Including her pre-trial detention, Lisa spent approximately six years in jail for an offence which the Court of Appeal eventually determined warranted a three year sentence, as opposed to the indeterminate one imposed by Justice Murray. To make matters worse, she also spent most of her time living in some of the most severe and limiting prison conditions in Canada. Nobody should ever have to face the sort of tortuous ordeal that Lisa was forced to endure.

Hopefully the decision of the Alberta Court of Appeal in Lisa’s case will result in broader systemic changes to the administration of justice for women in Alberta and across Canada. To start with, the Court reaffirmed the decision of the Supreme Court of Canada in the Lyons case, by indicating that the dangerous offender provision, “applies to “...a small group of highly dangerous criminals ...and that “the court must be satisfied that the pattern of conduct is substantially or pathologically intractable”. They also challenged the acceptance in the lower courts of a psychological assessment of Lisa that “effectively implies ... that a woman’s thoughts about murder can somehow be equated with a man’s commission of a murder...”

The Court also pointed out that “dangerous offender legislation is targeting that small group of recalcitrant offenders whose past behaviour is sufficiently entrenched that future risks to public safety warrant preventative detention” and noted that “every offence which Neve committed was entangled in some way with her life as a prostitute.” They also pointed out that while it was not to be condoned, Lisa’s violent offences were generally characterized as attempts to avenge wrongs done to others. Furthermore, they characterized Lisa as “a young woman with a relatively short criminal record for violence, [who was] disposed to telling shocking stories of violence.”