Law Times

Page 16 June 13, 2016 • Law Times www.lawtimesnews.com FATHER-DAUGHTER DUO LAUNCH STARTUP The idea to start his own firm came to Gavin MacKenzie when he was out for his Sunday morning run a few months ago. At the beginning of June, the litigant left his job working for DLA Piper (Canada) LLP and decided to start a boutique firm, called MacKenzie Barris- ters with his daughter, Brooke MacKenzie. Gavin MacKenzie was first called to the bar in 1977 and has since worked for a number of big firms, but he says the timing was right to start a firm with his daughter as she had just come to the end of a one-year leave of absence after two years of articling with Mc- Carthy Tétrault. "I've been very lucky that she and I are very close," he says. "We are both interested in the same type of work and thought it would be fun and challenging to practice law together." FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO BOOST LEGAL AID Legal Aid is set to get a boost from the federal government. Attorney General Jody Wilson-Raybould announced last week that the federal govern- ment would spend an additional $30 million per year on top of the $88 million it already committed to spend over the next five years in the 2016 budget. But that extra $30 million will not kick in until 2021-2022. "All Canadians — no matter their means — should have the right to a fair trial and access to a modern, efficient justice system," Wilson-Raybould said in a state- ment. The Department of Justice currently distributes $128 mil- lion among the provinces and territories for legal aid programs. Of the $88 million promised in the 2016 budget, $9 million will be forked out in 2016-2017. The federal government said that in addition to making legal aid more available to those who need it, the new funding would be used to develop new ways to deliver monies. COHEN HIGHLEY LLP AWARDED DAVID C. ONLEY HONOUR The provincial government has honoured Cohen Highley LLP with a David C. Onley Award for Leadership in Accessibil- ity. The award is given to "Ontar- ians who have demonstrated an outstanding commitment to im- proving accessibility for people with disabilities." Cohen Highley LLP, which has people on staff with disabili- ties, was awarded the honour for its work to lift barriers for em- ployees with disabilities and for fostering greater inclusion in the legal profession. The firm, which advises cli- ents on the province's acces- sibility standards and laws, has offices across southwest Ontar- io in London, Kitchener, Sarnia, and Chatham. 30 % NO, I DO NOT AGREE YES, I AGREE 70 % LAW TIMES POLL Law Times reported recently that the past president of the On- tario Trial Lawyers Association, Steve Rastin, says he hopes the Law Society of Upper Cana- da will adopt an aggressive ap- proach to regulating advertising. Readers were asked if this regulatory move is way overdue. About 70 per cent of respon- dents indicated yes, the law so- ciety should be tackling these regulations in the near future, and it's a crucial area that needs oversight. The remaining 30 per cent said this should not be a priority for the law society, as there are other pressing matters. LT u Bizarre Briefs By Viola James u The InsIde story SIX-YEAR-OLD CALLS POLICE ON FATHER QUINCY, Mass. — A police dispatcher outside Boston got an unexpected call when a 6-year- old boy dialed 911 to alert them that his father had run a red light on the way to the car wash, according to a recording posted online by the Quincy Police Department. "Daddy went past a red light. My daddy went past a red light," the boy said in the recording. "It was in a brand-new car, my mommy's car." The operator then asked to speak with the father, who seemed unsurprised when he learn- ed of his son's call, according to the recording and a report in the Boston Globe. The man apologized and the police dispatch- er told him not to worry, that he simply wanted to make sure everyone was OK. The Globe identified the caller as Robbie Richardson, who told the newspaper he wants to go into police work when he grows up. His father, Michael Richardson, told the newspaper his son had warned him that he had planned to call police. "He's a smart kid," the father said. "When he says he's going to do something, he does it." Richardson could not be reached for im- mediate comment. IF LAW DOESN'T PAN OUT . . . DEBRECEN, Hungary — In a graveyard in Hungary, solemn contemplation gave way to frantic sportsmanship as dozens of gravediggers battled to prove they were the fastest and best in the business. Taking their places at plots selected by pull- ing names out of a hard hat, 18 two-man teams waited for an official to shout "Start!" before shovelling at the ground to dig a precise, regula- tion-size grave as quickly as possible. "I don't think this is morbid," says Zoltan Juracsik, the Hungarian Undertakers' Associa- tion's deputy chairman, at the national gravedig- ging contest at the wooded cemetery in Debre- cen, Hungary's biggest city after Budapest. "This is a profession, and the colleagues who toil in competition today are proud and deserve our respect." In less than half an hour, the local team, per- haps enjoying the home advantage, finished its grave first. The stragglers took almost one hour. The graves were then judged on neatness and whether they complied with the regulation size. The winning team wins a place in an interna- tional tournament against Poland, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic. The