July 21, 2026
When facing a criminal charge, the person representing us as a lawyer is fundamentally important. For most of us, our lawyer is our guide to the arcane processes and rules of the justice system. She or he tells us what our choices are and has a huge influence on what we decide to do — which in most cases is to plead guilty. More than that, lawyers are often a main source of emotional support for those facing the overwhelming power of the criminal justice system and the huge anxiety that comes with the destruction of our life that being arrested represents.
July 21, 2026
The results of a recent study by an Ontario university and a non-profit organization have been published, and the conclusions are startling: the use of AI in family law disputes could produce legally accurate and fair outcomes at a fraction of the cost usually incurred — in most cases, in less than three minutes.
July 17, 2026
Canada’s government is spending more than half a billion dollars to support the next phase of its decade-long push to eradicate gender-based violence. On July 16, it was announced that Ottawa will be investing $607.4 million into its ongoing National Action Plan to End Gender-based Violence — a 10-year initiative where participating provinces and territories sign on to the plan and, in exchange, receive funding to help implement the plan in their respective jurisdictions.
July 17, 2026
Canada has announced several projects and $12.1 million in funding to advance the Canada-Mexico Action Plan, including to combat human trafficking.
July 17, 2026
Ami Assignon has been appointed a judge of the New Brunswick Provincial Court in Moncton, bringing the court to gender parity among its full-time judges, with 14 women and 14 men, the province says.
July 17, 2026
Nova Scotia’s Court of Appeal has corrected a “bizarre” matter where a criminal court judge “unilaterally” altered a prohibition order in a sex crimes case — more than three years after the offender was sentenced through a joint submission.
July 17, 2026
Appeal by appellant from convictions for historical sexual abuse. The complainant alleged that the appellant, her uncle, sexually abused her between 1993 and 2002, beginning when she was nine years old. The complainant testified in detail to repeated abuse, including incidents at the appellant’s home and during outings.
July 16, 2026
Canada is now the 79th signatory to the United Nations Convention against Cybercrime, a groundbreaking treaty aimed at providing a legal basis for international cooperation in the fight against cybercrime.
July 16, 2026
The Honourable Glenn D. Joyal was officially sworn in on July 15 as a judge of the Supreme Court of Canada. According to the court, the private ceremony was held in Ottawa and presided over by Chief Justice Richard Wagner.
July 16, 2026
In a recent decision out of the Ontario Court of Justice, R. v. MacDonald, 2026 ONCJ 332, Justice Seth Weinstein confronted a case that, on its surface, involved a single ugly outburst on a downtown Toronto street — but in its reasoning, became a broader meditation on how the justice system should respond to the normalization of racism in Canadian public life.