Supreme Court of Canada strikes down mandatory minimum sentences for gun crimes
Tuesday, April 21, 2015 - Filed in: Courts
The court ruled 6-3 on Tuesday that mandatory minimum jail sentences of three years for illegal gun possession, and five years for possession by people with repeat weapons offences, amount to cruel and unusual punishment, and are unconstitutional.
The majority ruling highlights how deeply at odds the government is with the country’s highest court. Adding salt to Ottawa’s wounds, Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin wrote the majority ruling. Prime Minister Stephen Harper clashed publicly with Chief Justice McLachlin last year after a series of major decisions went against his government.
In an election campaign this fall, the government is expected to highlight what it is doing to protect public safety, and the ruling could weaken that argument. Since 2006, the Conservatives have created 60 mandatory minimum jail terms for guns, drugs, sex offences and other crimes, according to the justice department, helping to boost the number of federal prisoners to record heights even as crime rates dropped to 50-year lows. Some of those minimum terms could now be challenged and struck down.
The federal Attorney-General argued that mandatory sentences deter crime, and that in less serious gun-possession cases, prosecutors may opt for a proceeding that carries a maximum penalty of only one year in jail. But the majority was vociferous in rejecting that argument, saying that so much discretion in the hands of prosecutors could lead to wrongful convictions as innocent people plead guilty rather than face more serious proceedings, and usurps the role of judges.
“Sentencing is inherently a judicial function,” Chief Justice McLachlin wrote.
Justice Minister Peter MacKay said the government is reviewing the ruling, and will continue to be tough on those who commit serious crimes. But the logic the majority used to reach its decision makes other government laws especially vulnerable.
The court used a controversial principle from the early years of the 1982 Charter: the “reasonable hypothetical” case. In the appeals on which the court was ruling, lawyers for two men convicted by lower courts, including a 19-year-old with a clean record, did not argue that the minimum sentences were unfair to their clients. They argued they could be unfair to others.
The principle stems from a 1985 case, R v. Big M Drug Mart Ltd., in which a company was charged for opening on a Sunday. The court accepted the company’s argument that the law discriminated against Jews and Seventh-Day Adventists. Then-chief justice Brian Dickson, an appointee of Liberal prime minister Pierre Trudeau, wrote that the nature of the law matters more than the individual case. Two years later, in R v. Smith, the court struck down a mandatory minimum jail term of seven years for importing illegal drugs, arguing that it could also apply to a hypothetical student driving home from the United States with a single joint.
Several provinces intervened in the gun-possession cases to argue for a restricted use of the reasonable-hypothetical case, and British Columbia wanted it scrapped. But the court said it was foreseeable that an otherwise law-abiding gun owner who stored a firearm in a dwelling contrary to the terms of his licence could go to prison for three years. The minority said striking down the 2008 law based on such a hypothetical case lacked common sense; it accepted prosecutorial discretion as a safeguard.
From the decision:
“N and C were convicted of possessing loaded prohibited firearms contrary to s. 95(1) of the Criminal Code . They were sentenced under s. 95(2) (a)(i) and (ii) to three and five year mandatory minimum imprisonment terms, respectively. In N’s case, the trial judge held that the three‑year minimum sentence imposed by s. 95(2) (a)(i) did not offend either s. 12 or 15 of the Charter . However, he concluded that the two‑year gap between the one‑year maximum sentence if the Crown proceeded summarily and the three‑year minimum sentence if the Crown proceeded on indictment offended s. 7 because it was arbitrary and was not justified under s. 1 . Nevertheless, the trial judge held that N was not personally affected by the gap, and therefore dismissed the s. 7 claim.
In C’s case, the judge also dismissed the s. 12 challenge. She held that the five‑year mandatory minimum sentence imposed by s. 95(2)(a)(ii) was not grossly disproportionate for C, in light of the gravity of his crimes. She also held that C had failed to put forward any reasonable hypothetical cases in which the application of the five‑year mandatory minimum sentence would be grossly disproportionate.
The Court of Appeal held that the mandatory minimum terms of imprisonment in s. 95(2)(a) resulted in grossly disproportionate sentences in reasonable hypothetical cases at the licensing end of the s. 95 spectrum, and therefore held that they violate s. 12 of the Charter . However, the Court of Appeal held that the sentences imposed on N and C were appropriate and should be upheld."
