries. Originally they were places where offenders were sequestered from society to reflect on their crimes and hopefully change their ways. According to the Correctional Services Canada website "the penitentiary was first introduced by the Philadelphia Quakers in 1789 as a more humane alternative to the harsh punishments of the time. The Quakers believed that a sentence of imprisonment, served under conditions of isolation, with opportunities for work and religious contemplation, would render the offender "penitent" and reformed."

Are there other ways whereby Jaskirat Singh Sidhu pays his debt to society and those who have suffered such unimaginable loss? One father of a player who died in the collision said that the admission of guilt mattered far more to him than the length of a prison sentence. I have no clear answer to this in my own mind but it is always a discussion worth having.

What do you think?

Today's Groundling blog is a reflection on our "daily bread" and plastic, plastic, plastic.

https://groundlingearthyheavenly.blogspot.com/2019/01/our-daily-bread-plastic.html