Cultural Expectations of Timeliness
Andre Picard has led an extended conversation in the Globe and Mail on the many questions respecting the quality of healthcare in Canada. In Friday, February 7’s column he focusses on two successful healthcare systems in the Netherlands and Denmark. He observes that virtually all their people have access to primary care, that there is a far more effective distribution of care duties between physicians, …
Defence Delays in Fouani Case Highlight Systemic Tug-of-War Between Timeliness and the Choice of Parties
Talal Fouani, 48, was charged in June 2022 for “laundering money for organized crime” in relation to a police investigation “into a massive, cross-border drug trafficking operation involving Mexican cartels.” According to the Alberta police, the $55-million drug bust was the largest ever in Alberta, “involving nearly one metric tonne of methamphetamine and six kilograms of cocaine.” Two weeks after Fouani was charged there was …
Re-starting the Clock: When Do We Start Measuring Timeliness
The Provincial Court of BC’s New Small Claims Practice Direction recognises that we should not force parties to start entirely afresh or rejoin the queue when a continuation is necessary or a re-trial has been ordered. This raises the important question of when we should start the clock on timeliness. The new practice direction issued by Chief Judge Melissa Gillespie for all small claims matters …
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“Inefficiency and Persistent Delays” in the Malawian Justice System, Reports the Nyasa Times
Inefficiencies and Corruption in Justice Systems The independence of judges from partisan or corrupt influence is universally valued and is a goal as old as judging itself. One symptom of both can be delays that seem calculated to benefit some litigants at the cost of others. The fact that a loss of trust often flows from reports or experiences of delay should make timeliness a …
Alleged Real Estate Fraudster With “Charges Old Enough to Drive” Still Has Not Stood Trial and Continues to Do Business
In 2002, the Vancouver police, with the help of the RCMP, “mounted what was described as the largest commercial crime investigation in the department’s history,” writes Dan Fumano for the Vancouver Sun. In 2008, criminal charges were laid against alleged real estate fraudster Tarsem Gill and Martin Wirick, Gill’s lawyer. Wirick cooperated with the investigation. He pleaded guilty in 2009 and he was disbarred and …
Timely Deadlines? Or a Timely Culture?
How do we deliver consistently speedy and timely results in justice? Do we focus on making deadlines that encourage/necessitate timeliness? Or do we begin with the culture? Perhaps we need both. But what do we begin with? This seems like a chicken-and-egg question: Do good deadlines produce a timely culture, or does a timely culture produce timely deadlines? We at Timely Justice suggest that timely …
Kent Cody Barlow Case Delayed Indefinitely: A Loss for Everyone
The Have and Have-Nots of Timeliness In criminal cases defendants are constitutionally entitled to timely justice but may also benefit from the increased uncertainty and decay in the quality of evidence that almost inevitably flows from long delays and asymmetrically benefits criminal defendants. Indeed, in some jurisdictions there is a decrease in guilty pleas as trial delays lengthen. For victims and the community there is …
Continue reading Kent Cody Barlow Case Delayed Indefinitely: A Loss for Everyone
They Will Wear You Out
The Need for Institutions How do we imagine justice being dispensed in ancient times? Robert Alter notes in his translation of the Hebrew Bible that the language used to describe the characteristics of a good judge (God-fearing, truthful, haters of bribes) is similar for “the recruitment of judges [that] occurs in both Hittite and Egyptian documents dating from the late second millennium B.C.E.”[1] This widespread …
Fourteen Stays in BC for Unreasonable Delay 2023/24: “An Injustice System for the Victims,” CBC Reports
How many judicial stays for unreasonable delay are acceptable? In each case there is a tension between timeliness and the community’s desire to see criminals punished. In 2023/24, there were 14 stays for unreasonable delay including a Ponzi scheme case (the Miller case), a sexual assault case of which the alleged victim was a six-year-old girl, and a case involving “a Prince George man who …
The Canadian Civil Justice System is “Breaking Down, Mired in Procedures that No Longer Make Sense,” Reports the Globe and Mail
Canada’s civil-justice system, writes Sean Fine for the Globe and Mail, “is breaking down, mired in procedures that no longer make sense, according to the Supreme Court of Canada.” Stays for delay are high and the Jordan ceiling has had “the unintended effect of draining the civil system’s resources” since criminal cases are prioritized due to their time-limit. On top of that, scores of judicial …