Ontario to spend $72M to tackle courts backlog, hire court staff, Attorney General says – National

TORONTO — Ontario plans to spend $72 million over two years to sort out a courts backlog the province says has reached tens of hundreds of circumstances over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Legal professional Normal Doug Downey says a part of the funding will go in direction of hiring greater than 340 new court docket workers, together with Crown prosecutors, sufferer help workers and bail vettors _ skilled Crown attorneys who facilitate quicker bail choices and resolutions when applicable.

He says the extra workers will assist increase trial capability and cut back the variety of circumstances coming into the justice system, in addition to pace up circumstances already within the system.

Downey says the province may even convene a group of skilled prosecutors to assessment recordsdata involving homicides and different focused offences to assist streamline these circumstances.

He says the province can also be renting house in some areas to spice up bodily capability, and plans to proceed utilizing know-how for distant hearings and construct on different processes to assist deal with circumstances nearly, corresponding to a digital proof administration program.

The legal professional common says he desires to make sure fees associated to crimes corresponding to homicide and sexual assault aren’t being stayed resulting from delays within the judicial system.

“I don’t suppose the justice system has seen this sort of funding in my dwelling reminiscence, fairly frankly,” Downey stated. “And I feel it’s an actual alternative to carry the precise folks accountable and to maneuver different folks by the system.”

Downey stated the funding ought to permit the backlog to return to what it was in 2019 by 2023, however careworn that isn’t the tip aim.

“Getting again to the place we have been system-wise isn’t essentially success, that’s presuming that the system was working correctly earlier than. So I’m just a little extra bold than simply getting again to a stage that we have been at,” he stated.

In-person court docket proceedings have been suspended within the first few months of the COVID-19 pandemic, with solely pressing issues shifting ahead remotely. Public well being restrictions have made it so that only a few jury trials have been heard throughout the pandemic.

An up to date directive to Crown attorneys that took impact earlier this month instructed them to weigh whether or not prosecution is “viable and applicable” and within the public curiosity given the impression of COVID-19 on the justice system.

It additionally directed prosecutors to think about all obtainable and applicable sanctions to resolve circumstances as rapidly as doable, and to “make each effort doable” to reduce delays brought on by the pandemic to be able to cut back the chance of circumstances being stayed.

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