Compensation for Wrongful Convictions in Canada

Compensation for Wrongful Convictions in Canada PDF Author: Myles Frederick McLellan
Publisher: Eliva Press
ISBN: 9789975347587
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 328

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Book Description
The plight of the wrongly convicted is gaining prominence with the growing awareness of the prodigious harms to innocent persons at the hands of the criminal justice system. Most of the attention, both scholarly and legislatively, has been focused on the causes of wrongful convictions and the need to free the innocent. What needs to now be addressed more comprehensively is the issue of how to provide redress to those persons whose lives have been inexorably damaged and how to best compensate them in their efforts to rebuild a life. The available remedies in Canada to pursue compensation include civil litigation for malicious prosecution, negligent investigation, a Charter breach and the highly politicized exercise of discretion by a government to make a payment without acknowledging liability. Except for the very few, none of these remedies are very helpful. Liberal democracies like Canada are honour bound if not constitutionally mandated to provide for innocence compensation far beyond the onerous and cost prohibitive pursuit of litigation against the State and the current highly secretive and inadequate executive remedy requiring an elusive exercise of mercy. About the Author: Dr. Myles Frederick McLellan (LL.B (J.D); LL.M (Osgoode); Ph.D. (Anglia Ruskin - Law) is a Professor of Law and Justice at Algoma University in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, Canada. The focus of his research, writing and teaching is criminal justice. He is the Director and Founder of the Innocence Compensation Project and is the Editor-in-Chief of the Wrongful Conviction Law Review. He is on the Policy Review Committee of the Canadian Criminal Justice Association. He has also been a Commissioner of Police and a Federal Crown Counsel.

Compensation for Wrongful Convictions in Canada

Compensation for Wrongful Convictions in Canada PDF Author: Myles Frederick McLellan
Publisher: Eliva Press
ISBN: 9789975347587
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 328

Get Book Here

Book Description
The plight of the wrongly convicted is gaining prominence with the growing awareness of the prodigious harms to innocent persons at the hands of the criminal justice system. Most of the attention, both scholarly and legislatively, has been focused on the causes of wrongful convictions and the need to free the innocent. What needs to now be addressed more comprehensively is the issue of how to provide redress to those persons whose lives have been inexorably damaged and how to best compensate them in their efforts to rebuild a life. The available remedies in Canada to pursue compensation include civil litigation for malicious prosecution, negligent investigation, a Charter breach and the highly politicized exercise of discretion by a government to make a payment without acknowledging liability. Except for the very few, none of these remedies are very helpful. Liberal democracies like Canada are honour bound if not constitutionally mandated to provide for innocence compensation far beyond the onerous and cost prohibitive pursuit of litigation against the State and the current highly secretive and inadequate executive remedy requiring an elusive exercise of mercy. About the Author: Dr. Myles Frederick McLellan (LL.B (J.D); LL.M (Osgoode); Ph.D. (Anglia Ruskin - Law) is a Professor of Law and Justice at Algoma University in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, Canada. The focus of his research, writing and teaching is criminal justice. He is the Director and Founder of the Innocence Compensation Project and is the Editor-in-Chief of the Wrongful Conviction Law Review. He is on the Policy Review Committee of the Canadian Criminal Justice Association. He has also been a Commissioner of Police and a Federal Crown Counsel.

Compensation for Wrongful Conviction

Compensation for Wrongful Conviction PDF Author: Bellack, Wendy
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 66

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Book Description


Justice Miscarried

Justice Miscarried PDF Author: Hélèna Katz
Publisher: Dundurn
ISBN: 1554888743
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 235

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Book Description
Looks at judicial error and wrongful conviction in Canada, including the cases of David Milgaard, Donald Marshall, Guy Paul Morin, and Clayton Johnson.

