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w w w . C A N A D I A N L a w y e r m a g . c o m M A Y 2 0 1 7 25 v. jordan lberta Court of Queen's Bench Justice Paul Belzil was asked to decide earlier this year whether a delay of approximately 33 months before trial was sufficient to stay charges against three men facing multiple offences including robbery and aggravated assault. It was an application to throw out charges based on the Supreme Court of Canada ruling last year in R. v. Jordan, which set out a new framework for analyzing s. 11(b) violations of the Charter. In the proceeding before Belzil, the time taken to get to trial was above the 30-month threshold established in Jordan for cases in Superior Court. That meant the Crown was required to show "exceptional circumstances" to rebut the presumption that the delay was unreasonable. Belzil concluded this was a case involving "exceptional circumstances." The reason was that a large part of the delay was a result of reserved rulings by judges at earlier stages. The preliminary hearing judge took three months to rule on a Crown request to admit certain documents. The original trial judge took four months to rule on a defence request for a jury trial. "Delays occasioned by judges reserving decisions are discrete events which constitute exceptional circumstances," wrote Belzil. A survey of reported decisions since Jordan indicates that the Alberta judge's ruling is by no means the only example of exceptional circumstances that did not relate to the complexity of the case. In Nova Scotia, Justice Anne Derrick concluded that while it was more than five months past the 18-month ceiling in provincial court to try an accused with mental health issues on a break and enter and weapons charge, the delay was reasonable. A seven-month adjournment fell under "exceptional circumstances" because a grandparent of the Crown died six days before the trial. The adjournment occurred during "prime summer vacation time," so it would be hard to find a replacement Crown, noted Derrick in her ruling issued in March. a A was a wakeup call, but did it really address root causes? MICHELLE THOMPSON