Read what a recent client says about defence lawyer Richard Auger.

“I highly recommend Richard. He handled my case with the utmost professionalism. His knowledge of the law is second to none and the way he handles himself in court is faultless. Richard managed to expose sufficient evidence to convince the judge into dismissing the case. I could not be happier with the outcome.”

George Avila, Ottawa, Ontario
July 2010

This criminal defence lawyer wonders if toughening Canada’s criminal laws will do anything other than improve the Conservative government’s image with the law and order constituency.

Six of 10 provinces that were surveyed by the Globe and Mail newspaper this week fear that the Conservative government’s proposed tough crime bills will cost them billions. The financial toll will be the result of the influx of prisoners they are anticipating, and they believe the federal government should help shield the cost.

Specific dollar figures for the cost of the bills have not been released by the government, however, the Parliamentary Budget Officer, Kevin Page, has said that current government estimates are too low.

Opposition critics have been able to use the fact that the bills will cost billions – with no guarantee that they will have a positive net effect — to justify opposing the bills.

The fact that crime rates are falling is another strong reason to query wisdom of the government’s intention.

Public Safety Minister Vic Toews has not yet confirmed that the government will be assisting provinces in paying for more prisons.  According to the government, provincial costs may be trimmed because of a decrease in people in provincial remand centres and more people in federal prisons.   This argument is unlikely to prove true as there are 10 individuals sentenced to provincial penitentiaries for every person who is sentenced to a federal prison.  Longer sentences lead to federal time.

If you are considering defending your charges at trial, Ottawa lawyers at Auger Hollingsworth want you to know that there may be many defences available. One of the more common defences is having an alibi.

Having an alibi is a defence that can be raised if the accused could not have committed the offence because he or she was not physically present at the location of the offence when it occurred. If the court concludes that the accused did not have the opportunity to commit the offence because he or she was elsewhere, the accused may be found not guilty.

If you maintain that you were somewhere else at the time of an offence, it is important that this is discussed privately with an experienced criminal defence lawyer. You may need to interview witnesses and secure evidence to confirm that you were where you say you were, and your lawyer will need to decide how and when to provide the notice of the alibi to the crown.

Usually, the defence is not required to disclose anything to the Crown, but the law suggests that the Crown and police be given opportunity to investigate any alibi defence put forward; if this is not done, the alibi defence can possibly be rejected by the court.

Make sure you have a criminal defence lawyer who has the knowledge and experience to give you the advice you need to protect your legal rights. Contact a criminal defence lawyer at Auger Hollingsworth at 613-233-4529 or at info@ottawalawfirm.ca

If you are considering defending your charges at trial, Ottawa lawyers at Auger Hollingsworth want you to know that there may be many defences available. One of the more common defences is having an alibi.

Having an alibi is a defence that can be raised if the accused could not have committed the offence because he or she was not physically present at the location of the offence when it occurred. If the court concludes that the accused did not have the opportunity to commit the offence because he or she was elsewhere, the accused may be found not guilty.

If you maintain that you were somewhere else at the time of an offence, it is important that this is discussed privately with an experienced criminal defence lawyer. You may need to interview witnesses and secure evidence to confirm that you were where you say you were, and your lawyer will need to decide how and when to provide the notice of the alibi to the crown.

Usually, the defence is not required to disclose anything to the Crown, but the law suggests that the Crown and police be given opportunity to investigate any alibi defence put forward; if this is not done, the alibi defence can possibly be rejected by the court.

Make sure you have a criminal defence lawyer who has the knowledge and experience to give you the advice you need to protect your legal rights. Contact a criminal defence lawyer at Auger Hollingsworth at 613-233-4529 or at info@ottawalawfirm.ca

