R. v. B. (D.): The Constitutionalization of Adolescence

Canadian law has long recognized that because youth have limited capacities and greater vulnerability, they should be afforded a special status in the criminal justice system. Since the Youth Criminal Justice Act (“YCJA”) came into force in 2003, the Supreme Court has favoured a “pro-youth” interpretation of the Act, restricting the use of custody for young offenders and protecting their legal rights. The 2008 decision of the Supreme Court in R. v. B. (D.) significantly extended this protective approach, recognizing that the principle of the “diminished moral blameworthiness” of youth in the criminal justice system has not only a statutory basis, but also a constitutional foundation. Writing for a five-member majority of the Court, Abella J. ruled that provisions of the YCJA that impose an obligation on a youth found guilty of a very serious offence to justify not imposing an adult sentence are unconstitutional. The majority also took a more expansive view of section 7 of the Charter, finding that the social and psychological stresses associated with identifying publicity are engaged if a youth is named in media reports, and ruled unconstitutional a provision of the YCJA requiring a youth found guilty of one of the most serious offences and receiving a youth sentence to justify a ban on the publication of identifying information. Significantly, the Court was unanimous in accepting that the diminished moral blameworthiness of youth is a principle of fundamental justice, though it was sharply divided in the application of this newly recognized principle. R.v. B. (D.) is the most important judgment of the Court regarding youth offending in the history of Canada, and will both affect judicial approaches to youth justice issues and constrain possible legislative reforms that might make the youth system more “adult-like”. The decision also suggests that a narrow majority of the Court is prepared to take a relatively broad approach to section 7 of the Charter

Reforming Ontario’s Family Justice System: An Evidence-Based Approach

This Report summarizes research about justice system responses to family disputes, makes recommendations for government action based on that empirical evidence, and identifies some as yet unanswered system design questions requiring further study. This document is provocative as it is premised on a realistic appreciation of the nature of family disputes and the limits of government action, especially in the present fiscal environment, and the fact that there are issues related to family justice that research has not adequately addressed and hence development of public policy must be undertaken in the face of uncertainty

Searching the World-Wide-Web using nucleotide and peptide sequences

*Background:* No approaches have yet been developed to allow instant searching of the World-Wide-Web by just entering a string of sequence data. Though general search engines can be tuned to accept ‘processed’ queries, the burden of preparing such ‘search strings’ simply defeats the purpose of quickly locating highly relevant information. Unlike ‘sequence similarity’ searches that employ dedicated algorithms (like BLAST) to compare an input sequence from defined databases, a direct ‘sequence based’ search simply locates quick and relevant information about a blunt piece of nucleotide or peptide sequence. This approach is particularly invaluable to all biomedical researchers who would often like to enter a sequence and quickly locate any pertinent information before proceeding to carry out detailed sequence alignment. 

*Results:* Here, we describe the theory and implementation of a web-based front-end for a search engine, like Google, which accepts sequence fragments and interactively retrieves a collection of highly relevant links and documents, in real-time. e.g. flat files like patent records, privately hosted sequence documents and regular databases. 

*Conclusions:* The importance of this simple yet highly relevant tool will be evident when with a little bit of tweaking, the tool can be engineered to carry out searches on all kinds of hosted documents in the World-Wide-Web.

*Availability:* Instaseq is free web based service that can be accessed by visiting the following hyperlink on the WWW
http://instaseq.georgetown.edu 
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Corruption and Doing Business in Emerging Markets

Corruption is a serious international problem with many damaging effects particularly in emerging market countries. We investigated to what degree overregulation and inadequate legal institutions contributed to corruption of small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) in emerging markets. Unlike other studies, we used data from the World Bank?s Doing Business annual series which provides indicators of the regulatory and legal environments facing SME. We had three major research questions. (1) Which government obstacles to conducting business in the form of overregulation and inadequate legal institutions contribute most to corruption? (2) Which are more closely linked to corruption, excessive regulations or weak legal institutions? (3) Which of the components, from which the World Bank?s indicators are derived, have the largest impact on corruption? We regressed Transparency International?s Corruption Perception Index on the nine World Bank indicators and five control variables for 51 emerging market countries from 2007 to 2015. This study concludes that all five regulation indicators, but only one of four legal indicators, contributed to corruption. While past studies have linked regulation and corruption, our contribution was identifying specifically which of the World Bank?s measures of the regulatory and legal environment cause corruption. In addition, our results also corroborate those of previous studies regarding our five control variables. Policy wise the World Bank has long advocated reducing regulations to improve SME operating efficiency. Our results further support such a policy because of its important additional benefit of reducing corruption and its many toxic effects

