Family of slain Kelowna mother urges B.C. to strengthen protections against intimate partner violence

Emma MacLeod

5/27/20262 min read

The family of Bailey McCourt, a Kelowna mother killed in July 2025, is urging British Columbia to take stronger action on intimate partner violence, saying federal reforms alone will not be enough to prevent future deaths. Their call comes as Bailey’s Law, a federal private member’s bill inspired by McCourt’s case, continues to advance in Ottawa. Bill C-225 passed the House of Commons on April 27, 2026, and is now at second reading in the Senate.

McCourt, 32, was killed in a Kelowna parking lot in broad daylight. Her estranged husband, James Plover, has been charged with first-degree murder. Reporting at the time said he had been convicted of assault in a separate case and released pending sentencing just hours before her death, a detail that has become central to the family’s push for reform.

Family says province also has a key role

McCourt’s relatives say the provincial government has an important responsibility in addressing intimate partner violence, especially in how court orders are enforced and how risk is assessed when accused people are released into the community.

They are calling for stronger protection-order enforcement and broader use of GPS monitoring for high-risk accused people on bail. B.C. already has an electronic supervision framework and has publicly described GPS-enabled monitoring as part of its correctional supervision tools.

Attorney General Niki Sharma has also publicly pointed to provincial work on intimate partner violence, including risk assessments and GPS monitoring, as part of B.C.’s response. Reporting in late 2025 additionally said McCourt’s killing helped trigger a provincial framework aimed at improving how the justice system responds to intimate partner violence.

What Bailey’s Law would change

Bailey’s Law would amend the Criminal Code in several ways.

According to the bill text passed by the House of Commons, it would create a new first-degree murder rule for killings of an intimate partner in certain circumstances, expand the use of judicial interim release conditions, and increase detention periods for seized items under section 490 of the Criminal Code. Parliament’s LEGISinfo site confirms the bill is now before the Senate.

The legislation was introduced by Conservative MP Frank Caputo, whose riding includes Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola.

Pressure building, but no B.C. bill yet

The family’s latest appeal underscores a broader frustration: that despite the public attention on McCourt’s death, there is still no separate provincial bill in British Columbia tied specifically to their reform requests.

For now, the issue appears to be moving on two tracks — federal criminal-law reform through Bailey’s Law, and provincial justice-system changes involving risk assessment, supervision and victim protection. McCourt’s family says both are necessary if governments want to prevent similar cases from happening again.

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