contest is meant to improve the prestige of gravedigging and attract young people to a job that must still be done by hand in crowded graveyards where mechanical diggers cannot fit. One of the competitors, Csaba Halasz, 21, began by taking a summer job after high school. Although he graduated with a degree in physical education, he stayed in the business. "This job chose me," he said. "It's hard, but it's worth it. Relatives come and thank me every time. The profession just lured me in." THAT'S (NOT) AMORE FRAMINGHAM, Mass. — WCVB and the MetroWest Daily News report that a woman who was mad she wasn't getting a pizza deal she wanted threw a sign and allegedly hit a young girl in the face. Iesha Davis, 36, was arrested by officers after an incident involving an 11-year- old girl at Framingham Sub Shop & Pizza. MetroWest Daily News said an employee at the pizza joint told police Davis had ordered a pizza, and then wanted chicken put on it. "Davis pointed at a pizza sign and demanded the $17.99 deal, but [the employee] told her that it would be more money if she asked for chick- en," police wrote in the report, as covered in the MetroWest Daily News. "At this point, Davis picked up the pizza sign and threw it, striking the girl in the face." The girl apparently suffered a scratch due to the incident. MetroWest Daily News reported police charged Davis with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon (pizza sign). LT 40 issues a year covering Ontario's legal landscape FREE digital edition and unlimited online access to past issues FREE Canadian Legal Newswire, a weekly e-newsletter from the editors of Law Times and Canadian Lawyer Juror ruling prompts call to look at Criminal Code BY TALI FOLKINS Law Times ith the Ontario Court of Appeal having ruled on jurors' use of extrinsic informa- tion in a recent case, the president of the Criminal Lawyers' Association says it may be necessary to amend the Criminal Code in order to get a better handle on the issue. "You can't say if jurors are or are not doing this at any level that is ap- preciable because you only find out in the rare case where a juror hap- pens to mention something," says Anthony Moustacalis. "Maybe jurors really do obey the judge's instructions. In my experi- ence, it seems that they generally do. But do I really know? The an- swer is no. Maybe they're Googling stuff all the time." The only way to know for sure and assess the necessity of any changes to the jury system, accord- ing to Moustacalis, is to amend the Criminal Code to allow research- ers to interview jury members anonymously about their experi- ences. "The fact of the matter is that people are people and they might not always remember the limits of what they're allowed to do or they might stray," he says. The comments follow the ap- peal court's ruling in R. v. Farinacci, a case that demonstrated the ease with which jurors can now find information about the defendant outside of the evidence presented during the trial. In their ruling on June 3, a panel of three judges re- fused to overturn the convictions of two brothers for possession of the proceeds of crime and conspiracy to traffic in cocaine. The brothers, Lucas Farinacci and Leonard Fari- nacci Jr., had argued their right to a fair trial had been compromised because jurors in the case, with the help of Google and other sources, had come across information about them that hadn't come up in court. The appeal came about as a result of a chance event at a coffee shop. Prior to sentencing but after the brothers' conviction, someone at the coffee shop overheard one of the ju- rors, in a conversation with a friend, mention that another me mber of Zero-tolerance conundrum Lawyers say pendulum has swung too far against accused in domestic violence cases BY TALI FOLKINS Law Times he justice system has taken the idea of zero toler- ance in domestic assault to such an extreme that it's unfair to defendants and no longer works in the best interests of Ontario families, says a 40- year veteran of criminal law. It's an opinion, however, vociferously opposed by at least one lawyer who helps victims of domestic violence. Leo Adler, of Adler Bytensky Prutschi Shikhman, says the issue of domestic assault has become "political football" over the last 25 to 30 years with largely undesirable results. While Adler emphasizes he doesn't want to diminish the tragedy of family violence, he says the situation has now reached a point where police called to family violence situa- tions are unduly afraid to release the defendant even in cases that don't appear serious. "Nobody wants to be the person who says, 'O.K., I'm going to release you,' because you might be the one in a million or whatever the statistic is who might end up killing your spouse," says Adler. "In a lot of these cases, there's no sign of violence, there's no sign of anything having occurred. You simply have the word of the complainant. And the person gets arrested and I can tell you that again in the majority of cases, the police don't even bother to try to take a statement from the accused, usually the male. . . . They don't ask because it doesn't make a difference because they're going to arrest you no matter what." Bail hearings in domestic violence cases, he says, are "a l- ways run on the presumption of guilt" and, if the court does grant bail, it's generally under strict conditions with the de- fendant required to live with a surety. The result, according to Adler, is often a divided family with the added financial strain OBA LAUDED Association honoured for mental-health efforts P4 CAMPAIGN SPENDING Bencher candidate calls for expense limits P6 FOCUS ON Legal Innovation 'In a lot of these cases, there's no sign of violence, there's no sign of anything having occurred,' says Leo Adler. Photo: Robin Kuniski See Silence, page 2 See Bail, page 2 There's no way to know if jurors are doing their own research on cases, says Anthony Moustacalis. PM #40762529 & $#&!