Access to Justice

  • June 18, 2026

    Appeal of convictions for teen drag race underscores seriousness of driving-related crimes

    It could have been a scene out of the 2002 film The Hire: Beat the Devil. Clive Owen was the driver piloting a BMW in an intense drag race down the Las Vegas Strip, and Gary Oldman was playing the devil in his customized Cadillac Eldorado. In reality, it was two Ontario teens in their fathers’ luxury vehicles.

  • June 18, 2026

    Shalini Konanur elected LSO treasurer

    The Law Society of Ontario (LSO) has chosen Shalini Konanur to serve as treasurer for the 2026-27 term. The Toronto-area bencher was elected by her colleagues at a meeting June 17. Konanur, the first racialized woman to serve in the top job, will officially take over from current treasurer Peter Wardle at the LSO’s June 25 convocation.

  • June 17, 2026

    Ontario appeal on Indigenous child class action dismissal allows 4 interveners

    Four mainly First Nations organizations were granted leave to intervene in a proposed class proceeding in September by Ontario Court of Appeal Justice Lise Favreau in a ruling released on June 12. In B.M. v. Ontario, 2026 ONCA 422, Justice Favreau said the Anishinabek Nation, the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association (BCCLA), the Chiefs of Ontario and the Nishnawbe Aski Nation will be able to participate as friends of the court in an appeal of a motion judge’s decision to dismiss a claim as a class proceeding.

  • June 17, 2026

    Alberta Court of Appeal upholds two fraud convictions but orders new trial on third charge

    After a lengthy trial, Jeffrey Brian Ber was found guilty on Sept. 18, 2024, of two counts of fraud over $5,000 and one count of accepting a secret commission. He appealed to the Alberta Court of Appeal, arguing that the trial judge committed several legal and evidentiary errors that undermined all the verdicts.

  • June 16, 2026

    Partially successful appeal in Saskatchewan teaching assistant sexual assault case leads to new trial

    The evil that men do reaches its lowest ebb in acts of pedophilia and, with the advent of the internet, in “sextortion” and emailing lewd pictures. But is it always men who engage in such activity?

  • June 16, 2026

    B.C. franchise law update: New low-value claims process in Consumer Protection Act

    On Aug. 1, 2026, the remaining provision of the Business Practices and Consumer Protection Amendment Act, 2025 (Bill 4-2025) will come into force, following an announcement on Feb. 9, 2026, by the B.C. Ministry of the Attorney General.

  • June 16, 2026

    View from prison: Making friends on the inside

    “You don’t go to prison to make friends” is one of the aphorisms new prisoners often hear. Connections with other people are fundamental to human life; we all need meaningful relationships with others. There’s lots of evidence that a lack of human connection is bad for our physical and mental health. But human connection takes on a very different form when you are in prison.

  • June 12, 2026

    Juridogenic harm: Why Canada’s justice system must radically reimagine sexual assault proceedings

    When a survivor of sexual violence steps forward to engage with the criminal justice system, they do so under the comforting myth of state neutrality — the belief that the law exists to heal a breach, discover the truth and deliver accountability. Yet, for decades, feminist legal scholarship and the lived realities of survivors have told a radically different story.

  • June 12, 2026

    Appeal Court in St. Catharines shooting case rejects claims of reasonable doubt

    There was a late-night gunfight outside Karma Nightclub in St. Catharines, Ont., on Sept. 29, 2019. The Crown had to prove that Jamar Stephens was one of the shooters. It did. A jury convicted Stephens on a multi-count indictment charging him with various offences arising from the shooting.

  • June 11, 2026

    Supreme Court of Canada says it’s business as usual while judges & staff move to temporary facilities

    The Supreme Court of Canada says it will continue to provide the bar, litigants and the public with all its usual services from its historic courthouse in Ottawa while its judges and registry staff undertake a phased move to the court’s temporary facilities across the street during the months of July and August.