- by Anne Finlay-Stewart, Editor

We don't know the identity of the man who was arrested, but we do know people who fit the description.

He was located at 4.00 a.m., so he was most likely sleeping out in the open, like the man sleeping on the concrete median behind my office when I arrived the other morning.  Police do not go knocking on doors or shining flashlights into tents at 4.00 a.m. to find a $100 package. 

Reading the charges, he has been convicted at least three times before.  We know many of our commenters will suggest it is time to "lock him up and throw away the key". This would  require changes in legislation, regulation and human rights standards, not to mention huge public expense. As of 2021, incarcerating one person in Ontario costs taxpayers an average of over $400 per day. 

The man who was sleeping on the concrete in a parking lot has multiple physical, mental and cognitive diagnoses.  Periodically he is hospitalized or taken to the ER, where he receives appropriate medication to take "home".  It is to be taken at different times of the day, often with food and water.  More often it is just "taken", while he is sleeping, along with his fishing rod or anything else he has that day that looks interesting.  Sometimes people take his shoes - the last two times I saw him he was walking in his socks.

There are no simple solutions to complex individual or community problems.  That does not mean that we do not hold people accountable for breaking the law.  It does demand the question, "Then what?"

Media release, Owen Sound Police Services, August 8, 2022

"On Sunday August 6th shortly after 12 p.m. a man entered onto the front porch of the victim’s west-side residence and stole a package that had recently been delivered.   The residence was equipped with surveillance cameras and Owen Sound Police were called by the victim to investigate.  Officers were able to identify the ‘porch pirate’ using the video footage.

On Tuesday August 8th at approximately 4:00 a.m. the offender was located and arrested by Owen Sound Police in the area of 10th Street and 3rd Avenue East.

The accused, a 28-year-old man of no fixed address, was charged with theft not exceeding five thousand dollars, failure to comply with a release order and three counts of failing to comply with a probation order and is being held in custody pending a bail hearing.

Unfortunately, the stolen package and its contents, which was valued at roughly $100, was not recovered. "