Relevant part of Law in Action in Chapter 9 are pp. 264-265, 275-276 (read up to and including “The Verdict”).

Lesson on Juries, Jury Trials, and Jury Selection.

Vocabulary:

• Sequestered.
• Foreperson.
• Plea.
• Unanimous.

Assignment: Steps in Jury Selection:

Put the steps in order.  Do not just write the numbers.  Literally type/copy out the sentences and put them in order on your Word Document.  Due before the end of class to Teams.

1. Names of the people on the jury panel are written on cards that are put into a ballot box and selected at random.
2. Some people are challenged for a cause and dismissed.
3. Some people are dismissed on a peremptory challenge.
4. On the fifth day of deliberation, the jury reaches a unanimous verdict of “guilty.”
5. You receive a summons from the court, requesting you for jury duty.
6. The murder trial begins, and you listen carefully to the evidence.
7. All the jurors leave the courtroom and go to the jury room to pick a foreperson to guide their deliberations.
8. You take the juror’s oath.
9. The judge explains to you and the other jurors what will take place during the trial.
10. After hearing closing statements from Crown and Defence counsel, the judge charges the jury.
11. As you and the other jurors enter the courtroom, you notice other court participants, such as the judge, the lawyers, the court recorder, and the sheriff.

 

What happened today?

• Feedback on yesterday’s assignment.
• Introduce lesson today and assignment.
• Continue giving feedback on Case Briefs.

Assignment: Evidence and Testimony

In Chapter 9 of Law in Action.

Testimony p. 269

• For each type of testimony, write one example of incorrectly, and then edit it to be correct (leading, hearsay, opinion. irrelevant, non-responsive).

For example, if you were doing a LEADING question:

1. Incorrect (i.e. you are leading the witness): “Were you in the marsh when Steven died?”
2. Correct (i.e. you are not leading the witness and letting them give info): “Where were you on the night of 1 July 2021?”

Evidence pp. 270-271

Create an example for each type of evidence.  Try to SHOW, not tell.

Make a definition in your own words, and then write an example for each type of evidence listed in the reading.

For example, a wire tap. “The police get permission and through your cell provider record all of the call on your cell phone.”

As always, due by the end of class to Teams!

 

What happened today?

• Expert Witness.
• Relevant textbook sections in Law in Action Chapter 9 pp. 260-263.
• Case Brief feedback will be in-person only.  There will not be enough time in ESS.  You are welcome to come to drop-in times (on classroom door + in Contact Info section of Blog) before school for this feedback as well.

Assignment: Participants in a Trial.  For each of the participants (listed below), do the following:

1. Find a photo/image of a fictional character that is that participant (e.g. Lawyer, Judge – Judge Judy, Harvey Dent).
2. In point form, define that character and their legal position in their respective fictional role.  E.g. Harvey Dent from Batman is a District Attorney, which is the American version of a prosecutor or the Crown.
3. After reading the relevant sections in Law in Action, using point-form, correct the character, articulating how their character would fit into the Canadian Court System.  E.g. In Canada, the Crown is not elected; they are employed in a full time position as Crown.  They represent the government in a criminal case.

The Participants

• Judge.
• Justice of the Peace.
• Duty Counsel (just definition, no photo).
• Defence Counsel.
• Court Clerk.
• Court Reporter.
• Court Security Officer/Sheriff (pick one of these only).
• Witnesses.
• Expert Witness (not in book – need to listen to Ms. Hopkin’s verbal lesson).
• Jury.

Due to Teams by the end of class!

What happened today?

• Questions and review from yesterday.
• Go in detail into the Trial Process.

Reading:

• Review of lesson already given: Law in Action Chapter 9 pp. 254-257.
• New reading (required): Law in Action Chapter 9 pp. 258-260 (do not read “The Participants”).

What happened today?

• Happy Leap Day!
• Review in-class write and categories of law assignments.
• Started new unit: the Criminal Court System.
• Daily Graded Class Discussion Self-Assessment Distributed.  Extras are in the Handouts folder at the back of the class (Paper Only).
• Detailed lesson on Trial Division (Provincial and Superior), Appeal Court, Supreme Court of Canada.  In person lesson only.  If absent, will need to get notes from a friend.  If unable to do this, will need to make up in ESS.

