There is a story about a business owner, we will call him Joe, who hired two people to help him unload large barrels of wine.

The wine was very expensive and he specifically instructed the workers to be very careful.

Unfortunately, as happens in life, one of the workers slipped as he was unloading the barrel and it cracked, spilling all the contents on the ground.

Joe was very angry. He told the workers that he will sue them for damages if they don’t pay him for the now unusable wine.

The workers were very poor and they begged Joe . . . [more]

I’m frequently asked to track down cases that lawyers can’t find. Most of the time the problem is an incorrect citation, but sometimes the problem is that the (usually older) case isn’t available in any online databases or print reporters. I’m now running into a new challenge: does the case exist or is it an AI hallucination?

I generally start with the assumption that the problem is an incorrect citation. In this situation, the most common issues are the misspelling of a party name or missing or incorrect numbers. I use multiple resources (e.g. CanLII, Lexis+, Westlaw Canada) and search . . . [more]

Guidance for lawyers on generative AI use consistently urges careful verification of outputs. One popular framing advises treating AI as a “first-year associate”—smart and keen, but inexperienced and needing supervision. In this column, I take the position that, while this framing helpfully encourages caution, it obscures how generative AI can be deceptive in ways that make it fundamentally dissimilar to an inexperienced first-year associate. How is AI deceptive? In short, generative AI can fail in unpredictable ways and sometimes in ways that mimic reliability, making errors harder to detect than those flowing from simple inexperience.

Before elaborating, three important caveats . . . [more]

Every week we present the summary of a decision handed down by a Québec court provided to us by SOQUIJ and considered to be of interest to our readers throughout Canada. SOQUIJ is attached to the Québec Department of Justice and collects, analyzes, enriches, and disseminates legal information in Québec.

PÉNAL (DROIT) : Dans l’affaire d’un accusé qui a tiré 3 balles dans le dos de la victime, lors d’un guet-apens résultant d’un meurtre commandé, la peine globale de 10 ans, consécutive à celle de 10 ans qui avait été infligée à l’appelant pour un homicide involontaire survenu quelques mois . . . [more]

Several times each month, we are pleased to republish a recent book review from the Canadian Law Library Review (CLLR). CLLR is the official journal of the Canadian Association of Law Libraries (CALL/ACBD), and its reviews cover both practice-oriented and academic publications related to the law.

The Right to Oblivion: Privacy and the Good Life. By Lowry Pressly. Cambridge, M.A.: Harvard University Press, 2024. ix, 228 p. Includes illustrations, notes, and index. ISBN 9780674260528 (hardcover) $47.00; ISBN 9780674298262 (eBook) $44.65.

Reviewed by Laura Reid
Student Learning & Engagement Librarian
University of Calgary

Many of us are . . . [more]

Described as everything from an ecosystem to a fourth level of government, a condo community can be representative of society on a much larger scale. This is a brief examination of what happens when an individual facing an issue takes matters into their own hands…

There is this memorable story from the early 2000s about a condo President, so eager to ensure that enjoyment of the community’s playground was limited to only the building’s residents that he took it upon himself to approach children playing on the equipment to ask them where they lived… until the police showed up!

Hero

The successful lawyers I speak with know that exceptional legal skills are table stakes. Beyond the law, their differentiator is their ability to build relationships, attract ideal clients, and generate consistent referrals. This is where strategic business development planning becomes your competitive advantage.

Without a plan, lawyers may find themselves randomly chasing opportunities which leads to inconsistent results. A good business development plan helps you stop chasing and help transform or eliminate those reactive ideas so you can spend your precious time pursuing opportunities that will lead to business.

After working with hundreds of professionals across solo practices and large . . . [more]

Every week we present the summary of a decision handed down by a Québec court provided to us by SOQUIJ and considered to be of interest to our readers throughout Canada. SOQUIJ is attached to the Québec Department of Justice and collects, analyzes, enriches, and disseminates legal information in Québec.

PÉNAL (DROIT) : Dans une affaire de complot pour meurtre, la juge de première instance n’a pas utilisé les documents électroniques déposés par la poursuite comme preuve de la véracité de leur contenu, ce qui aurait contrevenu au principe de la règle interdisant le ouï-dire; elle a plutôt considéré ces . . . [more]

As a supplement to our Sunday Summary each month, Supreme Advocacy LLP in Ottawa presents Supreme One-Liners, a super-short descriptive guide to the most recent decisions at the Supreme Court of Canada. Supreme Advocacy LLP offers its more comprehensive weekly electronic newsletter, Supreme Advocacy Letter, summarizing all Appeals, Oral Judgments and Leaves to Appeal granted.

Leaves to Appeal

Municipal Law: Assessment Roll Classifications
Ville de Québec v. Jardins de Vérone s.e.c., 2025 QCCA 123 (41748)

Issues re municipal assessment rolls.

Reasons on Appeal

Criminal Law: Sentencing; Considerations re Potential Separate Charge
R. v. Di Paola, 2025 SCC 31 . . . [more]