If you are considering defending your charges at trial, Ottawa lawyers at Auger Hollingsworth want you to know that there may be many defences available. One of the more common defences is having an alibi.
Having an alibi is a defence that can be raised if the accused could not have committed the offence because he or she was not physically present at the location of the offence when it occurred. If the court concludes that the accused did not have the opportunity to commit the offence because he or she was elsewhere, the accused may be found not guilty.
If you maintain that you were somewhere else at the time of an offence, it is important that this is discussed privately with an experienced criminal defence lawyer. You may need to interview witnesses and secure evidence to confirm that you were where you say you were, and your lawyer will need to decide how and when to provide the notice of the alibi to the crown.
Usually, the defence is not required to disclose anything to the Crown, but the law suggests that the Crown and police be given opportunity to investigate any alibi defence put forward; if this is not done, the alibi defence can possibly be rejected by the court.
Make sure you have a criminal defence lawyer who has the knowledge and experience to give you the advice you need to protect your legal rights. Contact a criminal defence lawyer at Auger Hollingsworth at 613-233-4529 or at info@ottawalawfirm.ca

Sentencing in a Canadian criminal case is a human process and can be one of the most difficult procedures to conduct.  It is very difficult to predict the outcome of a sentencing hearing.

The basic purpose of the criminal law is to protect society and individuals from personal injury and property damage.  The main goal in sentencing a person convicted of a criminal offence is to promote just sanctions which will promote the protection of society and its individual members.  More specifically, the Criminal Code prescribes the goals of sentence to be denunciation, deterrence, separate offenders from society where necessary, rehabilitation, reparation to victims, and to promote offender responsibility.

If you are facing an upcoming sentencing hearing, it is important that you understand and discuss with your criminal defence lawyer how each of these goals will be met.  This is critical because the judge will want to be persuaded that the sentence proposed meets these goals.  You should discuss with your criminal defence lawyer what documents, witnesses or other evidence will be presented in order to satisfy the court that these goals of sentencing will be met.

Ensure that your Ottawa criminal defence lawyer has a full understanding about your background including your education, community involvement, medical history, family support and personal circumstances in your life that may have been present leading up to the commission of the offence.  The sentencing judge will be trying to get a clear picture of you as a person and you will want to assist your criminal defence lawyer in conveying that picture in the best possible light.  You can assist your lawyer by gathering information and reliable evidence about the positive aspects about you and your character.

During the sentencing hearing, the judge can ask the convicted person if they wish to say anything to the court.  You should discuss this aspect of the process with your criminal defence lawyer.

You should also ask your criminal defence lawyer and make sure you understand all of the terms of the sentence your lawyer will ask for and all of the terms of sentence the crown attorney will ask for.  The law states that the sentencing judge does not have to accept the sentence proposed by either the defence lawyer or the crown attorney.  The sentencing judge can impose a sentence more harsh or more lenient that the sentence proposed by either party.

If you have been charged with a serious criminal offence, you may be wondering what defences are available to you.  We have compiled a short list of defences as an overview.  Of course, not every defence is applicable to every case.  Speak to an experienced criminal defence lawyer about whether you have a viable defence to your case.

Alibi:  This is a defence that can be raised where the accused could not have committed the offence because he was not physically present at the location of the offence when it occurred.  If the court concludes that the accused did not have the opportunity to commit the offence because he was elsewhere, the accused may be found not guilty.

If an accused maintains that he was elsewhere at the time of the offence, it is critical that this be discussed privately with an experienced criminal defence lawyer.  This is important because it may be necessary to privately interview witnesses and secure evidence to confirm that the accused was at a location other than where the offence occurred.  It is also important to discuss this privately with an experienced criminal defence lawyer because the lawyer will need to decide when and how to provide the necessary notice of the alibi to the crown.  Although usually the defence does not have to disclose anything to the crown, the law does suggest that the crown and police should be given a reasonable opportunity to investigate any alibi defence.  If this notice is not given, the alibi defence can be rejected by the court.

Provocation:  This is a defence which is commonly misunderstood.  Provocation can only be used to reduce the charge of murder to manslaughter.  Provocation is not a defence to other circumstances.  Generally, the accused must have committed the offence “in the heat of passion caused by sudden provocation”.  It must be a wrongful act of such a nature that it would deprive an ordinary person of the ability to self control.  The accused must have acted suddenly before there was any time to consider the actions or to cool his passion.

Self Defence:  This is a defence that may be available to a person who committed the wrongful but did so to prevent harm to him ro herself,  to others under their protection or to their property.

This defence is complicated and it is therefore critical that the accused discuss with an experienced criminal defence lawyer the circumstances of any possible self defence.  Generally, there needs to be evidence of the “necessity” to have committed the act by using force and the force used needs to be “reasonable”.

