Asher 1
Krish Asher
741354
Ms. Djuric
CLU3MO-B
3/20/2022
RV Stinchcombe's Case: Precedent Set for Canada
In Canada, every person has the right to a fair trial guaranteed by the law. This means that any person is entitled to be treated justly and without bias, no matter their background or situation. It is essential to the legal system, as it is unable to properly ensure truth and justice to those who desire them if the trial is unfair, like in the RV Stinchcombe’s case where the minister breached s.7 of the charter. This case set precedent for future law cases, emphasized, and clarified Canadians rights to a fair trial.
Firstly, this case set precedent that when a criminal proceeding is initiated against an accused
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The legal perspective of the case was that the Supreme Court of Canada found out about the wrong doings in this case in the same year the proceeding was held (1991). A man named George Stinchcombe was charged with fraud The main question in the case was that did the Crown have a legal obligation to provide the defence with all related information, including information that would help the defence or hurt the case as mentioned by the government of Canada “duty on the part of the Crown to disclose all material it proposes to use at trial and especially all evidence which may assist the accused even if the Crown does not propose to adduce it”. So, the Crown did have such a duty, the Supreme Court of Canada decided, and failing to provide this material violates the persons right to a fair trial. On the defence perspective of the case the R.v Stinchcombe case is a strong win as before the information was not required to be shown, “Prior to the 1991 release of the decision of R v Stinchcombe, the general duty to disclosed varied between jurisdictions. The Crown had some discretion to withhold evidence that was deemed uncredible”. Now, after the case it is made sure that an accused person has a fair trial, the case established a right of proper information in criminal proceedings, which is essential to the fair trial of an accused person. The ruling has given better communication between the prosecution and defence and has given defence counsel the tools they need to represent their clients in a fair