A Qualitative Study of the Issues that Govern the Compensation Process for Wrongful Convictions

A Qualitative Study of the Issues that Govern the Compensation Process for Wrongful Convictions PDF Author: Lindsay Catherine Hanright
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 111

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Book Description
Compensation for wrongful convictions in Canada is an ad hoc process that must be reformed. Once exonerated, wrongfully convicted persons deserve reasonable and expeditious compensation awards for the miscarriage of justice that they have suffered. This study involves the use of two qualitative methods to investigate the compensation process for wrongful convictions in Canada. First, a review of archival records was performed based on the examination of a number of wrongful conviction cases, along with assessments of the compensation recommendations from the seven Commissions of Inquiry into wrongful convictions in five Canadian provinces. Second, in-depth interviews were conducted with prominent legal and government experts on compensation for wrongful convictions. This study provides a forum for continued exploration of this societal problem, with the objectives of heightening awareness of its nature and scope and proposing recommendations for an improved compensation scheme.

Miscarriages of Justice in Canada

Miscarriages of Justice in Canada PDF Author: Kathryn M. Campbell
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 1487514573
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 442

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Book Description
Innocent people are regularly convicted of crimes they did not commit. A number of systemic factors have been found to contribute to wrongful convictions, including eyewitness misidentification, false confessions, informant testimony, official misconduct, and faulty forensic evidence. In Miscarriages of Justice in Canada, Kathryn M. Campbell offers an extensive overview of wrongful convictions, bringing together current sociological, criminological, and legal research, as well as current case-law examples. For the first time, information on all known and suspected cases of wrongful conviction in Canada is included and interspersed with discussions of how wrongful convictions happen, how existing remedies to rectify them are inadequate, and how those who have been victimized by these errors are rarely compensated. Campbell reveals that the causes of wrongful convictions are, in fact, avoidable, and that those in the criminal justice system must exercise greater vigilance and openness to the possibility of error if the problem of wrongful conviction is to be resolved.

Wrongfully Convicted

Wrongfully Convicted PDF Author: Kent Roach
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1668023687
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 400

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Book Description
A top legal scholar explains Canada’s national tragedy of wrongful convictions, how anyone could be caught up in them, and what we can do to safeguard justice. Canada’s legal system has a serious problem: a significant but unknown number of people have been convicted for crimes they didn’t commit. There are famous cases of wrongful convictions, such as David Milgaard and Donald Marshall Jr., where the system convicted the wrong person for murder. But there are lesser-known cases: people who feel they have no option but to plead guilty, and people convicted of crimes that were imagined by experts or the police that never, in fact, happened. Kent Roach, cofounder of the Canadian Registry of Wrongful Convictions, award-winning author, and law professor, has dedicated his illustrious career to documenting flaws in our justice system. His work reveals that the burden of wrongful convictions falls disproportionately on the disadvantaged, including Indigenous and racialized people, those with cognitive issues, single mothers, and the poor. Wrongfully Convicted raises awareness about wrongful convictions at a time when DNA exonerations are less frequent and the memories of most famous wrongful convictions are fading. Roach makes a compelling case for change that governments have so far lacked the courage to make. They include better legislative regulation of police and forensic experts and the creation of a permanent and independent federal commission both to investigate wrongful convictions and their multiple causes. Roach’s research and vast knowledge point to systemic failings in our legal system. But he also outlines vital changes that can better prevent and correct wrongful convictions. Until we do, many of the wrongfully convicted are still waiting for the promise of justice. It is an issue that affects all Canadians.

Compensation for Wrongful Convictions

Compensation for Wrongful Convictions PDF Author: Wojciech Jasiński
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000859312
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 222

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Book Description
This book presents a comprehensive comparative analysis of the substantive and procedural aspects of compensation for wrongful convictions in European countries and the USA, as well as the standard derived from the case law of the European Court of Human Rights. The collection draws comparative conclusions as to the similarities and differences between selected jurisdictions and assesses the effectiveness of the national compensation schemes. This enables the designing of an optimum model of compensation, offering accessibility and effectiveness to the victims of miscarriages of justice and being acceptable to jurisdictions based on common law, and civil law traditions, as well as inquisitorial and adversarial types of criminal process. Moreover, the discussion of the minimum European standard as established in the case law of the European Court of Human Rights enables readers to identify how the Strasbourg Court can contribute to strengthening the compensation scheme. The book will be essential reading for students, academics and policymakers working in the areas of criminal law and procedure.

