Author archives: Dennis Reeve

WHEN JUDGES CRITICIZE POLICE (#2) – Justice Tetley severely criticizes police for a lack of investigation in a sexual assault case. – “This judgment serves as a cautionary example as to the fact an injustice can occur when appropriate and available investigative steps are not pursued and a criminal prosecution instituted on what is now concluded to be an uncorroborated complaint of criminal misconduct of dubious reliability.”

https://gaggle.email/attachments/ag1zfmdhZ2dsZS1tYWlscigLEgRMaXN0GICAwJXj2KcJDAsSCkF0dGFjaG1lbnQYgIDQtf2cnQsM/R%20v.%20JANSEN%20Ashley%20-%20Written%20Reasons%20for%20Judgment%20(VF)%20-%2021Dec2023.pdf

WHEN JUDGES CRITICIZE POLICE CONDUCT (#1) – “It is difficult to avoid a suspicion and conclusion that the officer’s groundless targeting of the defendant for investigation was racially infected. There is no other valid explanation for his actions.”

https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/gta-cop-had-absolutely-no-grounds-for-racially-infected-confrontation-judge-rules-tossing-gun-charges/article_94016ea6-bbb8-11ee-8dd6-af2fdd431dab.html?source=newsletter&utm_content=a01&utm_source=ts_sa&utm_medium=email&utm_email=0B41BB051FF7EA38DB4BDD5E33BA3AB2&utm_campaign=police_208046

HOW IS OUR BAIL SYSTEM BROKEN? – With 82 percent of all Ontario prison inmates are being held without bail, the system seems to be cooking along just fine. “We have more people in our provincial jails who are supposed to be considered legally innocent than who have been convicted or found guilty and sentenced to be there,” 

https://www.cp24.com/news/the-vast-majority-of-people-in-ontario-jails-last-year-were-awaiting-a-trial-data-shows-1.6748052

A WISE MOVE – “Justice Michael Wendl of the Ontario Court of Justice walked back what is being called an unprecedented, heavy-handed and illegal contempt of court citation against a local lawyer on Tuesday.” I don’t believe this will or should alleviate a complaint to the Canadian Judicial Council for threatening a lawyer.

https://www.thespec.com/news/hamilton-region/contempt-citation-dropped-against-hamilton-lawyer/article_bdc295d4-97a4-50e4-a269-b46e14b9ffb8.html

JURY DUTY IS NO WALK IN THE PARK – “For most citizens figuratively plucked off the street to serve as jurors, being plonked down in a courtroom and experiencing a real blood-and-guts murder trial can be jarring. It’s one thing to sit back with a bag of popcorn and enjoy a Hollywood slasher movie, quite another to delve, in sometimes excruciating and bloody detail, into a horrific crime committed in your own community, at a location you might know and where you, your family and friends might even frequent.”

https://windsorstar.com/news/local-news/its-not-like-tv-canadian-courtroom-jury-duty-can-exact-a-heavy-toll