In a decision released on October 17, 2014, the Supreme Court of Canada had a rare opportunity to consider s. 193 of the Criminal Code which makes it a crime to disclose or use an intercepted private communication without the consent of the originator or the intended recipient of the ...
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In a judgment released on September 12, 2014, the Supreme Court of Canada established a new test for when an appellate court may interfere with the adversarial system by raising an issue not previously raised by the parties. The decision attempts to strike a balance between two competing roles for ...
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On June 5, 2013, the British newspaper The Guardian reported the first of several leaks of classified material from Edward Snowdon, a former National Security Agency contractor, which revealed multiple U.S. government intelligence collection and surveillance programs. The NSA bulk telephony metadata program has come under scrutiny since the Snowdon leaks ...
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In a recent wiretap trial I concluded in Edmonton Justice Brian R. Burrows of the Court of Queen's Bench decided a trilogy of motions excluding voice identification evidence obtained by the police in breach of the defendant's right to counsel and right to timely disclosure. In the first ruling reported ...
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For nine months from October 2013 to June 2014 I defended a drug conspiracy case in Edmonton which included a wire tap component. During the investigation the police obtained a General Warrant granted by Judge Marilena Carminati who is a Provincial Court Judge in Edmonton. The warrant authorized the police ...
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In a judgment released on June 13, 2014, the Supreme Court of Canada unanimously recognized that Canadians have a reasonable expectation of privacy in subscriber information held by their internet service providers. In R. v. Spencer, 2014 SCC 43 Justice Thomas A. Cromwell concluded, at para. 66, that the, "...disclosure ...
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A wiretap authorization may only be granted by a superior court judge. The application is made by an agent of the Attorney General of a province or the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness. An agent is specially designated under the Criminal Code. The application is usually based on ...
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In two major developments in Canada the courts have enhanced the protection of information stored by citizens on their computers and smart phones. In R. v. Vu, [2013] 3 S.C.R. 657 the Supreme Court of Canada unanimously held that the privacy interests implicated by computer searches call for specific judicial ...
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In a landmark case reported as Riley v. California, 573 U.S. __ (2014) released on June 25, 2014, the Supreme Court of the United States unanimously held that a warrantless search and seizure of digital contents of a cell phone during an arrest violated the Fourth Amendment and was unconstitutional ...
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The Charter of Rights protects three privacy interests which we encounter in our daily lives. Mr. Justice Ian Binnie of the Supreme Court of Canada identified them as: personal privacy (bodily integrity), territorial privacy (privacy in the home) and informational privacy (information about ourselves and our activities). Informational privacy has ...
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