Public Safety committee  Mr. Chair, vice-chairs, honourable members, good afternoon. My name is Solomon Friedman. I'm a criminal defence lawyer in private practice with the Ottawa firm of Edelson Clifford D’Angelo LLP. Although I maintain a comprehensive criminal law practice, I specialize in defending

Public Safety committee  Absolutely. I think the very first point you raised is the answer to your question, which is that we already have a wonderful database in this country of law-abiding citizens. It is the firearms licensing system. Those individuals are pre-approved through rigorous background ch

Public Safety committee  Thank you very much for the question. The reason I mentioned the Firearms Act reference, the Supreme Court case, was that it's the case in which the validity of the law, in fact the federal regulation of firearms, was disputed by several provinces. The way the Supreme Court sol

Public Safety committee  I wish that segment of my practice would disappear. The end result is that firearms owners are targeted; they're charged and they're prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. The question of whether or not that could occur by decriminalizing it doesn't take it out of the rea

Justice committee  Thank you.

Justice committee  Thank you. Mr. Chair, Vice-Chair and honourable members, thank you for inviting me to testify on the amendments to the jury selection provisions contained within Bill C-75. I'll say just a few words about myself so you know where I come from. I'm a criminal defence lawyer in Ot

Justice committee  Sure. That refers to the Batson v. Kentucky decision in the United States. It has to be modified for Canada, because in the United States jury selection process they engage in something they call “voir dire”. We call “voir dire” something completely different. They have sustained

Justice committee  Certainly. Last year, I was lead counsel on a first-degree murder trial. There were four accused. My client was a racialized young man charged with a fairly publicized homicide in a large urban area. There was a challenge for cause to address the publicity issue, but obviously I

Justice committee  As a defence lawyer, I've sworn an oath to try to get the most favourable outcome for my client by any legal means necessary, so if I or any of my colleagues used peremptory challenges to get a less favourable outcome, I'd be calling up the law society probably, and maybe you guy

Justice committee  I'm just "Mr." The "professor" is on my—

Justice committee  I think that's the full answer to the argument that this is really a provincial matter. If you were to enact that, I know I would exercise that challenge, and every jury trial would get held up until the provinces passed their legislation. It wouldn't take very long at all. I don

Justice committee  That's per accused.

Justice committee  —as many as all the accused put together.

Justice committee  That's correct, or four for an offence that falls below those two thresholds.

Justice committee  I've had cases where I've selected a jury and advised the judge at the outset that I didn't intend to use any of my peremptory challenges, that I wanted the first 12 people who were ready to serve. I've done that. I've also had cases where I've exhausted my peremptory challenges.