CROWN ATTORNEY STAYS CHARGES IN CASES OF MARIJUANA POSSESSION

With the law against simple possession of marijuana nullified in Ontario,
the federal Crown attorney's office for the area has decided to stay all
prosecutions against people charged with the offence.

In the last few days, copies of letters have been sent to defence lawyers
representing about 40 clients charged with possession of marijuana.

The letters direct the clerk of the court to stay the charges
administratively, without a court appearance. Ottawa-Gatineau federal Crown
attorney Eugene Williams said it is clear Ontario courts are bound by
recent rulings nullifying the law, so there was no point in trying to
continue prosecuting the cases.

"We assessed the law ... and we deemed that it wasn't in the public
interest for a number of reasons to proceed with these cases," Mr. Williams
said.

The prohibition against possessing marijuana became void a month ago when a
Windsor Superior Court judge, sitting as an appeal judge, agreed with a
lower court ruling that struck down the possession law for a combination of
reasons.

This is a binding decision on courts, and, in the last few weeks, when
faced with people charged with the offence, many judges have been simply
quashing the cases because the law doesn't exist any more.

"We wanted a clean, non-confrontational approach to deal with this
situation," Mr. Williams said.

The Crown is appealing the precedent to the Ontario Court of Appeal, but
this won't be heard for at least a month with the ruling to follow sometime
later. And an earlier attempt by the Crown to have the precedent set aside
pending the appeal failed.

Ottawa is the first jurisdiction in Ontario to stay all possession cases.
Others may follow suit.

Technically, if the appeal court overturns the precedent and reinstates the
possession law, the Crown has up to a year to restart cases against people.

Because of this, the Crown's move to stay cases received less than stellar
reviews from Ottawa defence lawyers yesterday.

"It's unfair for people to have to live with a charge outstanding against
them," said defence lawyer Rob Lewis, who received eight of the letters.
"These people deserve the right to be acquitted. They have a right to have
the charge quashed and be found not guilty, which is what judges were doing."

He was also suspicious of the motive behind the stays, fearing the federal
Crown may just be trying to buy time until the appeal is heard.

"The section is void. The crime doesn't exist. The stay means these cases
will never get before a judge to have them quashed properly."

Mr. Williams said the motive behind the stays was to simply get rid of the
cases and not waste court resources -- not to buy time with the idea of
restarting them if the appeal court overturns the precedent.

If they did that, he said, there would be several legal flaws that would
almost guarantee they would be thrown out.