Pubdate: Mon, 15 Mar 2010
Source: Hill Times, The (Ottawa, CN ON)
Copyright: 2010 Hill Times Publishing Inc.
Contact:  http://www.thehilltimes.ca/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/192
Author: Tim Naumetz

DON'T BLAME JUDGE FOR JAFFER'S SLAP ON WRIST, SAYS MP TILSON

Tory MP David Tilson says phone lines in his riding offices lit up
after the decision to drop charges against Rahim Jaffer became public
last week and callers weren't happy.

The Conservative MP who represents the federal electoral district
where an Ontario prosecutor dropped cocaine and impaired driving
charges against former Tory MP Rahim Jaffer says the judge in the
case-a former Progressive Conservative appointee-can't be blamed for
the deal.

David Tilson, whose Dufferin-Caledon constituency includes the
Orangeville, Ont., courthouse where Mr. Jaffer pleaded guilty to a
minor careless driving offence in place of the criminal charges, told
The Hill Times the phone lines in his riding offices lit up after the
decision became public last week.

"I can tell you, I have two constituency offices, one is in
Orangeville, one is at Bolton, we got a lot of calls, very cynical
calls," said Mr. Tilson, who practised law in Orangeville for 20 years
before he entered politics and won election to the Ontario legislative
assembly in 1990.

During his time as a provincial lawmaker prior to his first election
to the House of Commons in 2004, Mr. Tilson at one point served as
Parliamentary assistant to now federal Finance Minister James Flaherty
(Whitby-Oshawa, Ont.), when Mr. Flaherty was attorney general in the
provincial Progressive Conservative government of premier Mike Harris.
It was Mr. Flaherty who named the judge who presided over Mr. Jaffer's
case, Ontario Court Justice Douglas B. Maund, to the bench on Oct. 4,
2000.

Mr. Tilson said Judge Maund would not have been aware of the
decision-making of the Crown attorney Marie Balogh that took place
behind closed doors, before Mr. Jaffer entered the courtroom in
Orangeville last Monday and entered his guilty plea on the careless
driving charge with his lawyer Howard Rubel. Ms. Balogh told Judge
Maund only that the charges were withdrawn because of "significant"
legal issues and there was no reasonable prospect of a conviction.

Ontario Provincial Police had also charged Mr. Jaffer with speeding
after an officer pulled over his Ford Escape 45 minutes past midnight
last Sept. 11 in the hamlet of Palgrave, 65 kilometres north of
downtown Toronto. Mr. Jaffer was on his way to Angus, Ont., 50
kilometres further north, where he lives with his wife, federal Status
of Women Minister Helena Guergis (Simcoe-Grey, Ont.). Police said he
was driving 93 kilometres an hour in a 50-kilometre-an-hour zone when
he was stopped and arrested.

No details about what happened after Mr. Jaffer's arrest have been
made public, and Mr. Tilson said Judge Maund would not have been aware
of the reasons behind the prosecutor's decision to drop the drug and
impaired driving charges, since those charges and the information
behind them never made it to his courtroom.

"I don't think that's appropriate, to criticize the judge," Mr. Tilson
said. "All the judge knows is that the case, that the matters before
him, were the careless driving charge. The other matters weren't
before him because they were dropped. A judge can overrule a Crown
attorney, but that's only if the charge is before him."

Mr. Flaherty's past appointment of Judge Maund to the Ontario Court of
Justice was revealed after Mr. Jaffer's court appearance in a Twitter
post by Canwest News Service reporter David Akin, though opposition
MPs were careful not to criticize the judge, pointing out he
acknowledged in the courtroom Mr. Jaffer was fortunate to face only
the reduced charge.

The opposition instead focused on the apparent contradictions between
Mr. Jaffer's plea bargain as a former Conservative MP and the hardline
federal Conservative policy against crime and the justice system, Mr.
Jaffer's own campaigning against drugs, and previous criticism of the
courts by the Conservative party, Prime Minister Stephen Harper
(Calgary Southwest, Alta.) and Justice Minister Rob Nicholson (Niagara
Falls, Ont.).

"I'm sure you can recognize a break when you see one," The Alliston
Herald quoted Judge Maund as saying to Mr. Jaffer. Judge Maund fined
Mr. Jaffer $500 on the driving conviction, a provincial ticket offence
with no criminal record, after Mr. Jaffer had already agreed to donate
$500 to the Canadian Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. He also apologized
publicly outside the courtroom for driving carelessly. Ms. Guergis did
not appear with her husband in court. The journalist who attended the
hearing on behalf of The Alliston Herald and other newspapers in a
regional chain reported that Ms. Guergis' sister, Christiane Brayford,
a town councillor in New Tecumseth, Ont., accompanied Mr. Jaffer.

Mr. Tilson said it was "unfortunate" Judge Maund "made the remark he
did, but other than that, he's innocent, he has no say in these
matters because the charges weren't before him, they were withdrawn."

The Conservative MP said from his experience working as Mr. Flaherty's
Parliamentary assistant at Queen's Park, he suspects the current
attorney general for the province, Liberal MPP Chris Bentley, who is
in charge of the province's Crown attorneys, must have been aware of
the decision before it became public.

"I can't believe that a matter of this high-profile, the attorney
general of the province of Ontario didn't have some idea of what was
going down, I can't believe that," he said, noting that the Ontario
Provincial Police have defended their investigation and the way the
OPP officer, a 10-year veteran, handled the case.

Because of the controversy, Mr. Bentley assigned his chief Crown
prosecutor, deputy attorney general John Ayre to review the decision
of the Orangeville prosecutor, but a spokesman for Mr. Bentley said
two days later that Mr. Ayre "has reviewed the case and is entirely
confident that the Crown acted properly and in keeping with the proper
administration of justice."

The Criminal Law Society at Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto
describes Judge Maund as a 30-year veteran of the criminal courts,
including work as a defence lawyer and a Crown attorney.
Coincidentally, he was scheduled to address student members of the
Osgoode Hall society the afternoon of the day he sentenced Mr. Jaffer.
"He has seen it all, from drug busts to domestic violence to driver
over .80 and he's happy to speak candidly about how he got to the
bench, what motivated him to become a judge, what works in the
courtroom, and what shortcomings he sees in the justice system," the
society's notice of the speech said.

Mr. Tilson said sources within the Orangeville courthouse have told
him police made mistakes either before or after they charged Mr.
Jaffer. "People I know in the court system, the courthouse, have said
the police maybe made some errors," Mr. Tilson said.

There were rumours the officer who detained Mr. Jaffer on the highway
may not have given him the opportunity to call a lawyer prior to his
initial roadside breath test, a requirement if the detention is unduly
long. Judge Maund ruled on a similar case in 2004, but in favour of
the officer who charged a driver.

Mr. Tilson said the police deny these rumours.

The week of public anger at the decision of Mr. Jaffer's case saw even
Conservative media commentators criticizing it and calling on Mr.
Jaffer to explain what took place.

"I've heard a lot of people who share that view," said Tim Powers, one
of the most prominent Conservative media analysts. "There's a lot of
people who share that view, it's not just a view held in one precinct
of government, it's a view across the board."

"It's not a view of anybody trying to throw the guy under the bus, as
some described it. It's a proof point, here's a guy who stood up for a
lot of things. Here's a guy who many of us like, including me, who are
trying to encourage him for his sake and the sake of everything he
stood for, to speak up." 
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