According to the Globe and Mail, the number of criminal cases stayed in Quebec has more than quadrupled this year due to court delays. There were 18 cases stayed in 2022 and 75 cases have been stayed in 2023 so far. Between March 1 and September 22 this year, Quebec ended an additional 196 criminal cases by nolle prosequi, a procedure where the prosecution declines …

Continue reading Stays of Proceedings Quadruple in Quebec Due to Court Delays

            On November 8, 2023, Alberta, one of the most delay-conscious provinces in Canada, amended the Rules of Court, replacing summary trials with the new “streamlined trial” process. This amendment will take effect on January 1, 2024. Summary trials were intended to be an efficient option for cases that were too complex or important for summary judgment but did not require a full standard trial. …

Continue reading Alberta Amends Rules of Court Replacing Summary Trials with “Streamlined Trials”

Concerns for the backlogs in the Ontario justice system are becoming mainstream. According to Howard Levitt for the Financial Post, the backlog in small claims courts was “so outrageous that many lawyers were choosing to risk filing their claims in Superior Court — with serious adverse cost consequences — in order to have their matter heard on a more timely basis.”[1] Small claims court backlog …

Continue reading Outrageous Backlog in the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal

After 28 years, 68-year-old Sosthene Munyemana, a former doctor in Rwanda now living in France, has finally been put on trial on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity in the Rwandan genocide. In 1995, a complaint was filed in Bordeaux against Munyemana, one year after the genocide. He has been accused of organising torture and killings and almost 70 witnesses are expected to testify. …

Continue reading Former Rwandan Doctor Living in France Brought to Trial After Twenty-Eight Year Delay

In only eleven months, FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried has been arrested, charged, and found guilty of all seven charges of fraud and conspiracy. FTX, a cryptocurrency empire, toppled last year due to a spike in withdrawals that exposed $8 billion missing. Bankman-Fried was accused by the prosecution for stealing $10 billion from FTX and moving it to his hedge-fund, Alameda Research. Between Bankman-Fried’s attempts at …

Continue reading Bankman-Fried Arrested and Tried in Eleven Months

Trevor Cadieu, a retired lieutenant-general for the Canadian Armed Forces has received a stay of proceedings regarding two sexual assault charges from 1994 by Kingston judge Larry O’Brien. Justice O’Brien found that, given the trial was expected to conclude by mid-February 2024, the case will have exceeded the 18-month Jordan ceiling by a month and a half. He laid the blame at the feet of …

Continue reading Military Sexual Assault Case Stayed

The federal prosecution has just rested its case against Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of the bankrupt cryptocurrency FTX. He has plead “not guilty” to two charges of fraud and five charges of conspiracy. Three of his former colleagues have plead “guilty” and testified against Bankman-Fried. The prosecution alleges that Bankman-Fried misappropriated funds to his own hedge-fund, Alameda research. The position the defence seems to be …

Continue reading The Bankman-Fried Fraud Case

Back in 2010, Ellen Alston and Leslie Vecsey sued the Municipal District of Foothills No. 31 for $8 million for alleged contamination of the groundwater. By 2014, the parties exchanged records and the municipality applied for access of the water in order to test it. Ms. Alston and Mr. Vecsey initially appealed the order but later abandoned the appeal. However, the municipality couldn’t test the …

Continue reading Foothills 31 v Alston, 2022