Has the cop killer served enough time in prison?

The killer of Const. Todd Baylis is up for parole but a petition demands that he remains in prison for life. 

spatch received a gasping message, Code 10-33, for an emergency transmission from  "We've been shot! ... P.C.'s been shot! ... We've both been shot!'' Police officer Baylis subsequently died in the hospital five hours later.

At the slain officer's funeral procession, Officer, Leone, Baylis’ partner, carried his partner's cap on a blue velvet cushion. Four months after that, Leone was back at work. He said.  "I had three years on the job," Leone told the Toronto Star, "just starting my career. Twenty-five years later, here I am." He is currently a Staff Sergeant at 22 Division, a veteran who is  aged 53.

It has been a quarter-century since Baylis died in the line of duty. Later, his killer, Clinton Gayle (a black man) will appear at a parole hearing in Abbotsford, B.C., seeking release from prison. He has served the entirety of a life sentence with no parole eligibility for a minimum of 25 years. This means that he is eligible e for release if the parole board feels that he has served enough time in prison.

Leone will be present at the hearing, He's written a victim impact statement, filed with the board, but won't read it out loud. "It's the first time I've ever had to attend a parole hearing. I'm not putting my feelings on public display for this man.”  He added,  “I'm not surprised that it's being held so close to the anniversary (of his partner’s death.)  I think that's disrespectful."

At trial, Gayle insisted — and has continued to insist — that Constable Leone shot first, striking him twice; that he felt a bullet "whistle past my head" when he came hurtling out of the building, and that he'd already been pepper-sprayed by Leone, which gave him a sudden surge of strength to throw off both officers. "I just exploded, just go berserk … I seen someone leaping towards me. I shot at that person." He called it self-defence. He said the Constable emptied his own gun, striking and wounding Gayle, after Gayle had shot first.

About Leone's testimony, Gayle declared: "He's lying."

The jury also didn't believe Gayle.

As an aside, in 1962, another man shot a police officer and was sentenced to death for killing the officer. I talked with him while he was waiting to be hanged and he told me that he he shot the cop after the cop shot him first. His jury didn’t believe him.  

Justice David Watt, who sentenced Gayle to two concurrent life terms — consecutive terms at that time were not available at that tim—described him as a "gun-toting crack dealer" who showed an "entire absence of remorse for having snuffed out the life of a police officer,”

Gayle’s conviction was upheld on appeal, where Gayle's lawyers argued the trial was tainted by a jury selection process that restricted his ability to test racial prejudices of prospective jurors. Six years ago, Gayle applied for early release under the "faint hope" clause.  That clause is no longer in effect.

At that court  proceeding,the  court heard that Gayle had progressed from maximum to lower-medium security, shifted among prisons. He'd completed his high school diploma and several programs offered to inmates. Corrections staff noted he counselled other inmates against violence and had intervened on occasion to help quell incidents. A 2012 assessment had found him at "moderate" risk of violent recidivism.

However the other side of the ledger showed that, while incarcerated, he'd racked up 10 institutional convictions, nine of which were considered serious in nature — including possession of makeshift weapons. There was evidence Gayle was involved in smuggling drugs within prison and had operated a black market for contraband and had close associations with a prison gang, the Crack Down Posse.

While Gayle professed to feeling empathy for Baylis' family and fiancé, he never expressed remorse nor acknowledged guilt nor had he taken responsibility for his actions, persisting in the claim the shooting had been self-defence.

Justice Ian Nordheimer, rejecting the faint hope application, concluded that Gayle — who was then and remains subject to deportation upon release — was not, as professed, the "model prisoner whose conduct and attitude can be demonstrated to have changed so much from what it was at the time of the offence."

Gayle has never been designated a dangerous offender, which would mean he could be kept incarcerated indefinitely. He was 25 years old when taken into custody and hospitalized, within a day of the shooting. He's approaching 51 now.

Staff Sgt. Leone said, "We'll see how this chapter unfolds. "I don't think he's a suitable candidate for whatever programs are available to him outside prison now and right now I don't think he's got a good shot at parole. But all roads lead to a release at some point in he future.”

He added as he read his  "I know the board will listen to us.” as he read his victim impact statements.  “They (prisoners) will be very polite. But they measure their success by releases. What I know is that he (Gayle) is a con man who was very violent before Todd  (his murdered partner) and I ever came across him. As I understand it, he's had multiple violations in prison too. I'm not happy with the path he's on."

It is also my opinion that this killer’s violent history in prison is a sign that hat he is not ready for release.

Baylis's younger brother, Cory, upon learning of the parole hearing — which was originally scheduled for May but Gayle had it postponed — launched an online petition in February, opposing the release. The petition to keep this cop killer in prison had garnered more than 29,000 signatures.

Cory Baylis says in the petition. "Clinton Gayle deserves to spend the rest of his natural life behind   bars for the heinous and brutal execution style murder of Constable Baylis and the attempted murder of Constable Leone," "The people on this page support the fundamental idea that LIFE in the Canadian Justice System should mean LIFE. Perpetrators of extremely violent crimes such as this do not deserve a second chance. It is a LIFE sentence for the victims of such crimes. It should be a LIFE sentence for the perpetrators as well."

In my opinion, as I said earlier in this article that he should spend more time in prison until he can show that he is no longer a violent person. That could mean that he remains in prison for another five years.

The Baylis family will be at the hearing. The slain officer's father, Ted, had been a Toronto detective but took retirement a few months after his son was killed.

The victim’s father said that he'd like to see is a national conversation, a closer look at the whole process of parole hearings. "He said, We, as victims — and I hate to use that word — how can we do things differently? This whole process of giving victim impact statements, at some point that's just not enough. The reality for us is that, when Gayle was convicted, 25 years sounded like a lifetime. We weren't thinking about what might happen 25 years. We were just trying to survive."

Sometimes, when Leone is asked about the shooting by young officers, he advises them to truly examine the history, so that Todd Baylis isn't just a name on a memorial plaque. "Learn your history."

Even if Gayle is denied parole, this time, there will come a day when it's granted, says Leone. "In another year and a half, we get to open up our wounds again. We bleed again."

Yet what else can they do, except remain vigilant on behalf a beloved man who was 25 years old when Gayle took his life?

Ehen I learn what the decision is at the next haring, I will update this article.