Out of the Frying Pan

Who's looking for Alan Reavley?

There's a lot I don't track about my blog, but sometimes I do take note of the searches that bring people here. For some reason, this post about a man convicted of embezzling from the Great Falls Food Bank is attracting some traffic.

Alan Reavley's consistent stance has been that he didn't use funds from checks he cashed rather than deposit for his own benefit, that he "put the money back" most of the time. He was convicted on five counts; these counts were bargained down from an astonishing number -- 96, as I seem to recall.

The initial plea agreement recommended a 13 year sentence. District Judge Thomas McKittrick response was to look at Reavley's history -- he seems to have left a trail of embezzlement through non-profits in Great Falls -- and the crimes for which he pled guilty and to respond with a sentence of 25 years.

Reavley's first parole hearing was in December, 2007. Parole was denied; the board seemed to agree that one year per felony in this case is simply not enough. His next scheduled appeal for parole is in December, 2012, five years from the first.

More than seven years on from Reavley's sentencing, Great Falls non-profits might not have recovered from the sting of Reavley's actions. People have long memories when it comes to finding out that their charitable giving has been misappropriated.

Perhaps what is most hurtful is Reavley's stated view that pleading guilty to the five counts was the biggest mistake of his life. Seemingly he fails to acknowledge that the food bank was really hurt by his actions; the poor -- the people least able to defend themselves against injustice -- were harmed.

As far as I know (and I probably would, inasmuch as I have a google alert for his name set up for any activity on the Web), restitution has been neither made nor attempted. This is a case where if some good is being done, either by Reavley or by someone else, it should not be kept quiet. The community deserves to know if an effort is being made to restore the money that was taken.

The scenario I imagine in December, 2012 is that Reavley will give lip service to his guilt, all the while maintaining to himself his innocence. The Board will decide that eight or nine years is enough, especially if Reavley expresses contrition but perhaps even if he doesn't. For all I know, there is a formula that halves prison time for "white collar" crimes or perhaps a matrix that takes into account the convict's age (64 or 65 in this case). It doesn't seem like enough to me, but it's not my call to make.

Three things would help: honest contrition,  an honest attempt at restitution, and letting the community know about both of these things. I'll try to be optimistic that these things might yet happen.

Canada fights human trafficking

Nova Scotia Scott blogged the response of Canada's Department of Justice to the problem of human trafficking in Canada. Although it doesn't seem like we hear much about it, I don't imagine the problem stops at their border with us.

Support for pro-democracy voices

A goddaughter (I sponsored her confirmation years ago) is involved in directing an NGO out of Beirut. Their Web site has some information in English; click "Khitat Loubnaniya" for the translations. Visit khitat.com - I notice the server seems to have dropped at the moment, but I reached the site earlier today.

Parole denied

Alan Reavley's first parole hearing, only four years into a twenty year sentence for four counts of embezzling (he bargained this sentence for a great reduction in the number of counts) from the food bank in Great Falls, resulted in the board's unanimous decision to wait for five years before taking up the matter again. The Trib has a way of making stories disappear into their archive in seven days or so, so I'm going to repeat the comment I left on the reader forum, where Reavley's apologists (n.b., these are not people who make apologies :) ) are in full voice:

A number of the commenters here seem to believe that Alan Reavley is in prison for the moral equivalent of shoplifting. That's simply not the case. He pled guilty to multiple counts of embezzlement. These are felonies, people, and you are arguing that one year per felony count is more than enough.

It is astonishing and very discouraging to me that neither Reavley nor his family seem to have taken on board the impact of his violation of public trust. They, and he, just don't get it.

For the sake of argument, though, let's take up the idea of releasing him so that he could begin repaying the food bank. This begs a couple of crucial questions. First, is he actually employable? He's a felon. He has no discernible job skills outside the work he previously performed. His intention might be to work to repay, but I doubt that he would be able to do so. Second, doesn't he have other debts and expenses that would take priority, legally if not morally?

If he still argues that he did not divert these funds -- and bear in mind that the amount to which he pled is substantially less than the amount with which he was charged -- I am hard pressed to believe that he truly intends to repay the amount for which he was convicted. Remember the interview in which he said that he regretted having pled guilty to as much as he did?

Responding to the other red herring, which is that Reavley was not found guilty of murder, I will observe only that a finding of "not guilty" in no way means that he was found innocent. It is possible to have large and troubling doubts about Reavley's innocence in the murders and still agree that it was not possible to craft the airtight case justice rightly requires for conviction.

Reavley's anonymous defenders here would acquit themselves more honorably if they were to organize themselves to repay the financial harm -- both the funds stolen, outright, and the funds people and organizations declined to contribute during and because of this episode -- and the reputations of non-profit organizations' management in Great Falls. Such efforts would have an beneficial impact on the organizations damaged by Reavley's actions but would also, I expect, increase public sympathy for him.

We all value honest efforts at reparation. But making reparation means accepting responsibility, as Alan Reavley himself steadfastly refuses to do. To his supporters: it is hardly a sincere acknowledgment of his responsibility for these felonies to say, "Yeah, but you're all making too big of a deal of this." Get back to me when you understand the "big deal" and when you are able to show your involvement in a concrete plan for repairing the harm done.

I edited this post on 17 Feb 2011 in order to add paragraph markup to the blockquote.

This doesn't seem right

No jail for a businessman who downloaded and sent child pornography - I truly do not understand Androscoggin County Superior Court Justice Donald Marden's decision to answer this admitted child pornographer's prayers. That Regis F. Lepage gets to serve his sentence in a jail he "created" for himself, in the words of the judge, seems quite a lot less just than the legal consequences seem to call for.

It occurred to me to wonder what the judge was thinking and then I realized: I don't care. "Let it not be said"? Well, it's going to be.