COVID Lockdown in Lock-Step With Diminished Crime

"[The COVID-19 pandemic is] the largest criminological experiment in history. It's like a natural lab [and the public its test subjects]."                                              "'The stay-at-home' mandates brought about the most wide reaching, significant, and sudden alteration of the lives of billions of people in human history." "Practically overnight, the entire country ceased or significantly reduced day-to-day travels, eliminating commutes from home to work, as well as leisure activities, shopping trips, social gatherings, the ability to dine out, and more."               "Across the United States and around the world, a positive byproduct of these unprecedented events is a dramatic drop in crime rates." "                                   The basic population didn't change. The racial composition of communities remained the same. Poverty and inequality did not disappear or increase overnight. There is not much change in the basic social structure."                                             "So this is a natural test of the routine activity approach."                                             Marcus Felson, criminology professor, Texas State University

Jason Overbo, owner of the Brooklyn Clothing Co. in Vancouver, has had two break-ins at his store since the COVID-19 crisis began. (Maggie MacPherson/CBC)

"We saw a drop in motor vehicle collisions and impaired driving offences as people were staying home. Other trends we saw were increases in stunt driving offences, as well as a rise in domestic incidents. We attribute the rise in family domestic incidents to more people being at home with one another for long periods of time as they were isolating."                                                                                            "In the past week we have had three homicides in York Region where the victims were shot. We have been seeing an increase in impaired driving incidents again as people return to socializing and consuming alcohol or drugs in places other than their homes."                                                                                                       "Since July, as the province reopens and things start to get back to the new normal, we are seeing crime on the rise back to historical levels."                                         Sgt. Andy Pattenden, York Regional Police, Ontario

"Break-and-enters in particular have declined and, while I couldn't directly attribute it specifically to     COVID, I think it could be argued with more people at home there are less likely to be break-ins."                                                                         Toronto police spokeswoman Connie Osborne

"The pandemic certainly has [done] some collateral damage to folks' levels of stress and strain. For some, this may manifest into violent behaviour." "For most, this is not likely to show up in severe acts of violence."                                          Adam Vaughan, Canadian health criminologist, Texas State University

Some Canadian police forces report increases, decreases in crimes. (David Donnelly/CBC)

Dr.Felson has a long acquaintanceship with crime. He created the "routine activity theory" of crime over 40 years ago, representing an understanding of criminology away from focusing on offenders, instead a move to understand why crime occurs, and to study the circumstances which lead to crime. Crime, according to Dr.Felson's premise, occurs when three sets of circumstances converge; a capable offender, a suitable target, and the absence of an appropriate guardian; somewhat like crime-dependent-on-opportunity. Lacking a deterrent element, crime is a circumstantial occurrence dependent on crime-favourable conditions.

With the sudden appearance of a dread pathogen that has roiled the world community, the perfect confluence of circumstances has arisen to produce a living laboratory whereby Professor Felson sees an opportunity of rare proportions and circumstance to prove his generally accepted theory. Global data is now available which without the presence of COVID-19 never would be possible. With the entry of the SARS-CoV-2 virus causing the novel coronavirus to strike at will, necessitating lockdown conditions, that opportunity arose.

At last his theory could be tested in an aura of emergency isolation orders, border closures, social distancing regulations and mandated lockdowns. All unsettlingly inconvenient and upsetting to the natural order of civic life as we know it, but a godsend to a professional criminologist who has staked his professional reputation on an educated theory which could now be put to the test. An answer to why crime occurs, how to predict its occurrence and how to reduce its impact.

Sgt.Andy Pattenden: increases in commercial break-and-enters north of Toronto. (CBC)

Giving Professor Felson the opportunity to produce a study highlighting a dramatic drop in crime rates, a study he co-authored with Professor Ben Stickle of Middle Tennessee State University. Some crimes, it appears, rose, while other types fell. And Professor Felson felt confident that dissecting the interplay of the rise and fall at a unique time in history when human routines and activities were undergoing massive change could be the key to fully comprehending the whys and wherefores.

Crime rates were seen to have diminished by double digits almost immediately when the routine activities of massive populations reacted suddenly to the changes in civic behaviour mandated by their government authorities. Routine activity during lockdown had an inhibiting effect on capable offenders unable to meet up with crime targets. When offices and businesses are closed, opportunities for crime are enhanced for 'guardans' are absent. Researchers worldwide now use Felson's theory to analyze how COVID restrictions have altered crime patterns in various communities, cities and regions.

