Judge on the defensive with career in balance
Questions from Justice Robin Camp about her failure to fend off a rape suspect left a woman “uncomfortable and confused,” a hearing into whether the judge should be dismissed heard Tuesday.
The now 24-year-old woman, who is at the centre of a controversy surrounding Camp after four University of Calgary law professors complained about his conduct, said his actions left her devastated.
“He made me hate myself and he made me feel that I should have done something,” the woman, who can’t be identified, told a Canadian Judicial Council inquiry into Camp’s conduct.
“I was so confused during the trial,” she said.
“He made comments about why didn’t I close my legs or my ankles, or put my ass in the sink,” she said.
“What did he expect me to say to something like that?”
A five-member committee is presiding over the inquiry into Camp’s conduct.
The committee, consisting of three high court judges and two lawyers, will be asked to decide whether they will recommend to the judicial council that Camp should be relived of his judicial duties.
The Canadian Judicial Council, minus the three-judge members presiding over the inquiry, would then decide whether to recommend Camp’s removal to the minister of justice.
Camp, who has since been appointed to the federal court, was sitting in Calgary provincial court when he presided over the trial of Alexander Wagar.
Camp acquitted Wagar, but the Alberta Court of Appeal ordered a new trial saying it had doubt whether Camp fully understood the law as it pertained to sexual assault cases.
“We are satisfied that the trial judge’s comments throughout the proceedings and in his reasons gave rise to doubts about the trial judge’s understanding of the law governing sexual assaults,” the appeal judges said.
In her opening comments, presenting counsel Marjorie Hickey said the role of the committee will be to determine if Camp’s conduct damaged the public’s confidence in the judiciary as a whole.
“This inquiry must not only examine the individual comments Justice Camp made in the Wagar decision but the impact of those comments on the public interest in the judiciary as a whole,” Hickey said.
Camp’s lawyer, Frank Addario, said that while his client wasn’t a perfect judge, he shouldn’t lose his job over conduct in one case.
“Justice Camp, immediately after the complaint was lodged, apologized and took steps to interrogate his beliefs and to challenge his assumptions,” Addario said.
“The evidence will show that he is reformed in his thinking and sorry for his failing,” he said. “He’s an ethical and empathetic judge.
“The evidence will show he is not the caricature he has been made out to be,” Addario told the inquiry committee.
“The evidence will show he did not refuse to apply the law — a common allegation made against him and repeated numerous times in the media articles to which presenting counsel has made reference today.
“On the other hand, the evidence will show that he did not understand the degree to which pervasive myths contributed to his thinking,” Addario said.
“He did not deliberately choose, as some have alleged, to rely on rape myths as animus toward women,” he said. “He was under-educated about a complex area of the law.”
The hearing is set for seven days.