According to the Ontario Attorney General’s website:
In 1992, it took an average of 4.3 court appearances to bring a charge to completion. By last year, this figure had more than doubled to 9.2 appearances. Over the same period, the average time needed to complete a charge has gone from 115 days to 205 days.
One of AG Chris Bentley’s prime initiatives during his office has been to address these delays in the criminal justice system.
Bentley is the Liberal M.P.P. for my riding of London West. Because of his personal knowledge of our court’s delays, Bentley made London the testing ground for his “Justice on Target” program. The program aims to identify bottlenecks and address them to reduce the number of adjournments and the amount of time it takes for criminal cases to be resolved.
The Ministry of the Attorney General has issued the following (slightly edited) press release today:
—
Accelerating The Pace Of Justice
McGuinty Government Selects Three Courthouses For Next Phase Of Justice On Target Strategy
NEWS
The Ontario Courts of Justice in Newmarket, North York and London have been chosen to begin the province’s intensive, sustained effort to move cases through the justice system faster.
This is the next step in the Justice on Target strategy , to reduce unproductive criminal court delays and appearances by making more effective use of justice resources.
These courthouses have been designated as “action sites” to improve the pace of justice. Teams, led by Regional Senior Justice Bruce Durno and Senior Crown Attorney Ken Anthony, will work to quickly identify, test and implement new ideas.
Successful initiatives will then be rolled out in other courthouses across the province to help achieve the target of a 30 per cent reduction in the provincial average of days and court appearances needed to complete a criminal case. Progress towards the targets in each courthouse will be measured and reported online.
QUOTE
“Our expert teams will be working closely with all justice participants in these three courthouses initially – but the goal is to identify, test and implement approaches that will make criminal justice faster province-wide,” said Attorney General Chris Bentley. “We’re committed to making the justice system more effective for everyone – victims, witnesses, and the public who pay for it.”
QUICK FACT
* With 600,000 charges entering the system every year, saving one minute per charge could save seven years of court time.
—
My personal London criminal justice pet peeve: simple disclosure requests that take six months to fulfill.
