Judge cleared in assault case

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This article was published 05/11/2011 (5061 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Manitoba judge has been cleared of allegations he attacked his elderly mother during a dispute inside a River Heights home.

Brian Corrin was arrested last February and charged with assault and uttering threats. He was placed on administrative leave, pending his ongoing criminal case. Last week, an Ontario prosecutor appeared in a Winnipeg courtroom to announce the case was being dropped.

“Based on available evidence, there is not a reasonable likelihood of conviction,” Paul McDermott told the court. McDermott formally entered a stay of proceedings, which allows for charges to be reinstated within one year should circumstances change.

McDermott said he and another colleague in Ontario have spent the past several months reviewing the entire case against Corrin, including police interviews and witness statements. He told court there is “contradictory evidence,” along with “forensic examination of physical evidence,” which raised questions about what happened.

“The standard (used by the Crown) is very different than what the police use in laying charges, where they decide whether there is reasonable and probable grounds,” said McDermott. No further explanation of the apparent conflicts in the evidence was provided, but McDermott made it clear this was solely his discretion being exercised.

“The Manitoba prosecution services have had no involvement in this case or any decisions my colleague and I have made,” he told court.

A provincial court spokesman told the Free Press on Friday that Corrin is away from the office “for personal reasons” but is expected to return soon.

“Upon his return, he will be resuming his duties as a provincial court judge and therefore available for judicial assignment,” the spokesman said in a statement.

Winnipeg police never revealed details of the alleged assault, saying the incident was considered to be “family violence.” Police said it happened on Feb. 20 and the victim suffered minor injuries to her upper body.

Corrin, 65, was elected a city councillor in 1974 and an NDP MLA in 1977. He was named a provincial court judge in 1988 and has previously come under fire for his conduct inside various courtrooms.

He was convicted in 1996 of seven counts of professional misconduct and was suspended without pay for 30 days. He was also ordered by a judicial panel to write an essay on what it means to be a good judge.

Corrin was found by the panel to have acted with “arrogance and an over-inflated sense of his role” stemming from a high-profile incident in which he failed to return to court for a drunk-driving trial while his car was being repaired. The charges included offering to personally pay the fees of an expert Crown witness to cover the delay, making disparaging comments to three Crown attorneys and disregarding the rights of an accused.

In 2007, the Manitoba Court of Appeal twice rebuked Corrin for his actions during criminal cases. In the first example, the high court ruled Corrin used “inappropriate stereotypes” to consider the case of a young suburban teen who pleaded guilty to a drug-fuelled robbery spree. In the second case, the same court found Corrin had “embellished” evidence presented to him by lawyers and handed down an illegal sentence in a case involving a Winnipeg university student who damaged 13 red-light cameras during a year-long vandalism spree.

www.mikeoncrime.com