VICTORIA - The B.C. government is again being urged to ask the B.C. Court of Appeal to decide whether Canada's laws against polygamy are constitutional.
Vancouver lawyer Leonard Doust has confirmed that charging members of a polygamist colony at Bountiful, B.C., would take longer and be less conclusive than referring the matter directly to the B.C. Court of Appeal.
Doust was asked by attorney general Wally Oppal to take yet another look at the issue after a special prosecutor concluded last September that a court reference was the way to go.
In his report to the criminal justice branch, Doust says if the Supreme Court of Canada decides the law against polygamy is constitutional, then it will be very clear that anyone violating it will be prosecuted.
Doust says the abuses in Bountiful are unlikely to stop until the question the polygamy law is addressed.
Doust's review of the matter is the latest in several as the government grapples with what to do about the polygamist colony in southeastern B.C. and comes on the heels of a raid on a polygamist compound in San Angelo, Texas where state troopers removed 220 women and children.
