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Current Affairs 2007 - Legal (153 items)
| Dec 20, 2007 | Ex-Federal Justice Led Drug-Use Probe Former Supreme Court of Canada justice Gerald Eric Le Dain, who also led a landmark commission into drug use in Canada in the '60s and '70s, has died.
Le Dain, who died in Toronto Tuesday, was 83.
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| Dec 19, 2007 | BC: Judge's Death Puts Cases In Jeopardy Crown and defence lawyers are working to keep on track two long-running and ongoing Victoria cases temporarily delayed by the sudden death of a Supreme Court judge.
Conferences have been scheduled for January to make sure of continuations of the murder trial of Ruby Ann Ruffolo and the constitutional challenge to the marijuana charges levelled at two men arrested in a raid on a house used by the Vancouver Island Compassion Society as a grow operation.
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| Dec 18, 2007 | MS Sufferer Wins Right to Use Pot Vapourizer Pam Edgar has won her fight to have the provincial government pay for a device she says is needed for her to use marijuana to ease symptoms of multiple sclerosis.
The government, which earlier refused to pay for a $200 marijuana vapourizer, has been forced to reverse its decision following the unanimous decision of an appeal tribunal.
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| Dec 16, 2007 | NS: Justice Unit Holds Power To Evict Guilty or not, people suspected of certain crimes are being turfed from their homes across the province.
So far, occupants of 23 homes, apartments or trailers have been evicted since the summer, when a new division of the Justice Department began to fully enforce the new provincial Safer Communities and Neighbourhoods Act. Proclaimed Jan. 7, the act is intended to target suspected drug use and sales, prostitution, illegal gaming, bootlegging or child sexual abuse.
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| Dec 15, 2007 | Jail Too Stiff For Growers? A plan to put more pot growers behind bars has a Burnaby activist smoking mad.
Adam Scriven said a handful of people will gather outside Burnaby-New Westminster MP Peter Julian's office Monday, part of a nationwide day of protest against mandatory jail sentences proposed by the Conservative government.
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| Dec 13, 2007 | Compassion Pleaded After Drugs Convictions Pete Young said he wasn't trying to hide anything -- he was offering marijuana from a downtown location to ease people's pain.
He said doctors knew. So did the police.
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| Dec 6, 2007 | ON: Medicinal Pot Case Wraps Up Lawyers for Canadian users of medical marijuana who want Ottawa to ease restrictions on where they get their pot wrapped up their case Wednesday by telling a Federal Court judge that government-approved marijuana, grown by a Flin Flon contractor, doesn't compare to higher-quality strains available on the street.
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| Dec 5, 2007 | Tough New Drug Laws Promise Jail Time Canadians caught trafficking drugs will spend mandatory time in jail if new federal Conservative legislation passes.
But critics of the plan say it will just add to prison overcrowding, while doing little do deter drug dealing.
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| Dec 3, 2007 | NS: Simpson Facing Charges of Trafficking, Sentencing AMHERST - Within minutes of his Supreme Court sentencing for counts of possession, trafficking and producing marijuana being adjourned, Rickey Logan Simpson was taken into custody and faces additional charges of trafficking the same substance.
Crown attorney Paul Drysdale told Justice Felix Cacchione that two officers from Amherst Police Department, including Sgt. Tim Hunter, were at the back of the courtroom to take Simpson into custody where he would be charged with trafficking marijuana.
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| Nov 30, 2007 | Ministers Guilty Of Trafficking 'Sacrament' Hamilton's high priest of pot, who turns 75 next month, faces a possible jail sentence after being convicted of selling the holy sacrament to an undercover police officer.
A Superior Court jury deliberated eight hours Wednesday night before finding Walter Tucker and fellow minister of pot, Michael Baldasaro, 58, guilty of all five charges. They will be sentenced Jan. 24.
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| Nov 29, 2007 | Judge's Death Puts Pot Trial In Jeopardy The death of B.C. Supreme Court Justice Robert Edwards has jeopardized a lengthy and costly criminal trial involving an important constitutional challenge of the marijuana law.
In most criminal cases, when a judge is unable to follow through to judgment, a mistrial is declared.
In this case, a rare hearing has been scheduled in Vancouver tomorrow to see if there is a way to save the huge expense incurred and the evidence already presented.
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| Nov 24, 2007 | BC Civil Forfeiture Act -- Facts Figures There are now about 60 cases involving about $5 million in cash and assets, including real estate, vehicles and jewelry believed to be the profit from crime and other unlawful activity.
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| Nov 24, 2007 | Crime Rate: A 25 Year Low According to Statistics Canada, the national crime rate fell to its lowest level in 25 years last year. Since 1991, the crime rate is down by 30 per cent after steadily increasing through the '60s, '70s and '80s.
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| Nov 24, 2007 | We Need An Open, Comprehensive Grow-Op List Two weeks ago in this column, I asked whether listing agents should be required to disclose that a home was, or might have been, a marijuana grow operation, or whether they should disclose only if the seller tells them it was a grow-op?
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| Nov 23, 2007 | Harper's Misguided War on Pot Justice Minister Rob Nicholson's new package of mandatory sentences for marijuana dealers, announced on Tuesday, seems to involve some perverse incentives. Under the bill, a grower who is caught with between one and 200 plants and is found to have the intention of trafficking will receive a non-negotiable minimum of six months in prison, unless he can show that he is eligible for judicially ordered treatment under the auspices of a drug court. The maximum penalty for having a few pot plants on the premises will be increased to 14 years.
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| Nov 21, 2007 | Ottawa Proposes Mandatory Jail For Growers, Dealers The Conservative government unveiled historic legislation Tuesday to create the first mandatory prison terms in Canada for people convicted of trafficking illicit drugs.
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| Nov 21, 2007 | Drug Law Will Fill Jails, Expert Warns B.C.'s already crowded jails will need to squeeze in another 700 marijuana growers per year if new mandatory sentences are enacted, an analysis of sentencing figures suggests.
"You basically need a new prison to facilitate that," said Darryl Plecas, a criminologist at the University College of the Fraser Valley who studies marijuana sentencing. "You're going to have hundreds, if not thousands, of people going to jail who aren't going now."
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| Nov 17, 2007 | The Dangers of Keeping Pot Illegal The benefits to Canada's justice system of legalizing marijuana would be immediate. Police would have more time to investigate real crime, including cracking down on harder drugs. The courts wouldn't be bogged down by trivial pot charges. Jail cells could be reserved for actual criminals.
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| Nov 15, 2007 | Pot Activists Hail Ruling (Invalid law) Marijuana activists are hailing a recent court ruling as the beginning of the end of Canada's prohibition on pot, but the Crown dismisses the decision as non-binding.
A trial judge in Oshawa, Ont., threw out charges of simple possession of marijuana against three young men on Oct. 19, relying on a previous court ruling that found Canada's pot law unconstitutional. In making his decision, Judge Norman Edmondson cited a decision last July by a fellow judge of the Ontario Court of Justice.
[ See: http://thepotlawhasfallen.ca/, especially if you have been charged with possession of cannabis ] |
| Nov 12, 2007 | Trustee In Drug Bust Plans To Attend Board Meeting A Turtle River School Division trustee facing drug charges said he will attend Tuesday evening's board meeting, to prevent fellow trustees from kicking him off the school board.
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