It is important to send the message that there cannot be secret trials in Canada, the chief justice of the Supreme Court said Tuesday during a hearing into the mysterious criminal trial of a police informant who was held outside the usual circuits in Quebec.
“In fact, what is important is that Canadians know that there are not, there cannot be, secret trials in Canada,” said the Right Honorable Richard Wagner, in a exchange with the lawyer for the media coalition who contests the way the trial was held.
The chief judge also insisted on the democratic issue raised by this case. “We only have to look elsewhere, very close to home, to see how fragile democracy is,” he stressed.
Last year, the Quebec Court of Appeal overturned the conviction of a police informant tried in what it called a “secret trial.” The name of the judge, the lawyers, the police force involved, the crime charged, the sentence requested, the way in which the accused could have served his sentence: everything had been hidden from the public. The case would not even have been registered in the register of court files and the witnesses would have been questioned outside the court, according to the Court of Appeal, which had decried a way of doing things “incompatible with the values of a liberal democracy.
A coalition of media, including The Pressasked the Supreme Court on Tuesday to set guidelines that would allow journalistic organizations and other groups representing the public interest to make representations in favor of greater transparency when authorities request exceptional confidentiality measures for a trial.
The media also requested that the police informant’s case be sent back to the trial court for correction.
Me Christian Leblanc, who represented the media, insisted during the hearing on the importance of “ensuring that every Canadian knows that this cannot happen again in our country.”
Interested judges
“The judges seemed very interested in the issue. The publicity of judicial debates is a subject which always interests the Supreme Court and the Supreme Court has always been keen to defend the publicity of judicial debates,” commented Mr.e Leblanc leaving the court.
“What makes appearing before the Supreme Court so rewarding is the exchange we can have with the Court, which ultimately enriches the law. I really appreciated this exchange,” added M.e The White.
Lawyers for the Attorney General of Quebec, for their part, requested that the police informant’s file be referred to the Quebec Court of Appeal so that it could work to make new details of the case public. “We submit to you that the public has the right to know whether what happened in the case can really be described as a secret trial, with all the negative things that can arouse in the public imagination,” argued Mr.e Pierre-Luc Beauchesne.
The chief judge, however, challenged him by taking up the thesis of the former chief judge of the Court of Quebec, Lucie Rondeau, who said she had obtained new confidential information which would demonstrate that the trial of the police informant was not really secret and that the Court of Appeal erred in characterizing it as such. However, this new information also remains secret from the public.
“If I follow the hypothesis that there is no secret trial… the Court of Appeal, using these words: was it responsible or irresponsible? » asked Judge Wagner. Me Beauchesne did not want to decide.
“Unsavory people”
The Attorney General of Ontario and the Attorney General of Alberta have for their part argued against any change in this matter which, according to them, risks undermining the absolute protection that police informants enjoy when they agree to take risks to help the authorities. These informants are often members or relations of criminal organizations, but they can also be a simple retiree who stays at home and observes things, argued the lawyer for the Attorney General of Alberta.
“Yes and very often they are unsavory people,” immediately added Judge Malcolm Rowe.
A new day of hearing is scheduled for Wednesday behind closed doors to allow the Public Prosecution Service of Canada, the police informant concerned and the former chief judge of the Court of Quebec Lucie Rondeau to speak on the file away from public view.
The Court will then retire to prepare its decision.