BURNABY – Former British Columbia legislator Katrina Chen sits on a couch in her Burnaby home, reading aloud from the children’s book she’s co-written.
“‘Maybe,’ Mommy tells me, ‘It’s time for a stronger house. We leave everything behind. And we go.’”
The mother and son in the story, “A Stronger Home,” co-written with Elaine Su, turn their backs on a scene of domestic turmoil: a broken vase, furniture overturned, sofa cushions in disarray.
“I wrote this book as a survivor of gender-based violence with personal experiences about how violence has touched and impacted my whole life,” said Chen, B.C.‘s former minister of state for child care.
She considers the scene by artist Delphie Coté-Lacroix, showing the mother and son’s exit, to be among the most powerful in the book — having the courage and strength to leave a violent situation is not easy, she said.
Chen, who also has a young son, sees the problem as an urgent one, pointing to a recent spate of alleged intimate partner violence in B.C.
This month alone, there has been the killing of an 80-year-old Abbotsford woman and the death of her husband in what police consider a murder-suicide; the killing in a Richmond apartment of a 51-year-old woman whose partner has been charged with second-degree murder; and the death of Bailey McCourt, allegedly beaten to death in a Kelowna parking lot by her estranged husband, James Plover, also charged with second-degree murder.
Chen said it was “totally heartbreaking and unacceptable” to hear of such tragedies, and society needed to see the violence as an emergency. She and other advocates want changes to the legal and social justice systems to prevent it from continuing.
“Gender-based violence is a form of violence that’s the most pervasive and most persistent,” said Chen. “It’s the longest human rights violation throughout human history.”
Chen, who represented the riding of Burnaby-Lougheed until last year, was best known in B.C. as an advocate for the NDP government’s $10-a-day childcare program, as well as co-chairing Premier David Eby’s campaign to lead the party.
But in 2022, Chen announced she was taking herself out of contention for a new ministerial position, revealing she wanted “time and space to heal” from the trauma of gender-based violence.
“I have long-term trauma that has yet to be fully unpacked,” she said at the time.
Chen said in a recent interview that she was a victim of gender-based violence during her childhood, but she never talked about the trauma until she was hurt again in her late 30s.
“I started realizing that the impact of violence can really impact a whole person’s career, your life choices,” said Chen.
She said it was important to break the cycle of violence from generation to generation. But opening up isn’t easy — revealing emotional scars came with misunderstanding, judgment, and stigma, said Chen.
“I was very little when I was first touched by gender-based violence, and as I was growing up and realizing what was happening to me, I questioned myself, I judged myself,” said Chen.
‘A SAFER WAY TO LIVE’
It’s a feeling that Sarah Sherman has struggled with, too.
In 2004, her husband, Jeff Bethell, attacked her in her Nanaimo, B.C., home, tied her up, and tried to kill her.
She freed herself and alerted police, but when Bethell saw a police car, he crashed his own vehicle, killing himself and a four-year-old boy in a car he struck.
Sherman said she lived with “shame and guilt for many years,” relocating to New Brunswick to escape the past and be “invisible” again.
“Some people were critically injured. They lost their child. How do I ever make up for that?” said a tearful Sherman, “I can’t, I can’t, and that is the most heartbreaking part.”
Sherman is the founder of charity We’re Here for You, which provides comfort kits to survivors of intimate partner violence.
She believes sharing can empower other victims.
“When we share truthfully and authentically, we give other people hope, possibly inspire them to find a better way or a safer way to live.”
On the legal front, there has been some progress.
Last year, B.C. Attorney General Niki Sharma appointed lawyer Kim Stanton to conduct an independent review of the B.C. legal system’s treatment of intimate partner violence and sexual violence.
Stanton said she found numerous barriers to action and made nine recommendations to help survivors, including an increased focus on prevention, reform in the courts, and legal aid funding for family law services.
Chen called it a good start.
She also said the reform process could not involve a better person than Sharma, who supported her personally while she was struggling with violence.
“But we need actions,” said Chen. She would like to see all the proposals in Stanton’s report enacted, she said.
Sharma said “the work is underway,” and a team within ministries, including hers, was looking at how to implement the recommendations.
“I’ve seen that there are gaps in the justice system that we need to change,” she said.
Sharma said she pressed for changes to the Criminal Code to improve risk assessments when she attended last month’s first minister’s meeting in place of Eby, who was overseas.
“In particular, what I’m asking to see changed is changing it so after the person’s convicted, the bail conditions are looked at so they are held based on the risk that they pose, instead of them being released until sentencing,” said Sharma, adding that this period is usually “the riskiest time” for the victim.
The killing of McCourt in Kelowna had occurred a few hours after Plover was convicted of a separate assault; there was no discussion of keeping him in custody, a recording of the hearing revealed.
Eby said last week that he had delivered a letter from McCourt’s family to Prime Minister Mark Carney, who had committed to bail reform “on multiple occasions.”
Sharma said she plans to meet with Justice Minister Sean Fraser soon to continue such conversations.
“I think that anybody who has known somebody who’s been the victim of intimate partner violence, or anybody who’s been a victim themselves, understands that the system doesn’t take the crime as seriously as it should,” said Sharma.
“And that makes me angry.”
Chen, who is now president of An Xin Community Savings Credit Union in Richmond, said her recovery journey isn’t easy, but she is grateful for community support.
“It took me a while to understand how important it is to find my own sense of self and reflect on what I truly want in life — rather than simply reacting to what has happened to me, like constantly feel angry, hurt or sad.” she said.
“With the support of family, friends, counselling and coaching — and knowing I am not alone — I began to focus on my own well-being.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 29, 2025.