The S.C.C. (6:3) dismissed the appeals.
Chief Justice McLachlin wrote as follows (at paras. 4-5, 62-65, 77, 117):
" I agree with the Court of Appeal that the mandatory minimum sentences imposed by s. 95(2) (a) of the Criminal Code violate s. 12 of the Charter . Accordingly, the mandatory minimum sentences in s. 95(2)(a) of the Code are null and void under s. 52 of the Constitution Act, 1982 . In most cases, including those of Nur and Charles, the mandatory minimum sentences of three and five years respectively do not constitute cruel and unusual punishment. But in some reasonably foreseeable cases that are caught by s. 95(1) they may do so. This has not been shown to be justified under s. 1 of the Charter . It follows that s. 95(2) (a) is unconstitutional as presently structured. This conclusion makes it unnecessary to consider the respondents’ arguments that s. 95(2) (a) violates s. 7 of the Charter .
This does not prevent judges from imposing exemplary sentences that emphasize deterrence and denunciation in appropriate circumstances. Nur and Charles fall into this category. Like the Court of Appeal, I would uphold the sentences imposed by the trial judges in their cases.
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The inquiry into cases that the mandatory minimum provision may reasonably be expected to capture must be grounded in judicial experience and common sense. The judge may wish to start with cases that have actually arisen ... and make reasonable inferences from those cases to deduce what other cases are reasonably foreseeable. Fanciful or remote situations must be excluded: Goltz, at p. 506. To repeat, the exercise must be grounded in experience and common sense. Laws should not be set aside on the basis of mere speculation.
Not only is looking at the law’s impact on persons whom it is reasonably foreseeable the law may catch workable — it is essential to effective constitutional review. Refusing to consider reasonably foreseeable impacts of an impugned law would dramatically curtail the reach of the Charter and the ability of the courts to discharge their duty to scrutinize the constitutionality of legislation and maintain the integrity of the constitutional order. The protection of individuals’ rights demands constitutional review that looks not only to the situation of the offender before the court, but beyond that to the reasonably foreseeable reach of the law. Testing the law against reasonably foreseeable applications will prevent people from suffering cruel and unusual punishment in the interim until the mandatory minimum is found to be unconstitutional in a particular case.
Refusing to consider an impugned law’s impact on third parties would also undermine the prospect of bringing certainty to the constitutionality of legislation, condemning constitutional jurisprudence to a wilderness of single instances. Citizens, the police and government are entitled — and indeed obliged — to know what the criminal law is and whether it is constitutional. Looking at whether the mandatory minimum has an unconstitutional impact on others avoids the chilling effect of unconstitutional laws remaining on the statute books.
I conclude that a mandatory minimum sentence may be challenged on the ground that it would impose a grossly disproportionate sentence either on the offender or on other persons in reasonably foreseeable situations. The constant jurisprudence of this Court and effective constitutional review demand no less. In the result, a mandatory minimum sentencing provision may be challenged on the basis that it imposes cruel and unusual punishment (i.e. a grossly disproportionate sentence) on the particular offender before the court, or failing this, on the basis that it is reasonably foreseeable that it will impose cruel and unusual punishment on other persons.
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In summary, when a mandatory minimum sentencing provision is challenged, two questions arise. The first is whether the provision results in a grossly disproportionate sentence on the individual before the court. If the answer is no, the second question is whether the provision’s reasonably foreseeable applications will impose grossly disproportionate sentences on others. This is consistent with the settled jurisprudence on constitutional review and rules of constitutional interpretation, which seek to determine the potential reach of a law; is workable; and provides sufficient certainty.
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Parliament could have achieved its objective by drafting an offence with a close correspondence between conduct attracting significant moral blameworthiness — such as those engaged in criminal activity or conduct that poses a danger to others — and the mandatory minimum, rather than a sweeping law that includes in its ambit conduct attracting less blameworthiness for which the mandatory minimum sentence would be grossly disproportionate. The government has not discharged its burden on this branch of theOakes test. There are less harmful means of achieving the legislative goal."
Note: The summary is a reprint of a Globe and Mail News article. The body is drawn from Eugene Meehan’s SupremeAdvocacy Weekly Updates for the Law Community.