Compensation for Wrongful Conviction

Compensation for Wrongful Conviction PDF Author: Adrian Hoel
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781921185816
Category : Compensation for judicial error
Languages : en
Pages : 6

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Book Description
This paper examines the causes of wrongful imprisonment, the nature of losses and the applicability of international approaches and conventions. Definitions of wrongful conviction vary internationally, as do the circumstances and amount of compensation. Australian states and territories can make discretionary ex gratia payments, although determination of compensation amounts is unclear. Compensation levels for wrongful conviction in Australia are not as generous as tortious claims. The current system of ex gratia payments that exists in all Australian jurisdictions (other than the Australian Capital Territory) is arbitrary. The introduction of dedicated legislation or specific guidelines for wrongful conviction would help bring these Australian jurisdictions into line with international human rights best practice. This paper considers the scope of claims made in Australia through some key case studies. However, there is currently no reliable national data on the prevalence of wrongful convictions in Australia; overseas research suggests wrongful convictions may be less rare than we assume.

Convicting the Innocent

Convicting the Innocent PDF Author: Brandon L. Garrett
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674060989
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 376

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Book Description
On January 20, 1984, Earl Washington—defended for all of forty minutes by a lawyer who had never tried a death penalty case—was found guilty of rape and murder in the state of Virginia and sentenced to death. After nine years on death row, DNA testing cast doubt on his conviction and saved his life. However, he spent another eight years in prison before more sophisticated DNA technology proved his innocence and convicted the guilty man. DNA exonerations have shattered confidence in the criminal justice system by exposing how often we have convicted the innocent and let the guilty walk free. In this unsettling in-depth analysis, Brandon Garrett examines what went wrong in the cases of the first 250 wrongfully convicted people to be exonerated by DNA testing. Based on trial transcripts, Garrett’s investigation into the causes of wrongful convictions reveals larger patterns of incompetence, abuse, and error. Evidence corrupted by suggestive eyewitness procedures, coercive interrogations, unsound and unreliable forensics, shoddy investigative practices, cognitive bias, and poor lawyering illustrates the weaknesses built into our current criminal justice system. Garrett proposes practical reforms that rely more on documented, recorded, and audited evidence, and less on fallible human memory. Very few crimes committed in the United States involve biological evidence that can be tested using DNA. How many unjust convictions are there that we will never discover? Convicting the Innocent makes a powerful case for systemic reforms to improve the accuracy of all criminal cases.

Compensation and Wrongful Conviction

Compensation and Wrongful Conviction PDF Author: Claire Moore Lankford
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Judicial error
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Wrongful convictions represent grievous errors carried out by state actors either through misconduct or structural failures within the criminal justice system. A majority of research, policy, and advocacy focuses on the legal demands of individuals who are wrongfully convicted. However, this focus excludes the aftermath of exoneration and the barriers individuals face as they adjust to the community post-release (e.g., financial, physical health, mental health). Wrongful conviction has a lasting impact on the family members and children of those who are wrongfully convicted, directly impacts the victim of the crime, and increases societal distrust in the criminal justice system. Given the deleterious effects wrongful conviction has on individuals, families, and society, it is critical to further understand citizens' perceptions of compensation, which serves as one restorative modality. This study examined the general public's perception of compensation for wrongful conviction based on race and previous criminal conviction. Participants (N = 413) consisted of United States citizens who were randomly assigned to one of four case vignettes 1) Black exoneree with no previous criminal conviction 2) Black exoneree with a previous criminal conviction 3) white exoneree with no previous criminal conviction 4) white exoneree with a previous conviction. Results revealed a significant interaction effect between race and criminal conviction on the amount of compensation awarded to exonerees. Specifically, Black exonerees with no previous criminal conviction were awarded more compensation than Black exonerees with a previous criminal conviction and compared to white exonerees with no criminal conviction. Implications for future research and policy are discussed.