Justice of the Peace Reform Could Actually Promote Justice

 “The Supreme Court agreed in 2003 that requiring JPs to have a legal education enhances judicial independence and the quality of justice.  Since then, three additional provinces have required JPs hearing cases to be lawyers.  Now MPP David Orazietti has introduced legislation that would bring Ontario up to the same standard.  This reform is to be celebrated.  

“I believe that the most important decision in the criminal system is whether a person will lose their liberty,” said Brian Greenspan, Partner, Greenspan Humphrey Lavine.

Justices of the Peace (JPs) are political appointments.  Full disclosure – as a former political staffer, I’ve been in on the process of picking JPs.  My MPP would get a list of candidates and be asked for his thoughts on the background, experience and judgment of each one.  Obviously there’s more to the procedure than that, but that’s the bit I know.  I never gave much thought to the specifics of what JPs actually face until I was in a position of going before one myself.

At the end of March of this year, I was ploughed into by a Chevy Trailblazer.  I was crossing a street at a crosswalk and on a green light; the inattentive driver was in a rush to get home and took the corner without paying attention to the pedestrian traffic.  Although he hit me at around 30/40 kph, the driver, a well-heeled lawyer, never got out of the car.  I had to coax him for his name ( which he falsified) and phone number.  I took the license plate down myself and then he drove off.

It was then up to me to get to a phone and call 911.  As I was in severe pain and was understandably concerned about what had been done to me physically, I got to an Emergency Room as fast as possible.  I ended up having significant soft tissue damage that I’m still getting physiotherapy to remedy, but not on the dollar of the man who caused it. 

After hitting a fellow human being and showing no remorse, after obstructing, belittling and lying to a police officer, the victimizer in this got away with not so much as a slap on the wrist.  The attending officer actually discouraged me from  pursuing justice;  he comes across cases like this where it was clear who the bad guy was all the time, but when he brought the case to a Justice of the Peace, he would get laughed away.  There was no crime scene, no witnesses, no way of actually proving that my injuries were caused by that driver and that vehicle.  He actually told me the best thing to do should I find myself in a repeat situation is to lie on the road, even if it means exaggerating my wounds, and wait for someone to call 911.  He had no answer when I asked "what if he'd have driven off anyway?"

The JPs weren’t versed in the law – it was their status and supposed judgment that got them their position.  Given this, should it really come as a surprise that for many, the first inclination is to side with the person of property who’s life could be altered by their decisions?  It’s better to air on the side of caution, which the law is designed to do, anyway – keep those with property from being scammed by those without. 


What this unintentionally encourages is behaviour that abuses the rules on both sides.  This isn't serving justice, it's promoting selfish divisiveness.  If that's the approach we want to take, we should just implement a Stand Your Ground law.  That's not about justice, though - it's about retribution. 

When you get slammed into by a car, you lose your liberty, too – liberty of movement, liberty from a sense of safety, possibly liberty from life.  Apart from the physical damage, which limited me from doing things like lifting up my son for a month or cutting the grass, carrying groceries, etc, there was the psychological impact – not just mine, but my entire famiy’s.

Again – the guy who hit me had zero consequence at all.  If you don’t learn from mistakes, what incentive do you have not to repeat them?  Even more disturbing - front-line officers are being discouraged by decisions like this from pursuing justice.  They are being hampered to perform the very duty they are paid to do, by the people they have sworn to protect, but can't.  The greatest victim when justice fails is society as a whole.   

Given the real impact JPs have on the lives of those who come before them, given their impact on justice (both as it’s served and people’s faith in justice – I can tell you, mine has certainly been shaken), the more training they have the better.

David’s got my full backing on this.  I hope he has yours, too.