SR Vol 27 No 3, July 2009 - Nova Scotia Barristers' Society

Safeguarding the rights of
young people
Local case clarifying police interrogation procedures across Canada
Jennifer Stewart
Freelancer
Legal Aid lawyer had dealt with before.
It wasn’t the first time Shawna
Hoyte had received such a call.
But it would turn out to be a
case like no other the Dalhousie
It was August 2004. The mother of one of Hoyte’s clients had called to
say her 15-year-old son was in custody on a slew of charges, including
dangerous driving causing bodily harm in an alleged hit-and-run in
Dartmouth.
Hoyte knew the boy well. He’d had run-ins with the law before and
suffered from learning disabilities, which often made communication
with the teen difficult.
This time would prove no exception.
Despite his mother’s insistence that her son couldn’t properly
understand what it meant to waive his rights, officers extracted a
90-minute videotaped statement from the teen that was later admitted
as evidence at trial. Hoyte was not present for the interrogation.
“I knew this kid fairly well in a relationship as solicitor-client, and I
knew that he really didn’t get a lot of what was going on,” says Hoyte.
“He was the type of kid that would accept responsibility for things
just to get it done and over with because he didn’t have the intellect
or mentality to keep it going.”
Judge Pam Williams of Halifax Youth Court sensed that same vibe
and tossed the statement out.
“The judge made several comments in that the police have to go one
step further in making certain that a young person clearly understands
what it means to waive their rights,” Hoyte says.
With no other evidence against the boy, the charge was dismissed.
But that wasn’t the end of it.
The Crown took the case to the Nova Scotia Court of Appeal, which
ordered a new trial. Hoyte fired back and applied successfully to have
the case heard by the Supreme Court of Canada.
“There was a question of standard of compliance and proof — was it
22 The Society Record