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The Government of Manitoba created the Aboriginal Justice Inquiry in April 1988. The inquiry was formed in response to the separate murders of two Indigenous people, Helen Betty Osborne and John Joseph Harper. The commissioners of the inquiry investigated and made recommendations to the provincial government on the relationship between the justice system and Indigenous people. The inquiry’s 1991 report found that there was systemic racism within Manitoba’s criminal justice system. While some of the inquiry’s recommendations to reform the justice system were implemented, others were not. Notably, the recommendations to protect Indigenous women and girls from harm in the provincial justice system have not been fully realized.
Background
The Aboriginal Justice Inquiry was created by the Government of Manitoba in April 1988 in response to two legal incidents involving Indigenous people. The first was the November 1987 trial of two men, Dwayne Johnston and James Houghton, for the 1971 murder of Helen Betty Osborne, who was Cree. The second was the internal police investigation that followed the March 1988 murder of John Joseph Harper, a member of the Wasagamack First Nation, by Winnipeg police officer Robert Cross. These two incidents were widely seen as potent examples of the way in which the justice system was failing the Indigenous peoples in Manitoba. The premier of Manitoba appointed Justice Murray Sinclair and Associate Chief Justice of the Court of Queen's Bench Alvin C. Hamilton to be co-commissioners of the inquiry.
The Inquiry’s Report
The inquiry’s report was released in 1991 and found that there was systemic racism within Manitoba’s criminal justice system. It stated that "Aboriginal people who are arrested are more likely than non-Aboriginal people to be denied bail, spend more time in pre-trial detention and spend less time with their lawyers, and, if convicted, are more likely to be incarcerated." The inquiry made 296 recommendations that addressed a number of issues including questions of Indigenous rights and ways of reforming institutions of the justice system. The inquiry caused the Manitoba government to re-examine the way it treated Indigenous peoples. In 1999 the provincial government created the Aboriginal Justice Implementation Commission to advise on ways to implement the inquiry’s recommendations.
Impact
Some of the inquiry’s recommendations have been implemented. For example, the RCMP and the Winnipeg city police have worked toward strengthening employment equity programs. Additionally, in 2000, the Aboriginal Justice Inquiry–Child Welfare Initiative was created in association with Indigenous groups and the Manitoba government. The initiative’s purpose was to develop and oversee a plan to reform Manitoba’s child welfare system.
However, critics argue that too little has been done to create real change. One of the inquiry’s priorities was to better protect Indigenous women and children from harm in Manitoba’s justice system. Missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls remains a problem. Indigenous children are still being taken into care at higher rates than non-Indigenous children in the province. Indigenous rights advocate Percy Ballantyne told CBC News in 2021: "There are a lot of wonderful recommendations out to improve the justice system…but the justice inquiry [report] has actually just collected dust, sitting on the shelf."
