Close Contact
The Correctional peace officer counts his inmates differently than his colleagues in other units of the Edmonton Remand Centre do. Each prisoner stands at ease beside his cellmate outside his [...]
Prisons
Prisons
Policing the Police
Everything we know about what really happened to Sammy Sobieh exists in a few minutes of silent video from two stationary security cameras, in which the only thing in focus is the date and time: [...]
Less Crime, More Prisons
Once upon a time in St. Albert, where I was running for city council in the 2007 election, I was gobsmacked by a question from an unidentified audience member at an all-candidates meeting. I [...]
Thug Life
The month after Chris Crane’s 18th birthday was a blur. The Alberta Warriors gang member spent most of it drunk or stoned, blowing $16,000 on alcohol and marijuana in just three weeks. His first [...]
By Darcy Henton
Scared Straight?
For a number of years I exchanged services with youngsters in trouble with the law. The terms of our exchange weren’t clearly articulated, but in practice they are simple to describe. I offered [...]
By Clem Martini
Behind Bars: Maximum Security + The Remand Centre
On a wintry overcast day the entrance to the maximum-security Edmonton Institution, about 20 minutes north- east of the city limits, is a narrow, snow-covered ribbon lined with grey willow [...]
By Darcy Henton
MOST READ
MOST READ
The Plans to Strip-Mine Coal in the Mountains
It looks like spectacular wild country, but some see it more as a big money sandwich.
The top layer of that sandwich is comprised of alpine grasses, forget-me-nots and stonecrop, glacier lilies and ancient, brave pines whose branches have been gnarled and weathered by centuries of wind. In summer, solitaires and ...
Herd Memory
On a cold day in February, I flew over the tightly knit stands of black spruce and jack pine in northwestern Alberta, straining my eyes below, eager to catch sight of a woodland caribou. My dad, a wildlife biologist, called them the “grey ghosts” of the boreal. Woodland caribou have ...
An Environmentalist’s Case for Beef
“…If you knew how meat was made, you’d probably lose your lunch. I know; I’m from cattle country, and that’s why I became a vegetarian. Meat stinks, and not just for animals but for human health and the environment.”
That was Alberta singer-songwriter k.d. lang, in a 1990 television spot for ...