* Monday, December 2 - no court * Day 87: Thursday, December 5 * Day 86: Tuesday, December 3 * Day 88: Friday, December 6 * Wednesday, November 27 - no court
Abbreviations used in notes:
DC = Don Campbell (Defense)
SF = Shelagh Franklin (Defense)
GW = George Wool (Defense)
ST = Sheldon Tate (Defense)
MA = Manuel Azevedo (Defense)
HR = Harry Rankin (Defense)LB = Lance Bernard (Crown)
JF = Jennifer Fawcus (Crown)J = Judge
Without jury.
LB - RCMP videotapes here tomorrow from Toronto.
J asks about the remaining two issues - Farrell and Brown's notes and the hour and a half of the videotapes.
LB says that we can't deal with the hour and half until everyone has seen all the videotapes.
DC - says that when he asked for $700 for Francis Dick last week, he forgot to get an order signed by the J.
W - asks why he wasn't able to watch videos on the weekend. Madam Registrar says that the tapes won't be available until tomorrow. DC has extra tapes which he can pass on to W. A sheriff says that as soon as videos are available, then a TV and VCR will be made available too.
GW - says he has talked to Dr. Lock and she is concerned about JoJo because he displays classic FAS symptoms. The Dr. has learned that he is under two types of medication. Halidon, which is used for Alzheimer's and makes you forget things. The other is a sedative which makes you drowsy. She says that this is wearing on him and said the best place for him to be would be home. Forensics and Surrey Pre-trial are not the places for him to be. J says that everyone agrees with that. GW knows this too because JoJo has been out four times now. J says that GW knows his concerns and asks if the doctor knows what amount of drugs are being given to JoJo. GW says that she doesn't know. He says that right now, JoJo is in solitary, which is not the place for someone with FAS. GW says that there is a lack of facilities in the system for people with FAS and just wants to give some background to the issue for when he makes an application later.
GW's next issue is The Vancouver Sun's report of issues dealt with in the courtroom without the jury present. GW says that this article, which says that his clients have got a new amount of money, has a negative spin. GW suggests that the jury be told that this kind of money thing happens often and is lawful. The jury ought to be told that what the media reports is not always true. The article says that all 18 accused are getting pay hikes and he says that neither JoJo nor OJ are getting pay hikes.
GW says that he has trouble telling his clients that the defense can't do anything about this and only the Attorney General can. The clients are seeing that there is a law for some and not for others.
J says that a copy of Sec. 648 was attached to the pay increase order and the media must have had legal advice to carry on - J doesn't know, he's just speculating. J asks LB what his submissions are.
LB isn't entirely sure what GW is suggesting and suspects that the J will charge the jury with only basing their decisions on facts. J is afraid that it would draw more attention to it than it merits.
MA - says that he suggests nothing be done about it.
LB - says that the jury shouldn't believe anything that is being written in the papers.
GW - says that this is false reporting and the jury should be reminded while it's still fresh. GW says that if this is left to fester, it could just get worse. J asks GW and MA to talk about it. They will.
JF - regarding Farrell and Brown's notes, Brown's notes are on the way and Farrell is preparing his notes to send in soon. JF says that regarding the Police Log, it's made up mostly of 624s, which are police reports. J would like to see a sample of a 624 so the court is stood down.
We're back. JF hands up a volume of the log to the J so that he can get an idea of what the log is like. JF says that the purpose of the log is so that investigators can get an idea of the progress of an investigation. The only effort of organization is to put things in chronological order. In this case, the file co-ordinators, Tassell and Tremblay, would get a copy of a report and put it into the log. It is only after an investigation that the police look at a log to determine if there are any relevant items in it for disclosure. The resulting reports to Crown Counsel are a vetted version of the log. JF says that the Crown has already fulfilled its disclosure obligations and holding back the log will not prevent the accused from having relevant disclosures.
JF says that to go through every document in the log would be time consuming. J asks if the Defense got any Tip files. JF says that some were released. J asks how the Crown determined to release those. JF says that it was dependent upon which days incidents occurred. She cites examples such as forestry workers hearing shots and Wilby's shooting. She agrees that there are many items that aren't disclosed.
MA - asks when the Crown got the log. JF says that the log was started by Sarich in Feb. '95. MA asks when they got it. She says that it's not relevant when Crown got it. MA says that it was crucial for the log to be disclosed before the case began.
