Police and the legal system provides such funds to witnesses and others within the legal system all the time-often even if they DON"T need it. My suggestion WAS clearly a solution if the problem is that Charles was reluctant to get into a cop car and travel to Miramichi-and I can't say I blame him for that, or not wanting to go into the fredericton police station. IF those were the only options given, then Charles refusal to talk to them is perfectly reasonable. Whether a person can pay for the bill is irrelevant-why should they?
You aren't 'entitled' to legal aid duty counsel. The provinces set the standard and they don't have to provide legal help AT ALL.
However, if charles isn't asking for a lawyer, and refusing to talk to the police, he can't really complain about them not taking his statement or not providing a lawyer.
I'm not so sure about whether they will win or lose, they probably don't care and are just trying to continue to rack up his 'history' with the police so that any time he has a legitimate complaint they can preface it with his 'record' and discredit him. Also, giving statements on a blog is not the same as giving them to the police.
As for the Bernard Richard report, there was virtually nothing that could be asked that Charles hadn't already gone over repeatedly in his blog. I sort of think it was a mistake not to talk to him just because of the perception, but it very well could have simply given Richard more 'ammunition' to target Leblanc, as he clearly did in his report. So in the end it may have been the smarter thing to do.
I think some of that 'stubbornness' does work against Charles. That seems to often be the way, but without that stubbornness he probably would have given up a long time ago, so its not really surprising.
But on his video Charles actually has a witness and the laws regarding assault are that if somebody comes at you, you have to use 'limited' force (which sadly doesn't seem to apply to police), and charles use of force seems to be clearly limited according to what his witness says. So yeah, unless the police have another witness somewhere saying something different, I don't see how this is 'assault'. Mind you, this is a province where the provincial government told Charles he would be charged with 'assault' if he even set foot on the grounds of the legislature, so clearly the 'powers that be' in New Brunswick 'be' reading a different law book than the rest of us.
"You aren't 'entitled' to legal aid duty counsel. The provinces set the standard and they don't have to provide legal help AT ALL." That is not true at all. The standard is set by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, section 7, and Supreme Court of Canada Decision, which this Province, and its Legal Aid Services, violate every minute of every day. Most people think the only right to duty counsel in such situations comes under section 10(b), but that only applies on arrest or detention - which is why they wanted Charles to come in and make a voluntary statement: he had no section 10(b) rights to counsel - most people don't know the full scope of the legal right to counsel. The broad rights to counsel come under section 7 of the Charter - security of the person, which is enshrined in Supreme Court of Canada decisions. Any state action that compromises or jeopardises your security, whether it is the security of your job, income, health etc, entitles you to legal counsel. This province is run by criminals, cheating people of justice every day - and the people cheating us are the ones paid to protect us. Oh, the irony.
ReplyDeleteYou'll have to show exactly what Supreme Court decisions you are referring to, because ALL provinces regularly don't provide legal counsel on summary convictions. They claim the 'cost' isn't worth it, and so they stick duty counsel in the courtroom. I certainly am not saying thats 'right', but you'll have to actually show what Supreme Court decisions you are referring to, because that would invalidate literally hundreds of thousands of cases. In fact, a 2010 Supreme Court ruling maintains that people are not even entitled to a lawyer during interrogation.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/no-right-to-counsel-during-interrogation-top-court/article1214615/
Individual rights in the legal system have been under attack since the early eighties, this is not new, and its not restricted to New Brunswick. Just take a look at the recent case of the woman charged with mischief at the fracking protest. Not only is she barred from approaching fracking companies, and on probation prohibiting any more 'mischief', but she has had the charter protected right of freedom of assembly and freedom to protest taken away. Part of her probation is to stay away even from LEGAL protests.
Thats a pretty clear violation of charter rights. Just because you committed a crime doesn't mean you lose your charter rights any more than getting a speeding ticket should ban you from political protest. But that kind of thing happens ALL THE TIME, and it happens all across Canada.
But so far as I know, no other provincial government has barred people from the legislature and said they'd be charged with assault for simply walking onto the premises.
And in a related case, no other province has judges who seem completely oblivious to Supreme Court rulings that guarantee panhandlers the right to ask for money. In a fredericton case the judge threw out a case against a panhandler, not because of the supreme court ruling, but because he maintained that the man was playing an instrument, therefore was 'contributing to society'.
Charles restrained Himself and used only as much force to repel the attack as he knows! Otherwise a Ambulance would have probably been needed for the Parrot/Poet!
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