& t7PM/P Follow LAW TIMES on www.twitter.com/lawtimes L AW TIMES T W Juror ruling prompts call to look at Criminal Code BY TALI FOLKINS Law Times ith the Ontario Court of Appeal having ruled on jurors' use of extrinsic informa- tion in a recent case, the president of the Criminal Lawyers' Association says it may be necessary to amend the Criminal Code in order to get a better handle on the issue. "You can't say if jurors are or are not doing this at any level that is ap- preciable because you only find out in the rare case where a juror hap- pens to mention something," says Anthony Moustacalis. "Maybe jurors really do obey the judge's instructions. In my experi- ence, it seems that they generally do. But do I really know? The an- swer is no. Maybe they're Googling stuff all the time." The only way to know for sure and assess the necessity of any changes to the jury system, accord- ing to Moustacalis, is to amend the Criminal Code to allow research- ers to interview jury members anonymously about their experi- ences. "The fact of the matter is that people are people and they might not always remember the limits of what they're allowed to do or they might stray," he says. The comments follow the ap- peal court's ruling in R. v. Farinacci, a case that demonstrated the ease with which jurors can now find information about the defendant outside of the evidence presented during the trial. In their ruling on June 3, a panel of three judges re- fused to overturn the convictions of two brothers for possession of the proceeds of crime and conspiracy to traffic in cocaine. The brothers, Lucas Farinacci and Leonard Fari- nacci Jr., had argued their right to a fair trial had been compromised because jurors in the case, with the help of Google and other sources, had come across information about them that hadn't come up in court. The appeal came about as a result of a chance event at a coffee shop. Prior to sentencing but after the brothers' conviction, someone at the coffee shop overheard one of the ju- rors, in a conversation with a friend, mention that another me mber of Zero-tolerance conundrum Lawyers say pendulum has swung too far against accused in domestic violence cases BY TALI FOLKINS Law Times he justice system has taken the idea of zero toler- ance in domestic assault to such an extreme that it's unfair to defendants and no longer works in the best interests of Ontario families, says a 40- year veteran of criminal law. It's an opinion, however, vociferously opposed by at least one lawyer who helps victims of domestic violence. Leo Adler, of Adler Bytensky Prutschi Shikhman, says the issue of domestic assault has become "political football" over the last 25 to 30 years with largely undesirable results. While Adler emphasizes he doesn't want to diminish the tragedy of family violence, he says the situation has now reached a point where police called to family violence situa- tions are unduly afraid to release the defendant even in cases that don't appear serious. "Nobody wants to be the person who says, 'O.K., I'm going to release you,' because you might be the one in a million or whatever the statistic is who might end up killing your spouse," says Adler. "In a lot of these cases, there's no sign of violence, there's no sign of anything having occurred. You simply have the word of the complainant. And the person gets arrested and I can tell you that again in the majority of cases, the police don't even bother to try to take a statement from the accused, usually the male. . . . They don't ask because it doesn't make a difference because they're going to arrest you no matter what." Bail hearings in domestic violence cases, he says, are "a l- ways run on the presumption of guilt" and, if the court does grant bail, it's generally under strict conditions with the de- fendant required to live with a surety. The result, according to Adler, is often a divided family with the added financial strain OBA LAUDED Association honoured for mental-health efforts P4 CAMPAIGN SPENDING Bencher candidate calls for expense limits P6 FOCUS ON Legal Innovation P8 'In a lot of these cases, there's no sign of violence, there's no sign of anything having occurred,' says Leo Adler. Photo: Robin Kuniski See Silence, page 2 See Bail, page 2 There's no way to know if jurors are doing their own research on cases, says Anthony Moustacalis. PM #40762529 & $#&!&jmmm$cYa[bbWh$Yec t7PM/P +VOF Follow LAW TIMES on www.twitter.com/lawtimes L AW TIMES T W Subscribe to Law Times today for $199* and receive: Canlawyer.lawtimes@thomsonreuters.com | 416.609.3800 | 1.800.387.5164 Access a free preview at: bitly.com/LawTimes-FreePreview Order online at: www.lawtimesnews.com/subscribe *Plus applicable taxes How the legal community in Ontario gets its news @lawtimes Untitled-4 1 2016-06-08 12:27 PM Gavin and Brooke MacKenzie have launched MacKenzie Barristers, which will specialize in civil appeals and professional liability work.

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