On bail and how to get it

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 23/07/2014 (4150 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Bail — or specifically, how it’s granted, revoked and supervised — has been quite the topic today. 

Civil rights advocates came out this morning swinging, saying the Canadian courts’ system of bail is broken and needs immediate repair — as some accused people are being held behind bars needlessly and injustly waiting for their day in court.

[The Canadian Civil Liberties Association’s “Set up to fail” report can be found here. A worthwhile read.]

But back inside the courtroom, younger criminal defence lawyers are fighting their own battles just to get their clients a reasonable shot at release — something all accused people are entitled to — in the first place. 

It’s not an easy task, regardless of what the general public might think.

Bail hearings happen, generally speaking, in a rapid-fire courtroom setting where the smallest inattention to detail by counsel can result in a person spending years in custody waiting to deal with their charges. 

As I noted on Twitter the other day — one provincial court judge was staring down the task of dealing with 55 different matters on one single bail docket for a single day.

That kind of staggering volume puts pressure on the court to make rapid-fire risk-management decisions, pressure on the Crown to present their opposition to bail in an abbreviated, hurried fashion, and pressure on the defence to get on with things, to keep the flow of the courtroom moving along. 

That kind of atmosphere isn’t good for justice and it’s certainly not good for public confidence in the system overall. 

But at the end of the day, competent, enaged advocates must do what they can to present the best possible case for their clients, regardless of external pressures.

But how to make that case in the most persuasive way given the systemic pressures? What’s a young or inexperienced lawyer to do?

Enter Martin Glazer, a veteran city defence lawyer who has already tried and forgotten about more major cases he’s fought than younger lawyers likely may ever handle over their entire careers.

Though the Manitoba Law Journal, Glazer presents what appears to me to be a quasi handbook for defence lawyers on bails and how to conduct the hearings, what points to hammer home to the court depending on the presenting circumstances of a case. 

It’s a fascinating, insider look at how a lawyer’s mind works. And should be required reading for not just other lawyers, but also anyone in the public who wants to see how things actually work in a bail court. 

Presented in full below, again, originally posted by the Manitoba Law Journal  

 

 

Glazer - Bail FINAL by James Turner