By Chris Brown

Vital Statistics Act

Province wants to block sex offenders from legally changing their name

Jun 24, 2020 | 3:25 PM

The province has introduced legislation that would better ensure convicted sex offenders must live under their own name.

The proposed changes to the Vital Statistics Act will require anyone 18 years or older applying to change their name to submit to a criminal record check or police background check.

Anyone convicted of designated sexual offences will be ineligible for a legal change of name. Designated offences include sexual exploitation, incest, aggravated sexual assault, child pornography and others.

Sheldon Kennedy, a survivor, advocate and co-founder of Respect Group Inc., said the move is one step that can be taken to try to protect children and making offenders face their actions daily.

Kennedy was abused by his junior hockey coach Graham James, who was sentenced to three and a half years in that case, has since changed his name to Michael James.

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“It will not curb a pedophile’s instinct, but it will mean they cannot hide, they cannot be the chameleon in our communities,” said Kennedy. “They cannot escape their past, they will have a sentence more in keeping with the trauma and hurt they have inflicted.”

Service Alberta Minister Nate Glubish said he was shocked to learn that convicted sex offenders could legally change their names.

“Survivors of sexual violence have no choice but to live with the trauma they’ve experienced for the rest of their lives,” said Glubish. “So it seems common sense to me that their offenders should have to live with their names that they were convicted under for the rest of their lives too”

Glubish hopes his provincial counterparts will introduce similar legislation and this will be the beginning of a pan-Canadian approach. Currently, people can change their name before moving to Alberta.

“We are asking that the 13 different rules of law on legal name change become one law in 13 jurisdictions,” he said.

The law is modelled after Saskatchewan’s introduced earlier this year., after the loophole was first discovered there.