Watchdog wants faster court cases

Ontario’s Attorney General is calling on his federal counterpart to scrap preliminary inquiries in most criminal cases as a way to speed up the justice system.

These hearings are held prior to trials in Superior Court, which handles the most serious cases such as murder, and allow for a lower court judge to determine if there is enough evidence to send the accused to trial.

Speaking to the Empire Club of Canada Tuesday, Attorney General Yasir Naqvi said he also wants federal Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould to move as quickly as possible to fill Ontario’s11judicial vacancies in Superior Court, which include seven in the GTA and three in Ottawa.

“We need to make bold changes to speed up and simplify the criminal court process,” Naqvi said. “It is our view that the long-held rationales for preliminary inquiries simply no longer exist.”

The Criminal Lawyers’ Association, which supports preliminary inquiries as the best way to discover a case against the accused, said it was not consulted on Naqvi’s request.

“We will be pursuing the opportunity to point out the shortcomings of the Attorney General’s position,” CLA president Anthony Moustacalis said. He said a preliminary inquiry allows parties to narrow the scope of a case, meaning the eventual trial would not be so lengthy or costly.

In a letter to Wilson-Raybould obtained by the Star, Naqvi said preliminary inquiries should be limited to the most serious offences, such as murder and treason.

He said the Crown’s screening standard for bringing a case forward is already higher than the test used in a preliminary inquiry to determine if an accused should stand trial.

Naqvi said that the provincial government has been conducting an analysis regarding the effectiveness of preliminary inquiries, and found that, in the vast majority of cases, the accused was ordered to stand trial.