I seriously have to ask the question: Are New Brunswick's Crown Prosecutors completely out of touch?

I feel compelled to ask this question after hearing about another bizarre decision they've made.   The latest case is of 18-year-old Wayne Heighton of Oromocto, New Brunswick.  That's just down the road from Burton, New Brunswick's Lawrence Manzer, the man that Crown Prosecutors are charging with "weapon dangerous" for having his unloaded shotgun on his front porch.

If you're not familiar with that case, check out Katey Montague's video on the Lawrence Manzer case.  You'll be horrified and disgusted at the way he's being railroaded by a so-called justice system bent on rewarding criminals and punishing the good citizens of our country.

But, as usual, I digress...

Back to the matter of young Wayne Heighton.  In June of last year this little puke deliberately burned down the Royal Canadian Legion Branch #93.

Heighton is being handled with kid gloves, if you'll pardon the pun.  In exchange for his pleading guilty to a mischief charge, Crown prosecutor Paul Hawkins dropped the arson charge.

That is, to say the least, ridiculous.  Why on earth would you let this little puke off the hook for completely destroying the town's Legion building?  Just because he wants a deal is absolutely no reason to give it to him!

It really makes me question the justice system of this country when a person who has, by their own actions, PROVEN themselves to be a danger to the rest of us, like Wayne Heighton has done, gets off with a slap on the wrist, and another man from the same area is facing criminal charges for helping his neighbour STOP some other young pukes who were vandalizing and stealing from Lawrence Manzer's neighbourhood for six months.

To add insult to injury, about the only time the RCMP bothered to show up in Manzer's neighbourhood was to arrest him and his neighbour, Brian Fox for apprenending the drunken hooligans.

You'd think the RCMP would be thanking them for helping stop the thefts and vandalism, wouldn't you?  I mean, that would make sense.

The police keep harping on how much they need the help of us good citizens... but in the wake of how Manzer is being treated (Fox's asssault charge was eventually dropped), why on earth would any of us lift a finger to help the police?

So, given that burning down a building and causing hundreds of thousands of dollars damage, if not more, garners a slap on the wrist from Crown prosecutor Paul Hawkins, one really has to wonder what the objectives are.

If deterring crime was one of those objectives, letting Wayne Heighton off the hook wouldn't be happening, and neither would the prosecution of Lawrence Manzer.

If deterring crime was truly the objective, Heighton would be spending a good long time in prison to reflect on his actions, and the New Brunswick RCMP and Crown Prosecutors would be giving medals of merit to Lawrence Manzer and Brian Fox instead of charging them with criminal offences.

Sadly, that's the stuff of fantasy in today's Canada.... and it leaves me feeling just a little ashamed of being Canadian.   We should be celebrating those who get involved in stopping crime in their neighbourhoods, not trying to send them to jail.