Manitoba Law Journal
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Chapter 11 – Canada v. Asad Ansari: Avatars, Inexpertise, and Racial Bias in Canadian Anti-Terrorism Litigation
No full textThis chapter examines the litigation against Asad Ansari, who was charged with terrorism offences as part of the Toronto 18. The authors examined the litigation files held in the archives of the Ontario Court of Appeals. Through close readings of trial transcripts and judicial decisions on evidentiary motions, the chapter illustrates that systemically embedded in the features of Canada’s adversarial legal system and Criminal Code are legal dynamics that enable racialized, Orientalist readings of Islam and Muslims, and echo the medieval dynamics of religious inquisitions
Hryniak Comes to Manitoba: The Evolution of Manitoba Civil Procedure in the 2010s
No full textThis article investigates whether the Supreme Court of Canada’s 2014 decision Hryniak v Mauldin has led to changes in Manitoba procedural law, largely in the summary judgment context. After introducing Hryniak and civil procedure reform’s place in the context of Canada’s access to justice crisis, the author turns to Manitoba. In addition to exploring the regulatory history of explicit changes to Manitoba’s Court of Queen’s Bench Rules, the author delves into Manitoba case law to determine their jurisprudential consequences and whether they have had effects in terms of the frequency that particular rules are used. Ultimately, it is concluded that, despite some potential to be bolder, by and large, Manitoba has prudently charted its own path in this important area of facilitating access to justice
Chapter 15 – Rehabilitation, Intervention, and Parole for the Toronto 18: Dead Ends and Silver Linings
No full textThis chapter assesses the spectrum of intervention measures (on a state and non-state level) available to offenders who plan to, or have, committed terrorism-related offences. The author does so with a view to determining whether intervention measures or rehabilitative efforts are sufficiently mitigating for the purpose of sentencing or parole. The author begins by surveying various intervention programs in Canada for persons at the “pre-charge” stage and highlights their practical shortcomings. Relying on this information, she emphasizes that evidence of rehabilitation efforts or work with intervention groups can prove insufficient for the purpose of mitigating a sentence of incarceration or granting parole. The author argues that this phenomenon results in a dead-end at every milestone of the criminal justice system for offenders convicted for terrorism-related offences. Even in cases where offenders have shown an ability to rehabilitate, the weight of their rehabilitative efforts is often questioned by courts and the National Parole Board by virtue of the crime they committed
Chapter 4 – The Infiltration of the Toronto 18: A Conversation with Mubin Shaikh
No full textThis chapter is an edited version of a conversation that occurred in December 2019 between Amarnath Amarasingam and Mubin Shaikh, a confidential human source for Canadian law enforcement related to the Toronto 18 case. Shaikh, having spent an inordinate amount of time with the suspects, has important insights on the group, their friendship dynamics, and their differing levels of radicalization. The chapter also delves into the challenges of infiltration, trust-building with suspects, as well as the risks experienced by those who go undercover. The conversation concludes with Shaikh reflecting on ongoing struggles related to convincing some in the Muslim community in Canada that it was not entrapment and the social and psychological fallout of the whole experience, even after a decade
Chapter 16 – A Brief History of the Brief History of Citizenship Revocation in Canada
No full textFour of the men convicted as part of the Toronto 18 prosecution were subject to citizenship revocation on grounds of terrorism. One of the four was born in Canada, and the other three immigrated to Canada and acquired citizenship through naturalization. I situate the politics of the four men’s citizenship revocation in legal and comparative context. Contemporary citizenship revocation policies, especially those invoked in the name of national security, serve both instrumental and symbolic goals. I argue that the citizenship revocation scheme enacted in Canada resonated primarily in the register of symbolic politics and lacked virtually any instrumental value related to national security. Its deployment against four of the Toronto 18 was always, and only, a calculated electoral tactic. I conclude by recounting the case of U.K.-Canadian Jack Letts in order to illustrate how citizenship revocation not only infringes fundamental human rights but is dysfunctional from the vantage point of international relations
Chapter 14 – Sentencing the Toronto 18: Lessons from Then, Lessons for Now
No full textEleven of the Toronto 18 were eventually charged and tried for terrorism offences. All of them were found guilty and received various lengthy custodial sentences. This chapter considers the enduring importance of these ground-breaking sentencing decisions, including what they have meant for future cases in terms of the length of sentence, how aggravating and mitigating factors are to be considered in the context of terrorism offences, and how the fundamental principle of sentencing is to be conceived in cases of terrorism. It finds that the Toronto 18 sentencing decisions have had lasting importance on subsequent terrorism sentencing decisions, especially since they were amongst the very first and thus, precedent setting terrorism sentencing decisions, there were so many of them relative — even now — to the total number of terrorism cases in Canada, and their logic has been adopted by subsequent judges. But this judicial logic also comes under scrutiny.While each sentencing decision was tailored to the individual, varied in length and analysis, and clearly gave longer sentences for the lead actors, they also diverged in approach from the usual application of the “fundamental principle.” Instead, the analysis of terrorism offences in the Toronto 18 sentencing decisions was often portrayed through the broader lens of terrorism and the threat it poses conceptually; the result was a downplaying of individuality, which in turn caused certain fundamental mitigating considerations – such as youth and prospects for rehabilitation – to be turned into neutral, or even aggravating, factors. The result seemed to skew the normal balancing of individual moral culpability with the seriousness of the offence (the fundamental principle) towards the latter consideration, with a view to elevating denunciation and deterrence as the preeminent sentencing goals in terrorism cases
Speech by H.A. Robson: The Revival of Liberalism
No full textSpeech by H.A. Robson: The Revival of Liberalis