Automatism: This is a defence where the accused is in a state of impaired consciousness with no voluntary control over his or her actions.

Intoxication:  Intoxication may render an accused’s actions involuntary and therefore the accused may not have formed the mental intention to commit the offence.  There are complicated issues surrounding whether or not the intoxication was voluntary or involuntary.

Today is the 13th anniversary of my call to the Bar of Ontario.

During my 13 years I have been very fortunate to secure some great outcomes for great people who have had the misfortune of getting caught up in the criminal justice system. Some of the highlights of my career to date include:

• being counsel on a number of the leading decisions on extradition in Canada;
• acting as co-counsel for a man who had been convicted of murder on his second trial where a jury acquitted him;
• having the charges dropped for several clients on major tax evasion cases through Charter arguments and disclosure requests;
• having fraud charges dropped following preliminary inquiries for several business people in different cases;
• resolving countless domestic assault cases with no criminal records of conviction for my clients;
• acting as counsel for a key witness at the Gomery Inquiry;
• representing Karlheinz Schreiber before the Parliamentary Ethics Commitee and the Oliphant Inquiry; and
• acting for important political activists who are charged following protests and similar acts of alleged civil disobedience.

While these are just some highlights of the cases I have been fortunate enough to handle, this list serves to me as an important reminder of how lucky I am to be able to go to work every day to help people like you solve potentially life altering problems.

I am humbled and honoured to be able to enter my 14th year of practice as a criminal defence lawyer.  I thank all my clients, past, present and future for allowing me to serve.

If you have been released on bail, you may have bail conditions to obey while you are released.  These conditions will be printed on the papers the police gave you when you were released from the police station or detention centre.  You should study these conditions and have them on your person at all times.

To avoid being charged with a breach of your bail conditions (which is another criminal charge), you must obey the conditions.  If you have sureties, it is their job to make sure you obey your conditions.  They could lose their posted bail if you don’t obey your conditions.

So what happens if you have a legitimate reason why you cannot readily obey your conditions?  For example, you may have a curfew that requires you to be home by 8 pm but your shift at work ends at 8:30.  If you keep your condition, you will lose your job.  There is a solution in most cases which is to get a bail variation.

Your criminal defence lawyer can try to get you a bail variation when you have a good reason to vary the bail.   Often this can be obtained on the consent of the Crown, depending on the reason for the variation and the nature of the variation.  Sometimes, a bail variation is contested.  A contested variation will require argument before the court and a decision by a judge or a justice of the peace.

In either situation, the variation will certainly take days and may take a few weeks.  As a result, it is very important that you do not leave it to the last minute.  Your criminal lawyer needs some lead time to get a bail variation done.  In the meantime, recall that breaching your conditions could result in additional charges and will almost certainly ensure that your criminal charges will be harder to resolve favorably.

For most people, getting charged with a criminal offence is a nightmare.  All you want is for the charges to be dropped or withdrawn before a criminal trial is required.  No lawyer can guarantee that you will escape from the charges without a criminal record.  However, most lawyers will agree that there is certain conduct that will make it much more likely that you will be convicted.  Here are three tips on what to avoid:

• Avoid being rude to the police when you are charged or while you are in the cell block.  In many cases, if the Crown lawyer is considering dropping the charges against you, he or she will speak to the police officers on the case.  The accused who was polite and subdued during the arrest and after will have a much easier time getting the police officer to let go.
• Avoid breaches of any conditions of your release. Negotiations with the Crown attorney go better when the accused person has been well-behaved during the period of release.  If you are supposed to stay away from someone or somewhere, obey the condition.  if you are not supposed to use alcohol, don’t.   If there is a specific reason why you need to do something that your papers prevent you from doing, speak to your criminal defence lawyer, well in advance, to see if a variation of your bail conditions is possible.
• Don’t quit your job or drop out of school. If the terms of your release permit, keep your job or stay in school and try to do as well as possible.  It is a helpful negotiating tool for your lawyer to tell the Crown that you have been gainfully occupied since the charges.

If you are charged and your lawyer is going to bat for you to get the charges dropped or reduced, avoiding  these pitfalls will make your lawyer’s success much more likely.