Author archives: wpengine
KILLING AN UNBORN CHILD – Father of unborn child killed during mom’s murder wrestles emotions, wants new law | Windsor Star
– Although you can feel it kick and hear it’s heart beat and watch it develop, our law says that “a child becomes a human being when it has completely proceeded in a living state from the body of it’s mother”. Our society has adopted this value to be able to say abortions are not …
MICROSCOPIC FORENSIC TESTING IS NOT AS RELIABLE AS YOU MIGHT THINK
– FBI recently said that “most of the experts in hair microscopy gave flawed testimony during a 25-year period, potentially affecting more than 3,000 defendants. In one particularly egregious case, two FBI forensic experts confused a human hair with a dog hair. The defendant served 28 years in prison before DNA evidence exonerated him.” The …
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EYEWITNESSES AREN’T AS RELIABLE AS YOU MIGHT THINK
– “Careful studies have demonstrated that, regardless of the level of certainty an eyewitness expresses at the time of original identification (which itself may be affected by numerous factors), a witness’s confidence in the correctness of the identification steadily increases over time. This occurs for psychological and cognitive reasons that have nothing to do with …
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ISIS SUPPORTER BRINGS CHARTER CHALLENGE
He has a point. The court has imposed the equivalent of a criminal conviction sentence upon him although he has not been accused of or charged with breaking any law. He is a law abiding citizen. “With Bill C-51 passing we’re only going to see more of these.” Is this really what we want to …
JUSTICE DELAYED – A need for a statute of limitations in criminal law?
My friend and colleague makes a good point. Any Crown or Judge will tell you that historical cases are the most difficult to prove and usually result in an acquittal. Evidence is either gone or deteriorated to the point of being unreliable. The threshold for laying a charge is so low – as low as …
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REHABILITATION NEEDS TO BE RECOGNIZED – Irish Bill aims to wipe the slate clean on certain convictions
“Having to declare a criminal record presents a significant, sometimes insurmountable, obstacle to accessing employment, training and education. There is no doubt that in the case of certain serious crimes, it is never appropriate to forget the fact of a conviction. Our European neighbours have long recognised this and they have all adopted so-called “spent …
FITBIT DATA AS EVIDENCE – used to self-incriminate its user | Éloïse Gratton
As we go through daily life we leave an electronic data trail, seemingly of everything we do, whether online or not. Most of this data we’re not aware of creating and it seems to be cast off into the cloud like so much detritus but a lot of it is recoverable and can be used …
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CARTOON KIDDIE PORN -Criminalizing Cartoons
Is viewing/possession of such cartoons really criminal behaviour? Conviction carries the very harsh penalty of a mandatory minimum jail sentence and registration as a sex offender. “Animated child porn is very difficult to prosecute because how can we say if the animated figures in the cartoons are under 18? The Crown has been typically more …
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CALLING POLICE TO DO YOUR JOB -Toronto group homes turning outbursts from kids into matters for police | Toronto Star
Having a profoundly developmentally disabled child and being a participant in the justice system, this one is close to my heart. Police and courts are not the means to deal with mental health issues. Calling on them to do so is an abdication of responsibility and only exacerbates the situation. ““Isn’t the message we want …