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nice try neeek.
http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/columns/story?id=1951911
Bertuzzi's case didn't belong in court
By Scott Burnside
Special to ESPN.com
Archive
What a tawdry Christmas pageant this turned out to be. In their plea deal with Vancouver Canucks forward Todd Bertuzzi,
prosecutors in British Columbia made a ham-handed effort at sweeping
something distasteful under the Christmas rug -- and the rug still has
a handful of unpleasant lumps that simply won't go away. In
exchange for pleading guilty to assault causing bodily harm, the power
forward received a conditional discharge, which will ultimately see his
criminal record wiped clean in spite of his thuggish, blindsided attack
on Colorado's Steve Moore last March. It
took prosecutors in the British Columbia attorney general's office 108
days to lay a charge against Bertuzzi. Had the case been heard by the
province's Supreme Court, the charge could have carried a maximum
10-year prison sentence. The penalty at the lower, provincial court --
where Bertuzzi's case was resolved -- carried a maximum 18-month term. Now,
almost six months to the day after charges were filed, prosecutors have
used the plea deal to slink out the back door, reinforcing the
widespread view that this matter had no business in the courts to begin
with. Prosecuting attorney Garth Loeppky told reporters after
Wednesday's proceedings that they were unable to prove beyond a
reasonable doubt that Bertuzzi's punch to Moore's head during the
latter stages of a 9-2 Colorado win in Vancouver has had a long-term
effect on Moore's career. Bertuzzi received a year's probation in which
he is not allowed
to play in a game against Moore, and he must also perform 80 hours of
community service. "If
his career is over, the [British Columbia] Crown can't prove that,"
said Loeppky, who recommended the conditional discharge with no
criminal record. Moore, taken surprise by the plea agreement, had
asked that sentencing be postponed until he can attend to give a victim
impact statement in person. But judge Herb Weitzel ruled that having
Moore's statement read into the court records would suffice. Moore, 26 and a graduate of Harvard, asked that Bertuzzi be legally prevented from playing against him again. "I have no desire to interact with him in any way," Moore wrote. The
fact the impact statement was given short shrift indicates the judge
will follow the Crown's recommendation that Bertuzzi be given a
conditional discharge. The fact local prosecutors sought to slam this
plea deal through in the waning hours before the Christmas break, well
in advance of a scheduled Jan. 17 trial, without allowing Moore to have
his day in court as it were, merely reinforces the tawdry nature of
these proceedings. Moore's Toronto-based lawyer, Tim Danson,
well-known throughout Canada for taking on victims' rights in some of
the nation's biggest criminal cases, said he thought it was illegal for
an agreement to be reached without Moore's input. Danson hired a
Vancouver lawyer to ask for the sentencing portion of the case to be
held over until Moore could be present. Still, it would have been
highly unusual for a judge to stray from the sentencing suggestions
agreed upon in a plea arrangement such as this. And so the charade
continues. Moore's agent, Larry Kelly, and Danson have both
indicated Moore has not yet recovered from the attack, which left him
with three cracked vertebrae, muscle damage, post-concussion syndrome
and other medical issues. Moore was released by the Avalanche at the
end of the season, and his prospects for a future in hockey remain
unknown at best, grim at worst. Given the inherent failure of the
Crown's case, one has to wonder if there was any motivation to charge
Bertuzzi other than the attention such a charge would bring. This isn't
uncharted territory for British Columbia lawmakers. Four years
ago, this same provincial legal body charged longtime NHL tough guy
Marty McSorley with assault with a weapon after he clubbed Donald Brashear
in the head on the same Vancouver ice surface. A judge gave McSorley an
18-month conditional discharge after finding him guilty. Then to
what end was Bertuzzi charged and then essentially allowed to go free?
What possible lesson can be gleaned from Wednesday's outcome? If
the victims in this case are many -- from truth and justice to Moore,
to the game and in some ways Bertuzzi himself -- perhaps the lone
victor is the National Hockey League. The NHL and commissioner Gary
Bettman were indeed right when they insisted the league would and could
look after its own house as the best arbiter of right and wrong, of
crime and punishment. Former Vancouver general manager Brian
Burke, a lawyer by trade, has consistently maintained that this case
should never have gone before the courts. At the time of the incident,
longtime criminal lawyer and hockey agent Patrick Ducharme agreed with
Burke. He told ESPN.com that if the courts were going to bring the
legal standards of society to bear in the nation's hockey rinks, they
must do so every night, in every rink, to make sure the law is applied
evenly. Make no mistake -- Bertuzzi's punishment was swift and
harsh. Suspended for the final 20 games of the NHL's regular season and
the playoffs and with no guarantee that he will able to play whenever
the game resumes (Bertuzzi must apply for reinstatement and then meet
with Bettman to rejoin the league), Bertuzzi has paid a stiff price for
his folly. He forfeited $501,926.39 in salary. As for the impact
his absence had on the Canucks' playoff hopes, it's impossible to say
with any certainty. But given that they lost in overtime in a seventh
game to the Calgary Flames,
who advanced to the seventh game of the Stanley Cup finals, it's
entirely possible that Bertuzzi's cowardly act cost his team literally
millions of dollars in playoff revenues and perhaps even a Stanley Cup
championship. On a personal level, those close to Bertuzzi say he has also paid a heavy price with the shame of the attack. Some
felt a public trial would have shone a light on the game's dirty
secrets, those of backwoods justice and bounties and the bloodlust for
revenge. But even if this had gone to trial, truths would have been
twisted or ignored or forgotten in the same way that truth is often
sacrificed when police are called to testify against each other or
doctors or lawyers or any other closed society is forced to open its
secret doors to the world reluctantly. Those waiting for that
kind of public airing of hockey's dirty laundry would do well to wait
for Moore's civil suit. Although the Crown could not prove it, the suit
is almost certain because Moore has yet to recover from his injuries
and may never play professional hockey again. Scott Burnside is a freelance writer based in Atlanta and is a frequent contributor to ESPN.com.
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