A British study found a large drop in total reported crime in Lancashire county, led by shoplifting, for when shops are closed, access is denied shoplifters, just as pickpockets are out of luck when there are no longer bustling crowds of distracted people to enable their criminal pickpocketing activities, according to a Stockholm study of crime. As well, fewer home break-ins occur when people are in lockdown and remain in their homes, expressing the present 'guardian' principle.

A shooting victim was found in this vehicle in Toronto. (Paul Smith/CBC)

Outside the routine reportage of ordinary social crimes of opportunity, there are the extreme crime breakouts; mass murders, police shootouts, assassination attempts. Anecdotal and published accounts through news media suggest violent incidents may be linked to stress, loneliness and psychosocial changes resulting from the pandemic, that under lockdown, some people lost access to normal coping mechanisms; bars, friends, church, therapy, shopping.

In the end, the hope is that the theory that Dr.Felson placed so much of his experienced belief in can result in predicting what types of crime will increase, where they will occur both during a pandemic and following it, and that careful research examining how crime changes when lockdowns end, will help the criminal justice system more fully understand motivation and opportunity in crime. Human behaviour has a tendency to return to the familiar once an extraordinary, unsettling circumstance concludes. 

Clockwise from top left: Toronto Police officers contain an area behind a low-rise apartment complex where shots were fired on Sunday morning. Top left: RCMP officers prepare to take Gabriel Wortman into custody at a gas station in Enfield, N.S., on April 19. Bottom left: Four people were shot at a massive weekend house party in York Region in late July. Bottom right: An RCMP officer works with a police dog as they move through the contents of a truck that stormed Rideau Hall on July 2.

"Most crime is quite ordinary, and these extraordinary crimes [high-profile crimes that are highlighted by the media] get so much attention you forget how ordinary most crime is."                                                                                                          "It is difficult to escape the conclusion that the early effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on crime largely rest on routine activity theory."                                   Marcus Felson, criminologist

The Penalties for Defrauding and Victimizing an Elderly Woman?

"[The lawyer's actions] were a direct infringement of Mrs. Piela's fundamental rights."
"She was deprived of her freedom, forced to leave her home and taken by force into a private seniors' residence."
Quebec Bar Association, disciplinary committee

"[The subsequent medical report found] that she was totally capable of taking care of herself, she had an excellent memory, [and] she didn't have Alzheimer's."
"The police officers came to the house, they entered by the back door, so she started to scream and so the police officers called an ambulance and covered her mouth."
Igor Dogaru,lawyer for Veronika Piela, 94

Veronika Piela, 92, in December 2016. She says people took control of her life with a forged mandate and had her placed into a residence with no access to a phone or visitors. Phil Carpenter / Montreal Gazette

Imagine you've reached beyond 90 years of life, are a capable individual with a home of your own and manage all your own affairs. Age has done nothing to impair your memory, your facility with looking after yourself. You value your independence, and treasure your lifestyle, including your enjoyment in continuing to live in your home. You have a healthy bank account and decide to advertise for someone to come in from time to time to help manage some of the aspects of living independently, so you hire a woman and trust her and then everything goes wrong.

Veronika Piela who had immigrated to Canada after the Second World War, was most comfortable speaking Polish or Ukrainian. While she was still physically active, her knees were becoming a problem getting around, and she needed some help. She knew someone from the church she attended, and it was that person's daughter, in her 50s, whom she hired for general help in 2013. She paid Anita Obodzinski to help in her apartment, a bit of cleaning, shopping for groceries, feeding the cats. With no relatives close by much less children of her own, she relied on this woman to aid in her independence.

Anita Obodzinski prepared a mandate that gave her control of Veronika Piela’s personal protection and belongings if Piela were ever to become incapacitated. She later claimed she was Piela’s niece.

One day when she discovered money was missing, Veronika confronted Anita and dismissed her, informing the younger woman her services were no longer required. Six months passed, when suddenly Anita appeared at her apartment, accompanied by her husband ArthurTrzciakowski, demanding that she sign some papers, and she refused. The two rough-handled the elderly woman, who sustained cuts to her arms, insisting she sign the documents, until she relented: "I said 'Please, take everything. Please, leave me alone. Leave me alive. I need that'."

