A. Cameron Ward & Company is a progressive law firm with offices in Vancouver, British Columbia. It was founded in 1993 by Cameron Ward, a trial lawyer who was called to the Bar in 1984. The firm's lawyers have handled many important and complex cases over the last decade and are committed to providing representation and advocacy services for clients with a wide variety of legal problems. The firm has expertise in the areas of civil liberties, personal injury, product liability, medical and professional negligence, contracts, administrative law and criminal law. Its lawyers have represented major corporations, societies and individuals in all levels of Canadian courts and in various tribunals.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice
everywhere."
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
Latest Commentary - Justice delayed...
December 28, 2008
Today's Victoria Times-Colonist has an editorial on what it calls the "colossal failure" of our legal system's inability to get a high-profile fraud case to trial. "The Legislature raids, five years later: A dismal failure" can be linked below:
This is not the only high profile BC criminal fraud case that has been subject to inordinate investigative and procedural delay. Take the case of Martin Wirick and Tarsem Gill, who were charged more than six years after their alleged massive real estate fraud came to light. No word yet on when, or if, they will face trial:
Or how about the case of Ian Thow, who was charged a few months ago, three years after he skipped the country, leaving investors howling that he had bilked them out of millions:
The British Columbia criminal justice system seems to have a lot of trouble completing investigations and getting these types of cases to trial. Perhaps Conrad Black might offer us some advice on how to make our system more efficient. He has plenty of time on his hands these days...those who have followed his exploits will recall that he resigned his chairmanship of Hollinger Inc. in January of 2004 (the month after the BC Legislature raid) and was subsequently investigated, charged, convicted and sentenced to 6 1/2 years in jail. He may have served his time before the Basi/Virk trial even begins...
With nineteen days before the Braidwood Inquiry reconvenes to examine the circumstances of Robert Dziekanski's death, it's worth taking stock of what has occurred since the unfortunate Polish immigrant died at Vancouver Airport following five 50,000 volt jolts from an RCMP "less than lethal" TASER.
At least eighty other North Americans, mostly unarmed men, have died in similar circumstances since the Dziekanski incident on October 14, 2007. There were at least 64 deaths in 2008, starting with that of Brandon Smiley, 24 of Mobile, Alabama on January 2nd and ending with the death of an unidentified man in Harris County, Texas on Christmas Eve. The list includes six Canadians who died in 2008 after being Tasered: Jeffrey Marreel, 36 of Norfolk, Ontario; Michael Langan, 17, of Winnipeg; Sean Reilly, 42, of Brampton; Frank Frachette, 49, of Langley, BC; Trevor Grimolfson, 38, of Edmonton and Gordon Bowe, 30, of Calgary.
According to a recent CBC News study, TASER X26 models may discharge more energy than the manufacturer specifies. However, there is still no regulatory approval regimen for TASER products in Canada. An electric fence regulator must be CSA approved before it can be marketed, but electrical devices for controlling humans face no such scrutiny.
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Here, just for the heck of it, two late greats singing about the snow:
