Robson Crim Legal Blog

As the criminal courts operate as an environment with incredibly high stakes, inducing tantalising dramatics, it is therefore understandable that the media would be so interested in this arena. This coverage is as much impactful as it is complex, with the role the media being seemingly as important to consider as other roles in the criminal justice system.

Eyewitness identification has been regarded as the leading cause of wrongful convictions but, a mistake in an eyewitness is rarely, if ever intentional. These mistakes being made are deemed normal operations of the human memory. Our memories are frail, and the chance of a memory being unintentionally tampered with is relatively high. Numerous scenarios can impact any given memory including schematic processing, categorization, constructive processes and external sources.

"The Criminal Code continues to include serious criminal offences for defaming other people. These provisions exist separately from ordinary civil defamation actions and can potentially criminalize true statements. They remain controversial, yet under-studied. While the narrower offence found in section 300 has been upheld at the Supreme Court of Canada, its more expansive sister provision in section 301 has never been evaluated by an appellate court

This important paper considers criminal law practice during the pandemic. As the author writes: "In response to the COVID-19 pandemic,...

In January of 2007 Stuart Mark was beaten to death in his home by someone wielding a golf club. On July 15 2007, Michael Pearce was charged with murder in relation to the death of Stuart Mark following his confession to police investigators. He identified key features of the offence that had not been disclosed to the public, including the murder weapon, the location of the body in the apartment, and an injury to the finger of the victim.