Ontario’s Attorney General calls on federal counterpart to speed up justice system
Yasir Naqvi said he wants Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould to curtail the use of preliminary inquiries in criminal cases, and fill the 11 judicial vacancies in Ontario immediately.

thestar.com
By Jacques Gallant
Feb. 21, 2017

Ontario’s Attorney General is calling on his federal counterpart to scrap preliminary inquiries in most criminal cases as a way to speed up the justice system.

These hearings are held prior to trials in Superior Court, which handles the most serious cases such as murder, and allow for a lower court judge to determine if there is enough evidence to send the accused to trial.

Speaking to the Empire Club of Canada Tuesday, Attorney General Yasir Naqvi said he also wants federal Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould to move as quickly as possible to fill Ontario’s 11 judicial vacancies in Superior Court, which include seven in the GTA and three in Ottawa.

“We need to make bold changes to speed up and simplify the criminal court process,” Naqvi said.

“It is our view that the long-held rationales for preliminary inquiries simply no longer exist,” he continued. “I have, therefore, asked the Minister to consider Criminal Code reforms that will significantly curtail the use of preliminary inquiries in criminal cases destined for the Superior Court.”

The Criminal Lawyers’ Association, which supports preliminary inquiries as the best way to discover a case against the accused, said it was not consulted on Naqvi’s request.

“We will be pursuing the opportunity to point out the shortcomings of the Attorney General’s position,” said CLA president Anthony Moustacalis.

He said a preliminary inquiry also allows the parties to narrow the scope of a case, meaning the eventual trial would not be so lengthy or costly.

Toronto lawyer Daniel Brown pointed out that the Supreme Court’s recent decision to set a timeline of 30 months to get a case to trial in Superior Court obviously took into account the time needed for a preliminary inquiry.

“And, so, the notion that these preliminary inquiries have no value to the system is completely unfounded and false,” he said.

In a letter to Wilson-Raybould obtained by the Star, Naqvi said preliminary inquiries should be limited to the most serious offences, such as murder and treason.

He said the Crown’s screening standard for bringing a case forward is already higher than the test used in a preliminary inquiry to determine if an accused should stand trial.

Naqvi said that the provincial government has been conducting an analysis regarding the effectiveness of preliminary inquiries, and found that, in the vast majority of cases, the accused was ordered to stand trial.

“Yet this step in the process typically adds months to the length of a criminal case,” he said.

Naqvi said he has also asked Wilson-Raybould to convene a special meeting as soon as possible of provincial and territorial attorneys general to discuss the implications of a landmark 2016 Supreme Court decision that set new timelines to get a case to trial.

That decision, R v. Jordan, found that cases that take longer than 18 months to get to trial in provincial court, and 30 months in Superior Court, are considered presumptively unreasonable and it falls on the Crown to prove there were exceptional circumstances for the delay.

If the Crown fails, the charge against the accused will be stayed. Delay attributed to the defense cannot be used to justify staying a charge.

Several serious criminal cases have already been stayed in Ontario as a result of the Jordan decision, including a first-degree murder case in Ottawa last year.