Yesterday, the BC Court of Appeal released a ruling in a highly anticipated case that had the potential to affect thousands of traffic tickets across British Columbia.
The case concerned a ticket for disobeying a traffic control device. What was at issue in the case was the question of whether or not the ticket itself was properly issued, in that it gave the accused, Mr. Robinson, proper notice of the offence for which he had been charged.
There is a principle in Canadian law that states a person must be given reasonable notice of the charge they are facing. And they must be given sufficient particulars of the charge, so that they can understand what the charge is and be able and prepared to respond to it in court.
Mr. Robinson argued that the ticket was not valid on its face because a traffic control device could refer to any number of road features, including signs, painted lines, traffic lights, traffic signals. He argued that it was not clear what the basis of the charge was. This, he said, nullified the ticket itself such that the court ought to quash it.
When making this argument in his initial trial, Mr. Robinson was said by the police officer to have been given further information about the basis of the charge. Specifically, the officer claimed to have told Mr. Robinson that the ticket was being given to him as a lesser offence for speeding, and that the traffic control device that he had failed to obey was a speed limit sign. Mr. Robinson never disputed that he was told this information but merely argued that the face of the violation ticket should specify all of the information. Robinson lost this argument at trial, but he succeeded on appeal to the BC Supreme Court. A BC Supreme Court Justice sitting on the summary conviction appeal squashed the ticket and determined that it did need to indicate on the face of the ticket what the offence was. On appeal, the Court of Appeal reversed the BC Supreme Court decision and restored the conviction for disobeying a traffic control device.
Ultimately, the BC Court of Appeal was asked to consider two issues. The first issue they were asked to consider was whether there were sufficient particulars of the ticket, and in what circumstances sufficient particulars of the charge are given in traffic court. The second and perhaps more interesting, albeit legally thorny, issue that the Court of Appeal had to consider was the question of whether or not justice can amend the ticket and at what point in the process the ticket can be amended.
On the first issue, the BC Court of Appeal determined that sufficient particularization of a charge can come in any number of ways. It is not necessary for the details of the charge to be issued to somebody on the face of the ticket itself. Rather the Court of Appeal determined that information that an officer gives a person roadside, such as explaining the basis for the ticket or the reason for the traffic stop, can help to inform a person of what it is that they’re being charged with, the charge that they’re facing, and therefore sufficient particularization was given to Mr. Robinson at the roadside.
But more than that, the Court of Appeal also said that sufficient particularization can come in in the course of discussions outside the courtroom, or through the ordinary disclosure process. The result of this is that it is not required that the face of a violation ticket actually state what traffic sign or signal or device was disobeyed by the individual in order for the ticket to be valid.
That being said, the Court of Appeal did agree that it would be best practice if the ticket did say specifically what the issue was, and there may be circumstances in which sufficient particularization is not provided. So I anticipate seeing a chance to the process whereby the specifics are included, since we do want best practices to be followed.
On the more complex issue of whether a ticket can be amended, the Court determined that a judicial justice sitting in traffic court does have the power to amend the face of a violation ticket.
A judicial justice sitting in traffic court has both an express power given to them under British Columbia’s Offence Act, section 100, which permits a judicial justice during a trial to amend a ticket or amend the information in order to conform to the evidence that has been given in court. This is a standard procedure that is used in Canadian law. If the charging document itself is defective in some way, during the course of the trial, the Crown can apply to amend the charging document to conform to the evidence that has been led in the trial. It essentially prohibits defendants in court from taking advantage of minor slips in how an information is drafted.
Of course, there are procedures that occur when an amendment is made, such as granting an adjournment with the delay falling at the feet of the Crown, and possibly raising issues with the application of Section 11(b) rights to be tried with a speedy time. A person may argue that they have been prejudiced by an amendment because they crafted their defence in response to the defective information. And if they are successful in arguing that they have been prejudiced by the amendment, then the amendment might not be made. Although, in most circumstances, any prejudice would be cured by an adjournment.
Indeed, the Court of Appeal in this case found that there was no prejudice to Mr. Robinson, particularly because he was represented by counsel, an articling student, who took a short five-minute break, came back into court, and effectively cross-examined the police officer, although not successfully.
The Court of Appeal also considered, though, whether a judicial justice has the authority to amend the violation ticket prior to a trial. That is, if a judicial justice can amend the ticket before the trial starts.
This is why this case is so interesting.
The position taken by Mr. Robinson was that no amendment could be made because there is no authority given to judicial justices to do it in the Offence Act or in the Motor Vehicle Act, unless such an amendment was made during the course of trial.
The reason that this is such an important issue and potentially had broad implications to the operations of traffic court as a whole is because routinely in traffic court amendments are made as part of the negotiation process in order to keep the courts from overflowing with unnecessary trials. Amendments are made to charges, amendments are made to the face of the violation ticket to make changes that may eliminate points or other consequences. This process then allows people to enter guilty pleas to amended tickets that do not have the consequences they are seeking to avoid. And the courts are not backlogged with having to have every ticket go to trial.
So it was strange to see the defence taking the position that these amendments could not be made, and essentially taking a position that — if the Court of Appeal agreed with it — would have ground the wheels of justice to a halt in traffic court. It also would have made it a lot harder to argue traffic ticket cases successfully.
Thankfully, the Court of Appeal determined that this is not a correct statement of the law. Just because the Offence Act does not expressly give judicial justices express authority to amend tickets does not mean that that authority cannot be found elsewhere. And, more importantly, just because there is some partial authority, does not mean that additional authority cannot be granted in other methods.
Under the Offence Act, any provision that is not expressly provided for in the Act itself can be provided for by reference to provisions of the Criminal Code. Making amendments prior to trial is a provision that is provided for under the Criminal Code. So therefore, an amendment to the violation ticket in order to facilitate the expeditious resolution of manners or amendments that need to be made to provide sufficient particularization where they do not amount prejudice to an accused individual are permitted.
So even though the Court of Appeal disagreed with Mr. Robinson at the end of the day, and restored the conviction for disobeying a traffic control device, the outcome of the decision on the broader whole for the operations of traffic court and the implications of the expeditious and timely administration of justice in a fair manner is favourable.
