Marc Anthony Lerat is a violent, repeat offender with a lifetime firearms prohibition order against him. This prohibition did not stop Marc Lerat from illegally obtaining a .22 calibre rifle and ammunition for it, nor did it stop him from carrying the loaded rifle with him as he made his way around Regina.

On September 7th or 8th (news reports are unclear) Regina Provincial Court Judge Marylynne Beaton sentenced Marc Lerat to 33 months in prison by after he pleaded guilty to:

• possession of a loaded firearm
• possession of a firearm contrary to a prohibition order
• possession of methamphetamine
• failing to appear

The gun charges stem from a traffic stop in January where police discovered Marc Anthony Lerat in the back of a ride-share vehicle they stopped for a traffic infraction.

An officer recognized Lerat and knew he was wanted after he failed to meet his parole officer on October 15, 2019.

Lerat tried to get out of the vehicle and walk away, but dropped his backpack as he attempted to flee. Police immediately arrested him and searched the backpack, which contained a loaded .22 calibre rifle and a box of ammunition.

The crystal meth was discovered during the booking process at the Regina jail.

A Violent History

Marc Anthony Lerat’s criminal record dates back to at least 2015. On September 28, 2015, Yorkton Provincial Court issued a warrant for Lerat’s arrest. The announcement does not indicate his alleged crimes at that time.

In 2016, Lerat was charged with:

• aggravated assault (3 counts)
• assault causing bodily harm (1 count)
• break and enter with intent to commit an indictable offence (1 count)
• breach of probation (5 counts)

From Heather Polischuk’s April 25, 2016, article in the Regina Leader-Post:

The earliest allegation dates from Feb. 25, when a 22-year-old woman called police from a payphone to say she’d been beaten up by her partner.

Two days later, shortly before 5 a.m., city police were called to a house on the 1100 block of Elliott Street for a report of a weapons offence. A 23-year-old man was taken to hospital with a head injury, having been hit with an object, police said.

Then, in the early morning of March 1, police went to the 900 block of Rae Street for a report of a break-in.

The 22-year-old woman was again alleged to be the victim of an assault later that month when, on March 20, she and a 25-year-old woman were taken to hospital with serious injuries from a stabbing.

All of these assaults took place while Marc Anthony Lerat was subject to a No Contact order with respect to the 22-year-old woman and was on probation for crimes he committed in 2015.

Lerat’s Murderous Associate

As far as I can piece the timeline together, Marc Anthony Lerat’s arrest for violating his lifetime firearms prohibition order came days after the January 5th murder of his then-girlfriend, Keesha Cree Alexandra Bitternose, by another violent Regina man with a firearms prohibition order against him – Dillon Ricky Whitehawk.

Whitehawk was subsequently charged with first-degree murder in the killings of Jordan Denton in November 2019, Keenan Toto in December 2019 and Keesha Cree Alexandra Bitternose in January 2020.

Public Safety Minister Bill Blair;

If Britain’s police can pro-actively check on and search violent offenders and registered sex offenders, why can’t Canada’s police pro-actively check on and search the most dangerous people in our society – violent repeat offenders with Firearm Prohibition Orders registered against them?

Firearm researcher Dennis Young learned, through one of his myriad Freedom of Information requests, from 2014 to 2018 police arrested 5,550 criminals who were already prohibited from possessing firearms – an average of 1,110 per year.

When will you pass legislation to track and search these dangerous repeat offenders?

I’ve already done the hard work of creating the plan, Minister Blair.

I implore you to find the political will to draft and pass legislation based on this plan to take meaningful and measurable action to increase public safety – something the Liberal government’s virtue-signalling gun ban by Order in Council will not and cannot accomplish because SOR/2020-96 doesn’t apply to criminals.

Not only is Canada’s Firearm Prohibition Order system broken, it was designed to fail from the very start.

Designed to Fail is a 45-page Special Report which explains, in detail, everything that’s wrong with Canada’s Firearm Prohibition Order system, then outlines a clear plan to fix it.

The only question is… Will the federal government take the action required to keep Canadians safe?

Or will they continue to pay lip service to Public Safety while doing nothing to stop violent, repeat offenders from illegally obtaining guns?