with the Ontario Court of Appeal playing the role of the Red Queen in Alice in Wonderland.

See R. v. Metron Construction Corporation, 2013 ONCA 541.

A fine which bankrupts a corporation is the equivalent of a beheading.

I’m not slighting the tragedy that resulted in charges but, given what happened in Metron and why — all you need to do is read paras. 1 – 15, particularly paras. 9-15 — do you agree with the general deterrence rationale? It seems questionable, at best, to me. General deterrence of whom? (Consider the aphorism about “stupidity” in “Forest Gump”.) . . . [more]

Most of us will agree that doing legal research is generally tedious (and frustrating when you get the same results over and over again no matter what search words you use, without finding anything on point !). But once in a while, you will come across a funny case which will somehow make your day a little brighter. In the post-Lord Denning era, this is a post on my recent Canadian favourites.

Bruni v. Bruni, 2010 ONSC 6568 :

Contrary to Quebec, Ontario publishes the names of parties to divorce proceedings. These two, Catherine and Larry, probably wish they . . . [more]

The Quebec Court of Appeal (decision in French) recently overturned a decision of the Quebec Human Rights Tribunal (decision in English) made in 2010 which had essentially held that any decision not to train a pilot made by the U.S. Transportation Safety Administration (TSA) and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was prima facie anti-muslim and/or anti-Arab and discriminatory. Accordingly, Bombardier could not refuse to train a pilot for a license on the basis of a U.S. DHS determination that the pilot constituted a security risk. The CBC described the original case and its ramifications here. The follow up on . . . [more]

PM announces nominee for Supreme Court of Canada
30 September 2013
Ottawa, Ontario

Prime Minister Stephen Harper today announced the nomination of Mr. Justice Marc Nadon for the Supreme Court of Canada. Mr. Justice Nadon will replace Mr. Justice Morris Fish, who resigned from the Supreme Court of Canada effective August 31, 2013.

“I am pleased to announce the nomination of Mr. Justice Nadon, whose extraordinary body of legal work – as a longtime judge on both the Federal Court and the Federal Court of Appeal; judicial member of the Competition Tribunal; expert in maritime and transportation law with almost . . . [more]

The Ontario Court of Appeal released a decision earlier this month in Delicata v. Incorporated Synod of the Diocese of Huron, resolving a dispute between the congregation of an Anglican church in Windsor and the larger Anglican Church of Canada. The conflict originated in the Anglican Church of Canada’s blessing of same-sex marriages. The congregation of St. Aidan’s voted to leave the Synod of the Diocese of Huron after the Bishop of the Synod accepted a resolution to “grant permission to clergy, whose conscience permits, to bless the duly solemnized and registered civil marriages between same-sex couples.”

Although the . . . [more]

I had naively assumed that if you were pardoned for having committed, and being convicted of, a criminal offence, that was that: you and society were square and the slate was clean. An article in today’s Globe and Mail, “Ottawa revokes pardon for man accused in Via train plot” by Colin Freeze, disabused me of that notion. The truth of the matter is that the clearing of the record is conditional.

Under s.2.1 of the Criminal Records Act, R.S.C., 1985, c. C-47, the Parole Board of Canada “has exclusive jurisdiction and absolute discretion to order, refuse . . . [more]

Last month, the Manitoba Court of Appeal commented on the practice in some Manitoba courts of ordering charitable donations be made as a part of sentencing in criminal or other quasi-criminal proceedings.

The Court, in R. v. Choi (J.W.), 2013 MBCA 75 (CanLII) was considering an appeal of sentence by the Crown from a conviction under s. 124(1)(c) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act relating to the defendant’s illegal employment of six foreign nationals. The sentence imposed by the lower Court was an 18-month conditional discharge including supervised probation and a condition that Choi:

Make a charitable

An appeals court in the US has held that in principle, someone who sends a text message to someone she knows is driving (in this case, a motorcycle) and is likely to text back while driving, can be liable for damages caused by that driver while distracted by texting [Kubert v. Best]. In the case in point, the court held that the woman who was texting her boyfriend did not know he was responding while driving, so she was not liable for the damages he caused. (He himself settled with the victims, but his insurance did not cover . . . [more]

A couple of years ago, Connie Crosby mentioned on Slaw (third comment) that she had been surprised to discover that when she ‘Liked’ a page (by joining a ‘fan club’) devoted to a product, her name later appeared in advertisements for that product on her Facebook friends’ pages.

A number of others appear to have been not only surprised but offended at this practice. They brought a class action against Facebook for the practice, an action now settled for $20 million. Whether Connie gets a share of that, I can’t say. Probably not enough to fund a bottle of . . . [more]

We have The Court for Canada, the New Zealand Supreme Court Blog, for New Zealand, and SCOTUSblog for the United States. As of last week, Australia also has a blog dedicated to discussion of the decisions of its highest court: Opinions on High. Indeed, Melbourne Law School, at the University of Melbourne, expressly noted the influence of these three blogs in the development of its own high court commentary site.

It seems an objective of the Opinions on High is to engage a wide audience. Melbourne’s Associate Dean (Engagement) Professor Miranda Stewart not only expects the site to . . . [more]

The Supreme Court of Canada released the decision in Ontario v. Criminal Lawyers’ Association of Ontario last week, dealing with the compensation afforded to amicus curiae. Courts may appoint a “friend of the court,” known as amicus curiae, to assist the court where warranted, and the Attorney General is required to pay the fees for these amicus curiae.

This case involved the appeal of three non-Charter cases in Ontario where the Attorney General disputed the amicus curiae rates as determined by the court, raising constitutional issues about the relationship between the judiciary and the executive and . . . [more]

In a recent case, Heather Sinclair-McDonald, Human Being, asserted that she had waived her rights as a person under the law and therefore the Income Tax Act did not apply to her. She sought an order requiring CRA to pay back all taxes collected from her over the last ten years.

The CRA was able to have the lawsuit dismissed at the outset on the basis that Ms. Sinclair-McDonald’s claim did not disclose a reasonable cause of action.

The court noted that argument made by the plaintiff, that she is a human being and not a person recognized under . . . [more]