CRIM 131 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Canadian Judicial Council, Restorative Justice, Legal Aid
10 Dec 2017
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Responsibilities: determine guilt/innocence, sometimes there is not enough evidence for a conviction, impose appropriate sentence, protect the rights of the accused, underlying premise: innocent until proven guilty. Judicial independence: fair and impartial trials, no political interference, a politician cannot go to a judge and say (cid:498)this is the outcome ) want(cid:499) Most frequent cases: impaired driving and common assault, common assault drives the crime rate (lowest level of assault) 25% crimes against the person: much more likely to be taken to court because they are viewed more seriously. Historically: judicial independence over judicial accountability: may be changing. Judges have some accountability, their decisions can be appealed and higher judges may change the decision. Appointment depends on political affiliation and support: liberal government appoint a liberal judge, etc. Two systems: provincial court, superior court. Four levels of court deal with criminal cases: exception: nunavut is unified (single level, too small of a place to actually need more than one.
