Legal Issues In Policing

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. TRIGGER WARNING: This episode contains graphic content, including violence, suicide and death which may shock, offend or upset. In this episode, Mike discusses Tracking Injustice:  A Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice Data and Transparency Project and Carleton University's assertion of it being a "National Database of Deat...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the Ontario Court of Appeal decision R. v. Campbell , 2023 ONCA 483 where a convicted criminal contended a judge’s charge to a jury about why he ran from police should have included an instruction on the practical realities of racialized Canadians and systemic racism. Is it possible he fled because he f...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the BC Provincial Court decision R. v. Roberts , 2023 BCPC 118 in which a police officer stopped a person for speeding. Was this stop arbitrary because the police also wanted to identify the driver to advance a suspected drug trafficking investigation? Was instructing the driver to exit the vehicle an u...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the Prince Edward Island Court of Appeal decision R. v. Simmons , 2023 PECA 4 where the police arrested two men, conducted an incidental search, and seized methamphetamine, cocaine and cannabis. Seeking the exclusion of evidence, the defence challenged the lead investigator's grounds for arrest. Di...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the Newfoundland and Labrador Provincial Court decision R. v. Pike , 2023 NLPC 1322A00622 where the Crown’s impaired driving case didn’t go so well. Find out why and ask yourself whether you would have done anything different to prop up the prosecution.  Thanks for listening! Feedback welcome at legalis...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the BC Court of Appeal decision R. v. Fong , 2023 BCCA 196 where a police officer authorized the arrest of a man believed to be a dial-a-doper. Did the facts as found by the trial judge meet the legal threshold of reasonable grounds? Was the officer's SUBJECTIVE belief OBJECTIVELY reasonable? Liste...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the Statistics Canada report “Confidence in the police, the justice system and courts, the Federal Parliament, and the Canadian media varied across racialized groups” (March 31, 2023). Just how did the police stack up against the other institutions?   Yale Law School's four pillars of procedural ju...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the Supreme Court of Canada decision R. v. McGregor , 2023 SCC 4 where investigators searched a computer with a warrant for one purpose and discovered evidence related to entirely different crimes. Did the common law plain view doctrine apply in the digital world? Mike takes a deep dive into the require...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the BC Court of Appeal decision R. v. Dhillon , 2023 BCCA 38 where a police officer stopped a man for traffic reasons but safety concerns led to a pat-down, an investigative detention for drug trafficking and the discovery of a loaded handgun in a man-purse. The man argued an "imminent threat"...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the BC Court of Appeal decision R. v. Lundy , 2023 BCCA 133 where a police officer arrested a man he believed was trafficking in drugs based on a tip and surveillance observations, all filtered through his experience. But the trial judge didn’t think the officer had enough grounds for an arrest, thereby...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike celebrates a birthday! It was 41 years ago today -- on April 17, 1982 -- when the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms came into force. But the provisions of the Charter went through a series of drafts to become the text as you know it today.  Listen to learn how the right to counsel as it found expression in...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal decision R. v. Macfie , 2023 SKCA 39 where a police officer came upon a man slumped over the steering wheel of a truck that was oddly positioned in the parking lot of a grocery store in the early morning hour. The keys were in the ignition and the truck was running.  Ver...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the BC Court of Appeal decision R. v. Wilkinson , 2023 BCCA 3 where officers chased down a man who fled on foot as they drove by in an unmarked police car late at night in a high crime area. But the officers were not responding to a reported crime nor did they have a specific crime in mind when they too...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. Today, March 16, 2023, we lost two superheroes, 35-year-old  Constable Travis Jordan ( 8.5 years of service) and 30-year-old Constable Brett Ryan (5.5 years of service).  Both Edmonton Police Service officers were responding to a family dispute call in an apartment complex at about 12:47 a.m. Upon arrival, the officers entered  the ap...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses a trial tactic apparently used by some defence lawyers to make you feel humiliated while testifying. By knowing what to expect on cross-examination, you can “contemporaneously” keep your cool. If you can’t define contemporaneously, don’t feel less of yourself. Listen and you will understand what I mean....

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the Ontario Court of Justice decision R. v. Maftoon , (2021 ONCJ 583 / 2022 ONCJ 518) in which a patron at an outdoor public swimming pool took matters into his own hands and tried to argue the choices he made were somehow the fault of the police. Did his legal arguments stand up in court?  Warning: Thi...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the Ontario Court of Appeal decision R. v. Bond , 2021 ONCA 730 where a police officer resubmitted a search warrant application using the same information even though the warrant had already been rejected by a different justice. Did this amount to impermissible “judge-shopping” or was it a legitimate ex...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the Nova Scotia Court of Appeal decision R. v. Mitchell , 2022 NSCA 77 where a suspect in an intimate partner violence investigation asked a court to stay all 32 charges against him because the police entered his home without a warrant to arrest him. No statement was obtained nor was any evidence found...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the BC Supreme Court decision R. v. Morris , 2023 BCSC 106 where the court was tasked with determining whether a modified flare gun found in the accused’s pocket was actually a firearm. And that’s not all. Listen to learn whether the judge fell for the “someone snuck it in my pocket while I slept” defen...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike discusses the Supreme Court of Canada decision R. v. Beaver , 2022 SCC 54   where the court was tasked with determining whether a seasoned homicide detective was justified in ordering the arrest of two murder suspects. The legality of the arrest hinged on whether the detective had the requisite reasonable grounds...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike looks at the Independent Investigation Office's (IIO's) response to the Clear Statement issued by the BC Prosecution Service (Crown Counsel) explaining its decision not to lay charges against an RCMP officer who shot at and injured a man who was driving a truck erratically  and struck police vehicles. T...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike looks at Klassen v. British Columbia (Minister of Public Safety and Solicitor General) , 2021 BCCA 294 , leave to appeal ref’d 2022 CanLII 1932 (SCC), a civil case involving two people  acquitted in a criminal trial of assaulting a peace officer who then sued the officer and the Province for damages alleging wron...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike looks at R. v. Myers , 2022 NSCA 69 , another inventory search case, this time released by the Nova Scotia Court of Appeal. Listen to find out what the province's highest court said about whether the search of a passenger's personal belongings fits within the scope of a vehicle inventory search. Thanks...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike uses the case of R. v. Robertson , 2022 ONSC 5795 to discuss traffic related  stops under provincial legislation for regulatory and road safety reasons. Does an officer’s testimonial declaration of purpose dictate a factual finding of purpose? If not, what happens? Listen and learn. Thanks for listening! Feedback...

Provide your feedback here. Anonymously send me a text message. In this episode, Mike provides an outside look at  Surrey's transition from the RCMP to the Surrey Police Service. In 2018 Brenda Locke, now the new mayor of Surrey, ran as a candidate for city council with the Safe Surrey Coalition which made the following promise: "We will also on Day 1 initiate the process to establish lo...