Establishing Canada\u27s First Integrated Domestic Violence Court: Exploring Process, Outcomes, and Lessons Learned

The establishment of domestic violence courts has resulted in significant improvements in responses to family violence, but these courts have generally dealt only with criminal cases and do not address the risks that the victim and children may face in family proceedings. In some locations in the USA, courts have been established to deal with both criminal and family proceedings that arise from a domestic violence situation. This paper describes and analyzes the establishment of the first court in Canada that hears both criminal and family cases concerning families where there are domestic violence issues. The authors report on a study of the views and experiences of 21 stakeholders (judges, Crown, criminal and family lawyers, community supports, victims, and offenders) involved in the Integrated Domestic Violence Court in Toronto. The participants generally report that the Court provides a better approach to dealing with domestic violence post separation, though there are some concerns expressed about its operations, especially by lawyers representing alleged abusers. The Integrated Domestic Violence Court is a promising example of how systems can collaborate to better protect victims and advance the interests of children

One Judge for One Family: Differentiated Case Management for Families in Continuing Conflict

Understanding the differences between family cases and other types of litigation is essential for an appropriate response to family disputes. Judges have a role in family cases that markedly differs from the traditional judicial role. The authors argue that an effective and accessible family justice system requires pre-trial and post-trial case management by a single judge, an approach to family justice reflected in the slogan: One judge for one family. Judges should have the necessary knowledge, skills, and training needed to resolve family disputes and to help effect changes in parental behaviours and attitudes, as well as the willingness to collaborate effectively with non legal professionals. A differentiated approach to the way each family case is managed is required, varying with the nature of the case, the nature and level of the conflict, and the stage of the litigation process. The paper includes consideration of Canadian approaches to judicial case management, including analysis of the small body of reported case law on the reasons for judicial managing and monitoring family cases before and after trial, and on recusal—when to stop case management

Addressing Controversies About Experts in Disputes Over Children

There is significant controversy about the use of experts in child-related disputes in family and child protection proceedings in Canada. The 2015 Lang Review of the Motherisk Laboratory at Toronto\u27s Hospital for Sick Children concluded that experts retained by child protection agencies were introducing unreliable expert testimony about parental drug and alcohol use. The recent decision of Ontario Court of Appeal in M. v. F. suggested that evidence from a party-retained expert critiquing the opinion of a court-appointed psychologist is rarely helpful or admissible. This paper addresses these and related controversies about the use of experts in child-related cases. It reviews recent developments in the law governing the admissibility of expert evidence, with a particular focus on the 2015 Supreme Court decision in White Burgess, and the role of the judge as a gatekeeper, responsible for excluding biased or unreliable expert testimony. The paper explores the unique role played by court-appointed experts in child-related disputes. It is argued that there should be a continued role for experts retained by one parent to critique a report prepared by a court-appointed expert in a child-related case; nonetheless there is an obligation for party-retained experts to provide unbiased and reliable evidence, and avoid being hired guns. This critique role may be especially important when the state has been involved in the court process, either as a party in a child protection proceeding or by arranging for a particular court-appointed professional to undertake an assessment. It is also argued that there is a strong Charter based argument that indigent parents in child protection proceedings may be entitled to a court order for funding to retain their own experts to testify to counter evidence put forward by experts funded by the government

A Legal and Psychological Critique of the Present Approach to the Assessment of the Competence of Child Witnesses

The Canada Evidence Act requires an inquiry to determine whether a child has the requisite moral and intellectual capacity to testify. Caselaw suggests that a child must demonstrate an understanding of abstract concepts like truth and promise to be competent to testify. This article reports on a survey of Ontario justice system professionals, revealing significant variation in how judges conduct competency inquiries. Children are often asked about religious beliefs and practices, and are frequently asked developmentally inappropriate questions. The authors also report on their experimental research which indicates that children\u27s ability to explain such abstract concepts as truth, lie, and promise is not related to whether children actually tell the truth. Child competency inquiries are demeaning to children, do not promote the search for the truth, and result in unnecessary appeals. The child competence inquiry should be abolished, though a judge should give a child simple instructions about the importance of truth telling, and ask the child to promise to tell the truth