Instructions:

1. Find a case that interests you on CanLII involving the “new” 1982 Constitution, specifically, The Charter of Rights and Freedoms.  The previous post indicate Charter sections on which you should focus.
2. Read the case.  Take your notes.  Etc.
3. Write a Case Brief of your case.  This includes: Facts, Issues, Decisions, Reasons, Ratio.
4. The whole thing should be in plain and simple language.
5. Facts: What happened in the actual, original case?  Please remember to put this into your own words.
   • This will likely be the longest part of your Case Brief.
6. Issues: What is the court considering as the problem?  This should be a problem with Charter and something else in conflict.
   • This might have to be copied/pasted, but check with your teacher if you are uncertain.
   • There may be more than one Issue in the case.  If there are multiple Charter-related issues, pick the one you like the most.  You do not have to do all of the issues mentioned!
   • If the issue has sections not related to the Charter, you do not have to include them.  If there is no issue related to the Charter, and this is an assignment on the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, then you cannot pick that case.
7. Decision: Very brief (HA!  Get it?).  What did they (the court) decide?
   • One sentence or less.
   • Do not include things like “Held: the appeal was dismissed.”  That does not tell us anything.  Be clear about what happened.  E.g. “The police were found to have obtained the drug evidence legally and it was allowed in the trial.”
   • Remember: this should be in your own words.
   • Saying the “Appeal was dismissed” is not helpful.  WHAT was the appeal?  WHY was it dismissed?  Was evidence thrown out and a new trial ordered?  Was testimony included?  Excluded?  Be specific.
8. Reasons: What are the reasons they (court/judges) made the Decision?
   • This should be the second-longest section of your assignment.
9. Ratio: There are two main parts to the Ratio.  The first part is literally a numerical ratio.  The second, and main purpose of the Ratio, is it is meant to be “the main takeaway of the case.”  So, whatever the main point is of your Case Brief (likely not about guilty/not guilty – more likely about a Charter right and possible exclusions under 24(2) in roughly one sentence.
   • Most likely your case will have gone to the Supreme Court of Canada, which has a panel of nine judges, though sometimes only seven will sit to hear a case.  So, for example: if 7 out of 9 judges agree on the Decision, that means the Ratio is 7:2.
   • The ratio is NOT written in the case.  You must count the number of judges in the case total (often listed at the very beginning), and then count the number of judges listed in the Dissent.  Minus the amount of total judges from the amount dissenting.  E.g. If there are nine judges listed, and three judges dissenting –> That is 9-3=6.  Therefore, the Ratio is six judges in the majority, and three judges in dissent.  This is written as 6:3.
   • What is the ratio of judges who agree with the Decision and Reasons compared to those who Dissented?  Remember: the Dissent is not a separate section.  It is included in the Ratio!  However, the main part of the Ratio is that is is meant to be “the main takeaway of the case.” So, whatever the main point/decision is in roughly one sentence should also be in the Ratio.

Format:

• One page typed.
• One inch margins (this is the default, you will not need to change this).
• Times New Roman Font.
• Size 12 Font.
• Full Name, Block, and Date in top, left-hand margin (you can make it inside the top of the page’s margin so that you have more room for the actual Case Brief).
• Name of case is your title, correctly cited, in size 20 Font.
• Titles of each section should be all caps, Times New Roman, Size 12, underlined.
• To be uploaded to Teams on due date.
• Basically, it should look exactly like the examples Ms. Hopkin gave you with the case briefs of R. v. Trinneer and R. v. Vaillancourt.  Case names and legal documents should be italicized.
• Final copy save and submit as a PDF.
• Remember: The whole thing must be exactly one page.  Not more.  Not less.

STRATEGIES TO TACKLE CASE BRIEF

To start, your goal should be to read through your case taking notes of the key elements.  Secondly, focus on writing the Facts of the case.  This is the part that you will all probably do very well, since you are all already good at remembering details.  The hardest part will be making it concise (short) since the WHOLE THING has to fit on ONE PAGE.

