"Cowardice asks the question...is it safe? Expediency asks the question...is it politic? Vanity asks the question...is it popular? But conscience asks the question...is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular but one must take it because it is right." ~Dr. Martin Luther King

Monday 5 January 2015

Guest Post on Publicly Funded Legal Defense Costs

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "You were saying ....": 


There is an extremely disturbing story in the Toronto Star dated January 3 headed

"Public pays millions for legal fees of federal judges under investigation"
"Taxpayers have been dishing out millions of dollars to cover the legal fees of federal judges under investigation who are fighting the disciplinary process.

Judges facing complaints from the public get unlimited access to financial and legal resources. Some draw out public inquiries for years, fighting all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada - at taxpayers' expense.....

Last week the Star highlighted the fact that more than 99 per cent of complaints against federal judges are dealt with in secret by the council, which is made up exclusively of judges.

Established to investigate complaints against the country's 1,200 federally appointed judges, the council conducts closed-door investigations into about 200 complaints per year, never revealing publicly the judge's name or province, details of the allegations, or the results of the investigation....

Judges remain on paid leave during the investigations. Even if they are stripped of office, they have the option of retiring or resigning to keep their pension - an option all those targeted for an inquiry so far have exercised....

Last month, the Star revealed that Ontario taxpayers are picking up the legal bills of justices of the 


peace disciplined for offences including sexual harassment, falling asleep in court and demonstrating a "pervasive" lack of understanding of basic law."

Posted by Anonymous to Our Town and Its Business at 4 January 2015 at 20:38


****************************

I  removed the last two lines of this guest post. The Toronto Star has a related story. 

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

There was a judge here in the Region who one morning threw a tantrum because the person handling prosecutions was delayed by 4-5 minutes. He threw out every single case including drunk driving, sexual assault and a few other dandies.
Months later, probably while still being paid not to work, he received a caution and returned to the bench. They had allowed this due to his " family problem "which I think consisted of a divorce.
So they do protect their own.

Anonymous said...


Obviously federally appointed judges never have to concern themselves with that "jingo" word -

TRANSPARENCY

And are they ACCOUNTABLE? It appears that many aren't but that doesn't stop them from continuing to get paid a salary while they argue the case against them, and as a final insult they are allowed to retire while receiving their full pension.

Anonymous said...

9:48- There was a lot more to the story then was told. Remember....The papers/media will tell you what THEY want to tell you.