As soon as the two left, Veronika called the only two people she knew well in Montreal; her pastor and a notary, who referred her to lawyer Igor Dogaru who responded by sending a formal notice for Obodzinski to refrain from contacting her former employer at any future time. Unknown to both was that Obodzinski had prepared a mandate to give her control of Piela's personal protection and belongings should Piela ever become incapacitated, claiming she was Piela's niece, in a later affidavit.

She then proceeded to hire a social worker, Alissa Kerner, who just happens to be lawyer Gelber's wife. and advised her to prepare a psychosocial report, to state that Piela was incapable of looking to her affairs, impaired by ill health, both physical and psychological, which would accompany a medical report by Dr. Lindsay Goldsmith stating that Piela suffered from Alzheimer's disease. Obodzinski's plan was to have Piela declared mentally unfit to result in Obodzinski being placed in charge of Piela's affairs.

The report claimed Piela not only had irreversible Alzheimer's and dementia such that she was unable to take personal care of herself, was living in squalid conditions with cats, and that alcohol abuse made it additionally risky for her to continue to live on her own. "Mrs. Piela is unable to express herself within reason as her memory, insight and judgment are all severely impaired", wrote private social worker Alissa Kerner in her psychosocial report. Gelber, holding Piela's savings in trust, transferred $100,000 from Piela's account to Obodzinski.

The disciplinary committee of the Quebec Bar Association found that lawyer Charles Gelber, in acting for Obodzinski hadn't bothered to inform Piela or her lawyer that a court judgement had declared her legally incompetent. It found as well that he had failed to advise Igor Dogaru, lawyer for Piela that a request had been made to remove Piela from her home and into a residence for seniors. As well, Gelber's action in transferring substantial sums of Piela's savings to Obodzinski was clearly a criminal act, since reimbursed.

Obodzinski and her husband Arthur Trzciakowski both pleaded guilty in their roles plotting a scheme to defraud her former employer, with Obodzinski sentenced to two years house arrest and her husband, a conditional discharge. After pleading guilty to mischief and being unlawfully in Piela's home, Gelber's wife, social worker Alissa Kerner, received a conditional discharge, but was suspended by Quebec's order of social workers.

And the lawyer who used his legal know-how to underhandedly scheme with Piela's former employee to defraud the elderly woman who only managed to get a hearing in a court of law establishing her complete mental competence and outlining the manner in which all five people schemed to criminally defraud her -- has been suspended from practice, citing his role in forcing an elderly woman from her home by having her declared mentally unfit -- will serve an 18-month suspension after pleading guilty to seven disciplinary infractions.

A virtual slap on the wrist for all who were involved in his mendacious scheme to deprive an elderly woman of all she held dear, and take possession of her life savings in the process. A slap on the wrist for terrorizing an old woman, forcing her to live in a freezing basement where she was denied access to a telephone or any way in which she might contact the outside world. In the dead of a Montreal winter, she escaped, was found by police on a street without a coat and taken into custody. She asked for someone who could speak Polish and to that police officer described all that had occurred. The wheels of justice, as bitterly inadequate in this case as they proved to be, turned into action:

"A judge had ordered the curator to take charge of her file while the suit worked its way through the court system. It had been a long two years, but the personal documents that had been taken from her — her will, marriage papers, family photos, and more — were to be returned. A physical manifestation, of sorts, that she’s fully capable of taking care of herself."
"She’s also gotten most of her money back: Nearly $300,000 that had been transferred to the public curator from the in-trust account has been returned. Cheques for another $100,000 were sent to her last week. Another roughly $46,000 is gone, spent, and Piela’s lawyer says he is still trying to get it back. Ordered by a judge to account for the money spent from the in-trust account, Gelber wrote that $20,000 went to Obodzinski for items and services for Piela. Kerner was paid about $5,000 for her social work. Gelber was paid roughly $12,000 in legal fees. The rest went to Piela’s rent and a company to clean her apartment."
Montreal Gazette

Veronika Piela feels safe in her new residence, though her trust in people is shaken and a toll has been taken on her health.

