Conservative MP draws from personal tragedy to change the Youth Criminal Justice Act

< warm>WARNING: This story contains inside information virtually felo-de-se.

Sitting at their kitchen table, Luc and Caro lock eyes and hold hands tightly. They lost their son, David, last year. And it helps to talk about it.

"David was a curious little boy," recalls his father, Conservative MP Luc Berthold. "He wanted to touch everything. Try everything, do everything."

The two parents flip through a family photo album. Smiles appear at certain moments of happiness, but there is also a shadow in their eyes.

He was "vivid and intelligent, but not always happy-go-lucky," adds David's mother, Caroline Lévesque. 

"You would give him a gift, and he would say thank you, he was happy. But his face didn't show it."

The first red flags appeared during his teenage years.

"His first time getting drunk. He was 13-and-a-half or 14. He came home and could barely walk," Berthold says.

It was the beginning of a troubled period: questionable friendships, staying out until the early hours of the morning, drug and alcohol abuse. And later, as an adult, run-ins with the law.

At age 21, David was charged with trafficking crack cocaine. He pleaded guilty to reduced charges of drug possession. It was a shock for his parents to see him handcuffed standing before a judge.

David died by suicide at age 28 in early 2025. After several months of grieving, Berthold decided to turn his pain into action, introducing a private member's bill to give young offenders better access to substance-abuse treatment.

"We want to give some meaning to something that has none," Lévesque says.

"We are going to make sure that something positive comes out of all this," Berthold adds. 

Private member's bills from Opposition members rarely get passed in the House of Commons. But in this case, the Justice Department supports the idea, and the initiative has received backing from all political parties.

The Bill, C-231, would amend the Youth Criminal Justice Act as well as the Liberal government's bail-reform bill that is currently moving through Parliament. 

It would give youth justice courts the power to delay sentencing for a young offender found guilty of an offence tied to controlled substances or cannabis. This allows the youth to participate in an authorized addiction treatment program first. 

And failing or refusing to complete the treatment program would by itself trigger jail time.

These options already exist in adult courts, but not for young offenders. 

"Basically, we are taking a copy-paste of the adult law and applying it to youth," Berthold said.

David had at times gotten back on his feet, starting a family and having two children. But his demons caught up with him.

"If this bill had been in place for David," Lévesque said, "I don't know if it would have cured him. But it might have given him a few more tools in life."

"We can't do anything more for David," said Berthold. "But we can do something for [others]."

His bill is scheduled to be debated in its third and final reading on Sept. 22, after one of his Conservative colleagues, Garnett Genuis, yielded his own private member's bill slot on the order paper.

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Reporter, Radio-Canada

Christian Noel is a reporter with Radio-Canada.

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