{"id":79175,"date":"2017-06-15T14:08:11","date_gmt":"2017-06-15T14:08:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/?p=79175"},"modified":"2017-06-15T14:08:11","modified_gmt":"2017-06-15T14:08:11","slug":"justice-system-in-urgent-need-of-reform-senate-committee","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/political\/justice-system-in-urgent-need-of-reform-senate-committee.html","title":{"rendered":"Justice system ‘in urgent need of reform’: Senate committee"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Supreme Court of Canada is known as the court of last resort because its decisions are final. There are no more appeals to make, no more arguments to be heard on a case.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

But every so often the court of last resort gives itself a kind of do-over\u00a0using a new case to clarify a previous decision.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

That’s what’s expected to happen on Friday, when the court will rule on\u00a0a Newfoundland and Labrador\u00a0drug trafficking case<\/a>\u00a0that took more than five years to come to trial. That\u00a0will give the court a chance to clear up confusion it created with a decision last July<\/a> \u2014\u00a0confusion that’s led to hundreds, if not thousands, of criminal cases being stopped simply because they took too long to come to trial.<\/p>\n

The decision came to be known as “the Jordan ruling”<\/a> after the court\u00a0said\u00a0Barrett\u00a0Richard Jordan’s charter rights had been violated due to an “unreasonable” 49-month wait for a trial. Drug charges against him were stayed.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

What’s a reasonable time? The majority of judges decided in the 5-4 ruling\u00a0that it’s 18 months in provincial court\u00a0or 30 months in superior court\u00a0from\u00a0time of charge to conclusion of trial.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Lower court judges soon began tossing out all sorts of cases \u2014 some of them involving charges of murder<\/a> and sexual assault<\/a> \u2014 on the grounds that they, too, had taken too long.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

The decisions had widespread implications.<\/p>\n

Victims and their families felt that they would never get the chance to see justice done.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

For those accused of a crime, there would be no opportunity for a day in court \u2014 or,\u00a0as one judge put it in stopping a murder case in Ottawa last year, “The accused himself may find this to be a hollow victory. A stay of proceedings is not the same as a verdict of not guilty.”<\/p>\n

‘Urgent’ need for reform<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n

It’s against that backdrop that the Senate committee on legal and constitutional affairs released its report<\/a> Wednesday with a list of recommendations to reduce trial delays.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

The 205-page report is as thorough as it is long.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

But it starts with the premise that Canada’s justice system is “in urgent need of reform.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Among the recommendations: that a stay of proceedings should not be\u00a0the only remedy available to courts, including the court of last resort, in cases that have dragged through the system.\u00a0Another recommendation is that\u00a0courts have to do a better job of managing cases.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Perhaps most importantly, the report urges the federal justice minister to take the lead in changing the Criminal Code to reduce procedural and other barriers to a speedy trial, and to fill a judicial vacancy as soon as a judge retires.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n