First Nations vs Property Rights: Free Speech, Justice

"In my view, this [decision of the appeal court] understates the importance of both the common law liberty to proceed unimpeded along a public highway and the right to engage in political protest -- the heart and soul of freedom of expression in a democracy."
"...Mr. Fleming was entitled to attend and participate in the Flag Rally regardless of its effect on the government's political goals at Caledonia or anywhere else, and in particular, regardless of whether the Flag Rally was considered provocative by the government or protesters."
Judge Grant Huscroft, dissenting judgement, Ontario Court of Appeal

Randy Fleming is arrested - purportedly to prevent trouble - by OPP officers for carrying a Canadian flag in Caledonia, Ont., in an image taken from a video shown in court.   numberswatchdog.com

Justice Huscroft, the third member of the appeal court in the case of retired steelworker, 57-year-old Randy Fleming who had planned to attend a "flag event" in Caledonia, Ontario at the Douglas Creek Estates subdivision -- still under construction but halted when Six Nations 'warrior' protesters violently occupied the area in 2006 in protest against building on land they claimed to be traditionally theirs and for which no treaty had been signed -- but was stopped and seriously manhandled by a group of Ontario Provincial Police officers felt that the appeal court of which he was part, erred in not upholding the finding of the original judge.

Residents of Caledonia, Ontario, and families that had bought homes from the home builders at Douglas Creek Estates were put through years of intimidation and threats from the Six Nations/Haudenosonee occupiers. Their occupation of the site was illegal, their behaviour was criminal, and police did little to apprehend the First Nations men whose occupation of the subdivision and the mostly unfinished houses represented a state of chaotic criminality. The occupiers resorted to raging violence, vandalizing a Hydro One station, burning bridges and cars, issuing "passports" to residents living near the site, demanding to see them before permitting the passport-holders to access their homes.

Six Nations protesters in Caledonia in 2006

The reaction of the Ontario government was to warn the provincial police force not to interfere and to ensure that the First Nations warriors and the non-native residents were kept apart. But the larger purpose was to ensure that the First Nations people were not 'provoked' to further violence, leaving non-aboriginals to live with the intimidation of threats that terrorized the population. Over the occupied site, the flag of the Mohawk Warriors was flown in defiance of law and order. Ontario Superior Court Judge David Marshall issued orders that the barricades the warriors had put in place to exclude non-natives were to be removed; orders that were ignored.


In May 2009, three years following the original 'occupation' and ruination of the housing estate, non-native locals had arranged for a "Flag rally". Randy Fleming set out to join them. He had with him a Canadian flag mounted on a pole as he headed toward the rally. For his troubles a half-dozen OPP officers tackled him to the ground, injuring him physically, and adding another injury to his dignity as a free citizen of Canada and resident of Ontario, charging him with obstructing police as officers arrested him to "prevent a breach of the peace". Despite that he was charged with this malfeasance, the Crown ultimately withdrew the criminal charge.

Mr. Fleming responded by suing the OPP, and he won his suit. Ontario Superior Court Judge Kim Carpenter-Gunn ruled his arrest to have been unlawful, the police used undue force and in so doing breached his Charter and common-law rights. He was awarded close to $300,000 in damages along with legal costs. The OPP appealed and tasked three lawyers from the Ontario Attorney General's office to pursue the appeal. The appeal court saw fit to overturn Justice Carpenter'Gunn's decision on the basis of the judge having made "palpable and overriding error"; that the OPP meant "to prevent harm" coming to Mr. Fleming as well as preventing a peace breach.

The court turned Mr. Fleming's award into a fine of $25,000 representing fifty percent of the legal costs to the government of the appeal. Here's strange logic: the government with its unlimited financial resources depends on taxation, including Mr. Fleming's share, to fund those unlimited resources. Mr. Fleming also, quite incidentally, funded the decision depriving him of justice. And in ordering him to pay for half the government's legal appeal costs, he has been doubly financially tasked, in a most peculiar show of justice denied.

As for the 'error' cited having been attributed to the original trial judge finding in Mr. Fleming's favour? She erred, it would seem, when she made the determination that the OPP had prevented Mr. Fleming from "exercising his lawful rights of walking up Argyle Street (Caledon's main street)" which turns out not quite to have been the case, since it wasn't on Argyle Street but another Caledon street where the confrontation had taken place. The decision of a Mad Hatter, straight out of a confused Wonderland.

Randy Fleming’s arrest on May 24, 2009. Supplied

No justice for Mr. Fleming, no justice for the people who had bought the houses constructed and to-be-constructed in that ill-fated subdivision, because the Government of Ontario bought the land from the home builder,  Henco Industries Ltd. and turned the 40 hectares of land which had been purchased by them originally from the Crown which held that the Six Nations of the Grand River had historically relinquished it to the Crown -- over to the dissenting, aggrieved and violent protesters, to be handed over to the administration of the Six Nations.