By: Admin
PDF Version: Supreme Court Denies Leave to Appeal in Alberta Cases
Cases commented on: R v Alcantara, 2013 ABCA 163; R v Hanna, 2013 ABCA 134; Young v National Money Mart Company, 2013 ABCA 264
On January 30, 2014 the Supreme Court denied leave to appeal in three Alberta cases that gave rise to four separate leave applications. The Court’s summaries of the cases, and their dispositions, are below. Jonnette Watson Hamilton posted a comment on the Money Mart decision here.
By: Jennifer Koshan
PDF Version: Teaching Bedford: Reflections on the Supreme Court’s Most Recent Charter Decision
Case Commented On: Canada (Attorney General) v Bedford, 2013 SCC 72
Much commentary has already been written on the Supreme Court’s decision in Bedford and the implications the case has for the regulation of prostitution in Canada. My interest in this post is to reflect on how to approach Bedford when teaching constitutional law next term. I think Bedford brings some clarity to the case law on section 7 of the Charter, and as Sonia Lawrence has noted here, the decision helps dispel some of the problematic thinking around “choice” and causation in constitutional cases, though I would have liked to see the Court go further here. The Court also could have done more by way of taking a contextual approach in its consideration of the prostitution laws. The evidence presented in the case clearly provided a compelling enough picture of the harms of these laws for the Court to find a violation of section 7, but it is disappointing to see no explicit references to the gendered and racialized nature of prostitution nor to the rich and diverse literature in this area, some of which was cited in the submissions of interveners (see e.g. here, here and here). Finally, the case can also be seen as an example of the relative success that section 7 claims have had of late at the Supreme Court, especially in comparison to the lack of success of section 15 claims.
PDF Version: Supreme Court of Canada Expresses Its Opinion on Alberta Privacy Case
Case commented on: Alberta Information and Privacy Commissioner v United Food and Commercial Workers, Local 401, 2013 SCC 62 (“AIPC v UFCW”)
This case out of Alberta has been the subject of other ABlawg posts (see here and here), and now the Supreme Court of Canada has made its views known on the constitutionality of Alberta’s privacy legislation. Clearly, the issues that were addressed were of interest across Canada as there were several interveners in the case, including the Attorneys General of Canada and Ontario, the Privacy Commissioners of Canada, Ontario and British Columbia, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association and labour and business groups.
PDF Version: Supreme Court Denies Leave to Appeal in Marital Rape Sentencing Case
Case commented on: R v QJK, 2013 ABCA 244; leave to appeal to SCC dismissed November 21, 2013
On November 21, 2013 the Supreme Court of Canada (McLachlin CJ, Cromwell J and Wagner J) dismissed a leave to appeal application by the defence for a sentence handed down by the Alberta Court of Appeal in R v QJK. The Supreme Court’s summary of the case frames the issue on which leave to appeal was sought as “Whether the Honourable Court of Appeal erred in not giving deference to the Learned Sentencing Judge as he did give proper weight to the gravity of the offense and properly considered the principles of denunciation and deterrence and imposed a fit sentence.” In a very brief Memorandum of Decision delivered from the bench, the Court of Appeal had increased the sentence imposed by the sentencing judge from 6 months to 20 months imprisonment. The Court of Appeal noted that the circumstances of the case – forced sexual intercourse by the accused on his spouse – amounted to a major sexual assault necessitating a 3 year starting point (2013 ABCA 244 at para 1). According to the Court of Appeal, the sentencing judge “overemphasized the mitigating circumstances and underappreciated the gravity of the offence as well as the need that the sentence reflect an appropriate degree of denunciation and deterrence” (at para 1).
PDF version: Supreme Court Renders Leave to Appeal Decisions in Several Alberta Cases
Cases considered: R v Mack, 2012 ABCA 42, leave to appeal granted, April 11, 2013 (SCC); Métis Nation of Alberta Region 1 v Joint Review Panel, 2012 ABCA 352, leave to appeal dismissed April 11, 2013 (SCC); Fitzpatrick v Alberta College of Physical Therapists, 2012 ABCA 207, leave to appeal dismissed April 11, 2013 (SCC)
On April 11, 2013 the Supreme Court of Canada handed down leave to appeal decisions in three cases from Alberta.
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