Justice initiatives reduce youth court appearances to zero in Patuanak
A community justice coordinator for the English River First Nation in Patuanak, some 400 kilometers North of Prince Albert, has set out to mak youth in her community aware of the justice system, and she brought about an interesting result.
Janine Dawatsare was a presenter at the Northern Justice Symposium on May 16. She told the crowd gathered at Plaza 88 how she went about helping to improve her community with a Law Day.
She said a lot of youth in the community were unaware of protocol or etiquette when it comes to appearing in court. She hosted the law day event in the community, in the hopes of giving them an education.
“[The youth] seemed pretty interested… since I did that presentation we haven’t had any youth on the docket in the last three or four months,” Dawatsare said. “I believe it helped a bit somewhere.”