Judge accused of driving drunk

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This article was published 14/03/2016 (3728 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Manitoba judge will soon be on the other side of the courtroom as he stands accused of drunk driving.

Judge Michel Chartier faces charges of impaired driving and driving with a blood alcohol concentration over .08. He was charged by Carberry RCMP Sunday and is scheduled to appear in court in Brandon March 24.

An RCMP spokesman said police stopped Chartier around 1:30 p.m. on Highway 1 about five kilometres west of Highway 5 in the RM of North Cypress. RCMP would offer no other details about the arrest other than to say no one was hurt.

Chartier has been placed on administrative leave, according to a news release issued Monday on behalf of chief provincial court Judge Ken Champagne.

Two years ago, in what was believed to be a legal first in Manitoba, Chartier decided not to impose a jail sentence or a criminal record on a drunk driver who had hit and severely injured a motorcyclist while the driver’s blood-alcohol level was five times the legal limit.

Instead, Chartier granted the longtime alcoholic a “curative discharge” and considered it in the public’s best interest the accused get treatment for his alcohol addiction rather than jail time.

“Our courts have emphasized that denunciations and deterrence are driving principles of sentencing for the drinking driver,” Chartier said in his 2014 ruling.

“Sometimes, effective rehabilitation can be the most effective way of keeping an individual from drinking and driving.”

Melody Bodnarchuk of Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) Winnipeg said she was “very disheartened” to learn a sitting judge had been charged with impaired driving.

“Like a teacher or a police officer or a doctor or a nurse, (judges) are held to a higher standard…,” she said, adding an out-of-province judge should be brought in to deal with Chartier’s case.

“I’d like to see him be treated like anybody else — certainly, having to go through the whole procedure and being held to the letter of the law.”

There have been previous cases of federal and provincial court judges facing criminal charges in Manitoba and across the country, but such cases are rare. In 2011, Manitoba provincial court Judge Brian Corrin was charged with assault stemming from allegations of family violence. The charges were later stayed and Corrin returned to the bench. An Alberta provincial court judge in Edmonton pleaded guilty and was fined $1,500 for drunk driving in 2014.

‘I’d like to see him be treated like anybody else…’– Melody Bodnarchuk of Mothers Against Drunk Driving Winnipeg 

Whether a Manitoba provincial court judge continues to serve on the bench after being charged with a crime is up to the Judicial Council, which investigates complaints against judges under rules set out under the Provincial Court Act. The council can impose punishments ranging in severity from issuing a warning to recommending that the provincial justice minister remove the judge.

“For any of these cases involving criminal matters, it depends on all of the context of it — the seriousness of the charge, how the judge deals with it, what the perception is of the conduct and the reputation of the administration of justice,” said University of Manitoba law professor Debra Parkes.

“Judges are charged with upholding the law, so they are held to a high standard with respect to their own conduct, but again, it really depends on all of the circumstances,” she said.

Chartier was called to the bar in Manitoba in 1991 after graduating from Université de Moncton the previous year. He focused on banking law, labour law and insurance litigation while practising at Monk Goodwin in Winnipeg and was appointed as a provincial court judge in September 2007. For four years, from September 2009 to August 2013, Chartier served as associate chief judge.

katie.may@freepress.mb.ca