Remember, this is a Charter assignment, so make sure you include the parts about the Charter!

Use your teacher!  Bring sections you do not understand and ask for “translations!”

Do not write CJ or JJ beside judges’ names.  Those are just random titles.  Not necessary to include.

It is recommended for your own security to back-up your assignment (e.g. every once in a while, upload your drafts to OneDrive).  All of you have access to OneDrive through the school, but even emailing your progress to yourself every day as a back-up is a good idea.  You never know what can happen with technology, and technological issues are the issue/responsibility  of the student.

Please note how I have purposefully written things like Charter of Rights and Freedoms and R. v. Trinneer in italics.  These MUST ALWAYS be italicized, including in your assignments.  You are encouraged to start doing this in your notes to get into the habit.  Use that Case Citation Assignment and your textbook to help you check.  As you can see by looking up your cases, for example, only the case name “R. v. Last Name” is in italics, and the rest is not.  Make sure you leave yourself time for formatting technicalities like this.

Cases you CANNOT choose for this assignment:

• R. v. Oakes.
• R. v. Grant.
• R. v. Gladue.
• R. v. Morgentaler.
• R. v. Rodriguez.

DUE DATE

 Due to Teams by the end of class on Wednesday, 28 February 2024.

What happened today?

• Game plan for the short week.
• Interim Reports come up fast.  Please get in missing/late work.  One missing assignment could mean you will be reported as not passing due to the limited amount of assignments we have done so early in the course.
• Looking at section 7 and using two challenging cases to look at the Charter.  They were Rodriguez and Morgentaler I and II..
• In person lesson only.  No outside materials.  Speak to classmate or come to ESS to make up work.

What happened today?

• Infringement.
• Constitutional Issues and Questions.
• Imminent threat or danger.
• The “Law Helmet.”
• Worked through scenarios in groups.  Went over each as a class.  This is exactly what your in-class write will be.  These have now been uploaded to Teams under Files –> Class Materials –> Constitutional Law.  “Charter Case Scenarios – Review.”

Upcoming Next Week

Due to the long weekend and shortened week, we will unfortunately have to move some things around.  However, in the words of Monty Python, this is no problem because we “Adapt, Adopt, Improve!”

The Current Game Plan (Might Be Subject To Change):

• Tuesday, 20 February 2024: Charter lessons continued.
• Wednesday, 21 February 2024:
  • ESS (if applicable): To Make-Up missed Charter lessons if applicable.  Please review past blog posts. If you were absent certain days (articulated in previous posts), ESS is mandatory.
  • In Class: Will introduce and organize your Charter project.  Today should be the in-class write, but due to the shorter block, it will be moved to a class where you have the full hour-and-twenty-minutes.  The Charter project is essentially your “test” for the Charter unit.  You will have class time during part of the week of 26 February 2024 for this as well.
• Thursday, 22 February 2024: Charter of Rights and Freedoms in-class write.  Again, this is NOT a test.  As stated above, the project is the “test.”
  • Best way to prepare: Occasionally bring up a case and try talk it out with a classmate.  Could also look up issues in the news and try see how it could apply there and, again, talk it through with a classmate. 🙂

Keep in mind, Interim Reports are due in two weeks.  This is a good time to get ahead of any missing work/concerns before those are sent home!

Have a restful long weekend everyone!

What happened today?

• Again, as mentioned last week: all Charter lessons are in-person only.  There is no way to make it up outside of class other than attending ESS to make up the lessons.  You can do any readings affiliated with the posts.
• Relationship between Government and its Citizens.
• Section 1.
• Section 24(2) – Remedy.
• Sections 8, 9, 10.
• The Plain View Doctrine.
• The Test of a Reasonable Person.

Reading (you will have a very short time to review at the start of tomorrow’s class):

• Law in Action Chapter 4 pp. 102, 104-105, 110-113.

What happened today?

• EXCITING DAY: Everyone got their copy of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms!  Everyone got a paper copy.  It is also linked in the Home Page of Teams as well as on the Blog in the top-right corner under “Links.” 🙂
• Looked at which rights were most important to us and why.
• <3 Section 8 <3
• The Notwithstanding Clause.