The Supreme Court of Canada has heard a major case challenging the power of police to conduct arbitrary traffic stops in the face of mounting evidence of racial profiling. This week on Driving Law, Kyla Lee and Paul Doroshenko unpack what’s at stake — and what could finally change.
Welcome to British Columbia’s only weekly DUI law update newsletter. This newsletter contains the most cutting-edge information, the newest case law, and helpful practice tips for DUI defence in BC.
Authored by Kyla Lee, BC’s Impaired Driving Update is released weekly on Thursdays.
This week on Weird and Wacky Wednesdays:Just the facts – When truth requires a new category of understanding
In law, we are obsessed with attempting to find the truth. That is, after all, our job.
And of course we are in a strange period of time where lies are put forward as truth each and every day, particularly by the current U.S. executive branch. At the same time, AI hallucinations and the difficulty AI has in sorting out fact from fiction has created a new problem for lawyers and the courts. Add to that the calculated lies that can arise because of the ease and consequent proliferation of deep fakes, and it feels as if we are flooded in lies.
When the government tells you that you did not see something that you saw with your own eyes, and there’s no responsibility for them lying, it normalizes lies. I think we should all be concerned that we are witnessing the normalization of lies.
Beauty may be in the eye of the beholder, but in law we have relied on objective and subjective facts. That is often where the determination of truth is resolved. But it seems to me with AI, we may have to add a new category in the consideration of facts. Let’s look at a couple of weird and wacky Wednesday stories so you understand what I’m trying to say.
Traffic court proceedings in British Columbia are governed primarily by the Motor Vehicle Act and are dealt with in the Provincial Court of British Columbia. We are often asked how long people have to wait for the traffic court hearing to be scheduled and the answer depends on several variables, most notably the jurisdiction in which the ticket was issued.
Welcome to “Cases That Should Have Gone to the Supreme Court of Canada, But Didn’t!”
In this episode, Kyla Lee from Acumen Law Corporation unpacks a case involving a police search of a computer that raised major privacy concerns. The accused, facing charges related to online conduct, challenged the broad scope of a search conducted on his seized devices. He argued there should be a distinction between the authority to seize a computer and the authority to conduct a full forensic search of its digital contents. The Supreme Court of Canada declined to hear the case.
The Supreme Court of Canada has agreed to hear a major impaired-driving case that could reshape how “causing death” offences are applied. In Episode 436 of Driving Law, Kyla Lee and Paul Doroshenko explain why the decision matters.
Welcome to British Columbia’s only weekly DUI law update newsletter. This newsletter contains the most cutting-edge information, the newest case law, and helpful practice tips for DUI defence in BC.
Authored by Kyla Lee, BC’s Impaired Driving Update is released weekly on Thursdays.
This week on Weird and Wacky Wednesdays: Greed and evidence
Greed is one of those things we look at as a motive. With most of my files, there is no motive. My clients may be investigated or charged with a drinking-driving offence, and I suppose the motive might be to get home, but typically the issue is either a simple mistake, a substance abuse problem, or an innocent person wrongly accused. I always think the moral culpability of people who are motivated by greed is somehow the most offensive. Jealousy can be somewhat understandable, but greed is just a high level of selfishness.
This week, we are looking at three weird and wacky cases where police officers found themselves facing criminal charges because of greed.
The rapid rise of generative AI has introduced a new challenge for the Canadian legal system: the deepfake. In the recent decision of R. v. Medow, the court conducted a seminal analysis of how courts must address allegations of manipulated digital evidence. This case is a blueprint for judges navigating the murky waters of AI-generated content in criminal trials.
Welcome to Cases That Should Have Gone to the Supreme Court of Canada, But Didn’t!
In this episode, Kyla Lee from Acumen Law Corporation explores a case out of Saskatchewan that challenged the constitutionality of mandatory alcohol screening. After being required to provide a breath sample without any suspicion of impairment, the accused argued that this random breath testing violated Charter rights. The Saskatchewan Court of Appeal was split on the decision, with one judge finding the law unconstitutional. Despite the national impact of mandatory screening, the Supreme Court of Canada refused to hear the case.
