A Brantford judge said there must be a public accounting of how jails have operated during the pandemic, including investigating the treatment of prisoners exposed to COVID-19.
“A broader inquiry needs to take place,” Ontario Court Justice Gethin Edward said as he sentenced Dillon James Miller, 32, of Ohsweken.
Before being sentenced, Miller, facing dozens of driving charges, was held in custody through several COVID waves, spending time in jails in Hamilton, Toronto and Milton.
Speaking by phone at this sentencing, Miller said he was held in his cell for almost 60 days straight before pandemic restrictions eased, permitting prisoners out once or twice a week for 20 minutes.
“I haven’t had any toilet paper for seven days now,” he told the judge.
“It’s hard to get supplies.
“Multiple times three weeks will go by and then you get out for 20 minutes and use the shower 10 and the phone for 10.”
He said his facility was hit with a COVID outbreak just before Christmas and the virus spread easily among prisoners.
During his year in jail, Miller said he was offered a vaccination once but he and many other inmates were reluctant because they heard that people were getting blood clots. He said he was never again offered the vaccine.
He said he was triple-bunked during his first seven months at the Hamilton-Wentworth Detention Centre.
“There’s not enough room to even walk around or anything. You got two guys on the beds and the other on the floor, taking up space.”
Miller said he was happy when he was transferred to the Toronto South detention center, where there was no triple-bunking. He also could participate in smudging rituals and he started working toward high school credits. But he was moved again after three weeks.
He said the situation was bad at the Maplehurst Correctional Complex in Milton.
“You can’t get clothes, towels, underwear and there’s no programs,” he said.
“They just throw you in a cell and you stay there. I’ve missed five lawyer calls and missed court dates. There’s no paper or envelopes, no visits and no calls.”
Defense lawyer Geneviève Eliani said jail conditions are so poor that it’s difficult for the public to grasp the situation.
“We get calls every day about conditions and how scared clients are about getting sick,” said Eliani.
“At the beginning of the pandemic, there was an effort to reduce the jail population with tracking bracelets and other options but the province ran out of tracking bracelets and now the jails are jammed.”
Eliani said she hopes “some sort of inquest” or accountability will be demanded of the province.
The judge said that those running businesses poorly during a pandemic and causing an outbreak could be charged.
“One wonders if there’s ever been a charge against (Ontario jails) for outbreaks. Is there anyone who holds provincial facilities to account or do we just accept it’s part of being incarcerated – you’re simply subject to the vagaries of the pandemic in a petri dish known as a provincial jail,” he said.
“If other organizations, institutions and businesses are being subject to provincial prosecution, those same prosecutors can’t turn a blind eye to what transpires at provincial lockup facilities.”
The judge thanked Miller for his information before sentencing him on two incidents from 2020 and 2021.
Miller, who has been repeatedly suspended from driving, pleaded guilty to two counts of driving while prohibited, failing to stop for police and failing to reside with his surety.
When police boxed him in a driveway in January 2021, Miller reversed into a cruiser and made room to escape. Police followed and caught him when his vehicle got stuck in a swampy field.
Despite the conditions in jail, Edward gave him only the usual one-and-a-half days of credit for each one day of custody, totally an 18-month sentence.
“If there was any incentive to behave yourself, it would be not wanting to go back and relive the experience you’ve had for the last 373 days,” said the judge.
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