FASD diagnosis not sufficient reason to adjust sentence: court

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This article was published 08/07/2019 (2308 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Winnipeg man’s three-year prison sentence will stand after Manitoba’s highest court ruled fresh evidence that he suffers from fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD) was not sufficient reason to change an appropriate sentence.

Richard Joseph Catcheway, 33, was convicted of possession of a prohibited weapon dangerous to the peace, unsafe storage of a prohibited weapon, uttering a threat and other offences.

Court heard at trial that Catcheway bought a sawed-off rifle on the street, hid it in a false ceiling at his girlfriend’s home and then told her she had “better not rat, or else.”

While his trial lawyer told court Catcheway had been diagnosed with FASD in 2000, he filed no supporting reports or evidence of impairment.

Catcheway’s lawyer on appeal, Scott Newman, found the five reports confirming the FASD diagnosis and argued the sentence was unfit because it did not recognize his reduced moral blameworthiness or prospects for rehabilitation.

A fit sentence, Newman told the appeal court, would be no longer than two years.

The Crown argued there was no evidence the FASD reports could not have been obtained before Catcheway’s sentencing. It said denying an opportunity to appeal for a shorter sentence did not constitute a miscarriage of justice.

“When read together, it is clear (from the reports) that the accused has consistently struggled with his behaviour and functioning from an early age,” Justice Holly Beard wrote on behalf of the appeal court in a decision released Wednesday.

But while the reports support Catcheway’s argument “of a somewhat reduced moral blameworthiness,” his age, lengthy record for violence and his assessment as a high risk to reoffend support a sentence in the range of the one already imposed, Beard said.

“Looking at the evidence and arguments… in my view, the sentence of three years incarceration that included the conviction for uttering a threat is still within the range for the offences and offender and is not unfit,” she said.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca