Angry in the Great White North

The analogy offered up is that of a child caught grabbing a treat from a store display and opening it. Caught with the ill gotten sweet, a parent pays for the item to settle the matter.

Well, that's not really what happens. First, the child is severely scolded. The treat is taken away, assuming it's not too late. Follow-up punishments are promised. But most of all, restitution is not anonymous. The child accompanies the parent to face the wronged store owner, and to offer up his or her own personal apology. After all that, payment is made, and hopefully the child, who likely did not understand the true nature of his or her act, has a new understanding of how goods are sold, and a sense of the serious consequences for not following the rules.

And the offer of restitution comes from a person with the authority to act on the child's behalf, and who would be perceived to share, at least in part, in the responsibility for the bad act.

It's probably happened to many of us as children, and as parents, there's a fair chance we'll be going through this time-honoured process with our own kids.

We don't know the details of Pretlove's offer on Pawlak's behalf. But since the police did not lay charges until July, six months later, it may be that Pawlak was not identified in Pretlove's email to the London riding association. Indeed, the reaction of the riding executive as reported in the press seems to be one of confusion. If Pretlove's offer had said explicitly that Suzan Pawlak had confessed to Pretlove, the reaction might have been different, and more specific. And presumably the police investigation would have been much shorter.

Or maybe not. It depends on what the police were told. Even if they knew where to look, it could still have been complicated to piece together the financial transactions.

Did Pretlove intend for Pawlak to pay him back the money he was going to give to the riding assocation?

Did Pretlove intend for Pawlak to own up to her actions (assuming she did indeed steal the money) to the riding executive?

And by what authority did Pretlove claim the role of acting on Pawlak's behalf, and why would he expect the riding association to recognize that role?

These are important aspects to restitution and contrition. Without them, and with only having Pretlove pay the money back, Pawlak (or whoever is guilty) would simply have gotten away with it.

And here's one more difference between the story of the child stealing a candy and the situation in London.

When a child sneaks a treat, one would assume it was the first time, and that it is not likely that there is a stash of stolen chocolate bars filling the closet at home. (If there is a stash, the reaction will be different.)

But when a person in charge of safekeeping money steals, and does so repeatedly, the situation is much more serious. Pawlak has been charged with 42 counts of forgery and fraud. If a person stands accused of a pattern of pilfering money, you have to wonder if that person had access to other bank accounts on behalf of other people and organizations, before, during, or after the events in London. Do those accounts need to be audited as well? If the person accused is formally accredited as an accountant, are the circumstances of the theft such that the formal accreditation needs to be suspended or withdrawn entirely in order to safeguard the profession and future clients? And where is the money?

Unless the person who is alleged to have committed the crime is publicly tried, the truth is not likely to come out, and other hurt parties, if there are any, are likely to suffer more out of ignorance of what might have happened to them.

There is a reason we have forgone private justice in favour of public trials.

Did Pretlove intend to address this somehow? He didn't want the police involved. Was he going to check on other potential victims? Or was there an assurance that there weren't any? By what authority can he make the unilateral decision that an assurance was credible?

I've been pondering this for a couple of days, and even with the best intentions (and hopefully David Pretlove's offer was made with the best intentions), a private settling of the matter of the missing money is not in the best interests of anyone except the guilty party. The riding association was right to turn down the offer and make the situation public. It is the only way to be certain that the situation is corrected as much as possible.

Even if Pawlak was involved in the missing money, and even if she was named in Pretlove's offer (certainly better than never mentioning her at all), we still have the problem that the offer would have prevented a further investigation and potentially the discovery of even more problems. Did the scope of Pretlove's offer match what the police now believe was taken? We also have the problem of the guilty party's future role in the Liberal Party. Had all this been keep quiet, was the situation being set up for the same thing to happen again in the future?

David Pretlove ought to have known the implications of his approach to solving this problem. There are other ways of helping out a person who has gotten himself or herself into potentially criminal trouble than just sweeping it under the carpet. As it is, I wonder if he's made the situation worse for all involved.

As such, is there a political price David Pretlove will have to pay for his bad judgement?

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