Getting there – Canadian Lawyer Magazine

May 4, 2015

A compassionate and moving ruling from a Toronto judge has focused attention on Gladue courts and other support mechanisms for aboriginal offenders, and of the progress, and lack of progress, since the landmark R. v. Gladue decision first came out.

In the ruling in R. v. Armitage, Justice Shaun Nakatsuru took pains to avoid complicated legal language that defendant Jesse Armitage might fail to understand, saying Armitage’s aboriginal background had been a factor behind the offences he committed.

“In the Gladue court at Old City Hall, accused persons who share a proud history of the first people who lived in this nation not only have a right to be heard, but they also have a right to fully understand,” he wrote. “One important thing I must consider is the past injustices done to the aboriginal peoples in this country. How that has affected the present. How that has affected Mr. Armitage. I must also consider the present problem of the over-incarceration of aboriginal offenders.”

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