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The Federal Government has announced a commitment to nearly $1 Million in funding for research into cannabis impairment. And while it is nice to see the government finally direct money toward studying this important issue, it is also a little bit frustrating. In reality, the decision to do this, at this stage of the game is far too little, too late.

They say a man who represents himself has a fool for a lawyer. But what if you have a pile of wool for a lawyer? Find out more about this strange situation on this week’s edition of Weird and Wacky Wednesdays. Then, we explore the case of a thirteen-year-old charged with eavesdropping. And because I’m partial to impaired driving, another wacky excuse that didn’t fly in a DUI investigation.

Something is rotten in the Province of Ontario.

And if I weren’t so upset by it, I would be inserting jokes at Ontario’s expense here.

Ever since the Newmarket region of Ontario set Canada’s record for the highest sentence ever handed down in an impaired driving case, after the Marco Muzzo sentencing, Ontario has developed a disturbing trend of issuing jail sentences to first time impaired drivers.

This is incredibly problematic and serves only to harm the administration of justice in the long term. And this blog post explains why.

This week is exciting as I get to announce the creation of the Driving Law Podcast Twitter Account! Driving law is the only legal podcast that I know about that also has its own Twitter page. So that’s super exciting and fun. In addition to our exciting announcement, the Driving Law Podcast is now live for Friday, July 13, 2018.

This week, Paul Doroshenko and I speak about the decision by Greyhound to cease service on all but one of its Western Canada routes. Next, we talk about some of the hurdles the Crown will face in the prosecution of the Humboldt Broncos bus crash, and look a little deeper at the bail conditions he was placed on. Finally, we talk about a recent report in Alberta about driver licensing centres and the fraud, bribery, and sexual assault allegations that have recently come to light.

You can catch this week’s episode on iTunes, SoundCloud, or on PlayerFM.

A significant issue that has arisen since the announcement of legalization of recreational cannabis in Canada has been cross-border travel. The United States government still considers cannabis to be an illegal drug, and those who admit to using cannabis and working in the cannabis industry face the potential of lifetime bans on entry into the United States.

Practically speaking, this means that if mom and dad admit to smoking pot, they may be prevented from taking the kids to Disneyland on the family vacation. Or a person who works at a dispensary may be denied entry and not permitted to travel to the United States for a medical procedure not available in Canada.

The consequences are significant and there is a lot that is unknown about how Canadian legal cannabis use will impact border travel.

In the seventh installment of my Weird and Wacky Wednesdays series, we look at the case of a man who was so tired of not getting his fifteen minutes, he made his own made-for-TV experience. Next, we dive into… well, what the police really dove into in a drug trafficking investigation. And finally, we consider yet another really good reason to quit smoking cigarettes.

All on this week’s edition of Weird and Wacky Wednesdays!

The Law Society of BC’s treatment of an Indigenous lawyer fell short of its anti-discrimination obligations, the Supreme Court of British Columbia has ruled. It found the public body failed to adequately take into account the background and personal circumstances of lawyer Miranda Moore, who is of Anishnaabe ancestry and a member of the Cote First Nation, when deciding on her transfer from the Law Society of Alberta to BC. This case highlights some of the challenges Aboriginal members of the legal profession face and it suggests that, despite recent progress, law societies across Canada are still not doing as much as they should to make the bar and the bench more inclusive.
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Ms. Moore had applied to the Law Society of BC to transfer from her former regulating body, the Law Society of Alberta (LSA). She also applied to practice in BC on a temporary basis until the transfer was decided.

                                                                        ………………………

The case of an Ontario Justice of the Peace facing discipline for speaking out about a dysfunctional court system is very troubling for the integrity of the justice system. However, it is not so for the reasons one may initially think.

Complaints have been filed against Julie Lauzon, a Justice of the Peace sitting in Ottawa. The complaints were initiated after Lauzon published a scathing editorial in the National Post, criticizing what she called a “broken” bail system in the Ontario courts. In Ontario, justices of the peace preside over bail hearings. They also, as in British Columbia, perform other judicial functions such as reviewing applications for search warrants.

The basis of the complaints was a concern that Ms. Lauzon’s article brought the administration of justice into disrepute, by publicly denigrating the reputation of Crown counsel and thereby also raised a reasonable apprehension of bias against the Crown. The complaints allege that Ms. Lauzon’s article harmed the justice system.

I call foul.