Who doesn't love a happy ending? It's just that they're so rare on the evening news. For those who haven't heard, three-year-old Kienan Hebert, who went missing from his Sparwood, B.C. home, has been safely returned.
RCMP Cpl. Dan Moskaluk confirmed that a suspect in the case delivered the boy to his family's home in the wee hours of Sunday morning. His parents, who'd been living at a neighbour's house while their own home was cordoned off while the investigation continued, returned to find their little boy sitting on the couch with his blanket.
"In general, the little guy appears to be in good health," Moskaluk told reporters. "We've got a child back. We've got a child returned. I've never been able to say that."
It's thought that the child was returned by the abductor after Kienan's father made an emotional plea on Saturday to whoever had his son.
"We're just asking please bring Kienan to a safe place right now, like a gas station or a store parking lot where he's visibly seen and just drop him off there," Paul Hebert said at an RCMP news conference. "Walk away. We just want him safe."
It remains to be seen if 46-year-old Randall Hopley, a convicted sex offender, was involved in the child's disappearance or safe return.
The investigation goes on, but at least the boy is home with his family. Pass the Kleenex.
Image Credit: cbc.ca
After two trials and two appeals, the Alberta teen who murdered her newborn son over six years ago has finally received a verdict: three years suspended sentence with probation.
Katrina Effert, now 25, strangled her newborn after secretly giving birth in her parents' basement, and then threw the baby's corpse over a neighbour's fence.
Although she was previously convicted of infanticide on two separate occasions, in 2006 and 2009 respectively, the latest ruling was appealed due to "errors in the jury instructions".
For an infanticide conviction to hold, Effert must have been in found in a "disturbed state" when she killed the baby in 2005. The maximum sentence for infanticide is five years.
The Prosecution argued that the psychiatric evidence was not ironclad, since both so-called experts admitted to having little experience with infanticide and relied on contradictory statements from Effert herself. She had also lied to police at one point, saying she'd given the newborn to her boyfriend.
"I just want to say that I'm sorry for everything that's happened, especially to my family," Effert said, weeping as she addressed the courtroom after years of legal proceedings. "I wish I could take it back, but I can't."
The Defence argued that infanticide cases require support, not prison time. Her lawyer, Peter Royal, maintained that Effert had already lived with the case, and all the incumbent publicity, for years and would always be haunted by her actions.
"This is, in many respects, a very fine young woman who went through a very tragic event." He went on to defend her character, saying she now "holds a steady job and attends church regularly".
Do you agree with her lawyer, or feel that murder is murder and that Effert deserves a tougher sentence, regardless of her troubled state of mind at the time?
It's been a decade since the 9/11 terrorist attacks devastated New York City -- and the Western world. If you're anything like me, you remember exactly where you were at the time (office, London) and the frozen shock you felt as the Twin Towers were struck down one after another.
Ten years on -- and, according to intel by the Ottawa think tank, The Rideau Institute, over $92 billion plugged into national security later -- do you feel Canada is any safer, as Prime Minister Stephen Harper suggests? Putting economics aside for a moment, do you feel our homeland is safer now? Or did you ever feel threatened being north of the border in the first place?
Do you feel the main threat is, as Harper maintains, "Islamicism"? Personally, I was shocked that he simply didn't say "fundamentalism", of which any religion or social group can be guilty -- as we discovered in Norway this past summer.
In a recent Ipsos Reid poll for Postmedia News and Global TV, over half of Canadians felt that Muslims were discriminated against more now than they were 10 years ago. However, Canadian Muslim groups regarded the impact of 9/11 on the Muslim community was both good and bad.
"On the good side," said Kashif Ahmed, a national board member with the Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relations, "there has been the ability for Canadians to access their fellow citizens with Muslim backgrounds, to get to know them more, and essentially have the ability to get accurate information about Islam in the Muslim community which has been a great thing for those who want to have that information."
On the bad side, 9/11 has led to more workplace discrimination, due to a misunderstanding or a lack of information about the faith.
"Once (organizations) know about the faith practices, they are more open to make reasonable accommodations or resolve issues without any further problems," said Ahmed. "The common misconception people have about Islam is that it promotes terrorism and that the Muslim community doesn't condemn terrorism, or women are chattel of Muslim men."
In many cases, the cultural practices in question don't reflect Islam's teachings. As ever, knowledge is power. Before he sounds off, Harper would do with remembering that terrorists are at the heart of terrorism -- not whole communities.
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