On The Wire

Tireless and Absolute

On June 22, 2018, the Supreme Court of the United States released the 5-4 opinion in Carpenter v United States, 585 US _ (2018) holding that a warrant is required for law enforcement to obtain cell site location information (CSLI) from a wireless carrier. "Given the unique nature of cell ...
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Too Good for the Neighbourhood

The exclusion of unlawfully obtained evidence from a criminal trial in Canada is governed by s 24(2) of the Charter of Rights. Evidence obtained in a manner that infringed a Charter right shall be excluded if its admission in the proceedings would bring the administration of justice into disrepute. What, then, ...
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Privacy and Black Tech

On May 28, 2018, the General Data Protection Regulation of the European Union became law aiming to standardize the protection of personal data across Europe. But it is not a panacea. The new GDPR permits member states to enact derogations in accordance with national needs and no data protection law ...
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When Is a Rule a Precedent?

On April 18, 2018, the Alberta Court of Appeal released the Memorandum of Judgment in R v Pucci, 2018 ABCA 149 where the Crown brought an application for reconsideration of the rule in R v Gladue, 2012 ABCA 143 that arises, most often, in drug investigations. Speaking for a unanimous ...
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Knowing What the Government Is Up To

The American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, in a joint Brief of Amici Curiae filed in Webster v Hennepin County, Minnesota Supreme Court, Case No.: A16-0736, began argument this way, at p. 5: "Knowing 'what the government is up to' is often the first step in ensuring that ...
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Influence Peddling

Crimes of corruption in Canadian law fall under Part IV of the Criminal Code. Bribery of judicial officers and fraud on the government are two of them. Influence peddling is in the fraud category. By criminalizing acts of corruption Parliament strives to preserve both government integrity and the appearance of ...
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A Too-Clever Game of Partial Truths

On February 16, 2018, Justice Jolaine Antonio of the Court of Queen's Bench of Alberta, at Calgary, released the reasons for exclusion of evidence in a case reported as R v Sandhu, 2018 ABQB 112. The Calgary police had covertly installed a hallway camera in a downtown apartment building during a ...
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Police Violated Prosper Duty

He was sitting in the back of a police vehicle in Edmonton, Alberta, arrested for sexual assault of a former intimate partner. The police officer read him his rights. When the officer asked if he wanted to speak with a lawyer, he said: "Uh, yes." The officer then said: "You ...
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Behind the Black Mirror

A new report was published this month by twenty-six researchers at renowned universities and non-governmental organizations including the University of Oxford, the University of Cambridge and the Electronic Frontier Foundation warning that artificial intelligence technology creates dangerous opportunities for hackers, political operatives and oppressive governments. The report titled The Malicious ...
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The Haunting of Girou

On December 14, 2017, the Alberta Court of Appeal released the per curiam ruling in R v Girou, 2017 ABCA 426 involving a rare case where the Crown and the defendant agreed that lost evidence breached the defendant's fair trial interests under s. 7 of the Charter of Rights. The trial ...
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