Judge speaks out against long delays as case tossed

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This article was published 06/08/2020 (2053 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Chronically overbooked court dockets, too few circuit-court sittings, and a straightforward trial that ran out of time have prompted a judge to lament systemic delays in northern Manitoba.

Last week, provincial court Judge Todd Rambow tossed out an impaired-driving case against a Norway House man who waited more than a year-and-a-half for his day in court.

Deciding the man’s charter right to have a trial within a reasonable time was violated, the judge took the opportunity to comment on longstanding problems with holding court in Norway House, a largely Indigenous community of roughly 8,000 people about 800 kilometres north of Winnipeg.

Rambow said he and the two other provincial court judges who live in Thompson and preside over circuit court hearings in more than 15 other communities across northern Manitoba have “long been concerned with the insufficient number of sitting days upon which to adjudicate Norway House matters.”

Norway House has roughly the same population as Dauphin, Rambow said, “but without, I strongly suspect, the same number of court sitting days.” Dauphin, about 300 km northwest of Winnipeg, has a permanent courthouse.

He said Norway House is “currently experiencing a significant work volume relating to gang and/or drug-related violence. We have lamented the significant overbooking of Norway House dockets, which, unfortunately, has become all too commonplace.”

Trial dates are supposed to happen in Norway House twice a month, when a judge travels there. All circuit court sittings in Manitoba are currently cancelled owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, but it is not uncommon for them to be cancelled for reasons such as bad weather.

It’s common for cases to run out of time, Rambow said. He made clear he didn’t have evidence of systemic delay in the case at hand — for which the Crown is considering an appeal — but was “merely voicing my concerns” about the chronic issues.

“I am not the first judge to be concerned about a lack of northern judicial resources,” he said, referencing two other Manitoba court decisions that called attention to the issue within the past year.

One of those rulings, issued by Justice Chris Martin in November, was also the result of a charter motion launched by defence lawyer Rohit Gupta, who represented the accused in this most recent case.

Myles William Folster was arrested in Norway House in July 2018, and impaired driving charges were officially sworn against him about a month later. His trial began more than a year later, in November 2019, but before it could be completed, court ran out of time.

The one-day circuit court session had to deal with several other court cases before the trial could start in the afternoon.

It was supposed to resume in May, but all circuit courts across the province were cancelled owing to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Rambow subtracted the delays caused by the COVID-19-related cancellations and by Folster’s defence lawyer, and found the case took 18 months, 23 days — over the time limit set by the Supreme Court in its so-called Jordan decision in 2016 that cracked down on delays. He ordered a judicial stay on Folster’s charges on July 30, dropping the case.

Gupta said Folster was fortunate he wasn’t in custody while he waited for his trial. Others, he said, are still waiting for circuit courts to resume. Gupta pointed to a persistent lack of court resources.

“The systemic problem is overlaid throughout all of northern Manitoba, and it’s going to continue to be a problem,” he said.

“There remains three judges (in Thompson). I think it echoes, and what Jordan echoes, is that all players in the justice system need to come together to figure out a solution here.”

The Crown has 30 days to decide whether to appeal.

The Aboriginal Justice Inquiry recognized as far back as 1991 that Manitoba circuit courts didn’t provide enough time for all cases to be heard. The report recommended the temporary court sessions last at least two days at a time, saying: “There is no clearer example of the unequal and uneven manner in which the current justice system deals with Aboriginal people than in the circuit courts of northern Manitoba.”

katie.may@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @thatkatiemay