MA says that the Crown may be mistaken in how they determine relevance. He understands that the Crown is saying that the file co-ordinators decided what was relevant and then this is what they gave the Crown. MA cites a case which decided that the prosecutor's material for that case could be used by the defense. J wonders if the Crown's position is what MA alleges it to be - that the Crown has decided on relevance of disclosures based only on admissibility.
JF says that they aren't doing that, but are disclosing anything that is relevant. JF says that it isn't a clear-cut process, but reminds the J that in an earlier application, the J said that the Crown relies on the police to decide relevance at the Crown's own peril. J says that the question then is if a dump truck has to come to him with disclosures for him to go through.
MA - asks if the Crown is saying that the police decide what goes into the police reports to Crown Counsel. JF says that the reports are largely made up of things from the log.
GW - says that a log is nothing more than a compilation of police notebooks. He says there is no magic in this. A tip sheet is made based on the police notebooks. GW says that there are two things happening here: police credibility and police bad faith. J wonders if MA was finished. GW has MA continue.
MA - says that the police log is highly relevant because it is chronologically based. He says that the Crown has disclosed irrelevant material before the case began and relevant material after the case began. He says that if the Crown doesn't reveal the five volumes of logs, then they should give them to the J so that he can review them because there is no other process available.
MA says that the disclosures have been coming piecemeal and the Defense has had to hunt for disclosures. He revisits his application for the Crown to put forward a list of documents that they are not disclosing.
GW - regarding Aug. 18, GW needs to know about all officers that were at the camp that day because JoJo is charged with attempted murder that day. GW says that the Crown can't withhold evidence because they don't think it would help the Defense. He wants all reports for that day. If there is no informant involved, then what is the problem with disclosing it and letting the Defense go through it to decide what is relevant. If there are some secrets, then the police can flag it.
J says that according to Stinchcomb, the Crown only has to hand over what they think is relevant and if the Defense thinks something is relevant, then they can make the argument to the J.
GW - says that Aug. 18 is very important to him because of his alibi defense for JoJo and everything is important to him relating to that day.
ST - says that for a long time, he has been seeking the transcripts of Percy's phone call to the police on the morning of the 18th. He says that surely there is a log of this somewhere and he wants to know what notes the police made regarding this call. ST says that they have nothing to show the jury of what was said on the phone that morning. He says that it's like having an anthology without an index. This log is an index which is highly useful for the Defense to understand how things worked.
DC - says that he returns to his position that all material that doesn't have privilege should be released. He says that Stinchcomb is good for dealing with smaller, narrower cases, but in this kind of case, the issues are too broad and it is a superhuman task to expect the police to decide what is relevant. DC says that the Crown has said that this request places an inordinate amount of pressure on them, but DC points out the entire trial has been like this. DC says that the Crown has had a long time with the log and would know what is sensitive. DC adds that if they don't disclose the log, the onus falls on the J to review the evidence so that at least someone has seen it to decide on relevance.
J says that he will have to consider all this before ruling.
JF - says that regarding the phone call of Aug. 18th, the Crown had earlier said that dispatch tickets were made by the dispatcher and these are still being searched for.
GW - says that all calls to the police are recorded and Kamloops would have this. GW says that the tape recording would clear up what exactly was said. The issue here is timing. He may have to call the dispatcher in as a witness.
J asks MA to find out if there was a decision regarding the Dosanjh case. MA says he will.
MA - says that the Crown has said constantly that they are working on things and since the Crown's case will be wrapped up in a week, he would like to get some finality regarding disclosures so that Defense can form a defense. He would like the J to set a deadline for the Crown to say one way or another regarding the status of outstanding disclosure requests. MA also asks on behalf of W for photographs that Warrant Officer Bidwell had seen before going to Gustafsen Lake.
JF - says that she has a rough outline of how things stand at the moment. She says that the criminal intelligence file is being requested and the police are still getting back to the Crown regarding their position on disclosing it.
J says that so far, he has also heard about the request for the audiotapes of Aug. 18 and photographs seen by Bidwell. MA says that he can get together with JF to go through some things.
J will have everyone come back on Thursday at 10:00 a.m.
GW - says that he will be calling a defense and would like to have a date that he can expect the Crown to finish because he has to have a date to put on the subpoenas for witnesses. J says that there are still a number of issues to deal with before an estimate is possible.
GW has spoken to MA and GW would like to have the jury know that the newspaper report was wrong.
W - says that he has a problem with the disclosures. He wants compensation for every day that he spent in jail along with his son. W says that he's not going to be asking for the amount that these people are getting (the rest of the accused), but will be asking for a hell of a lot more.
* Monday, December 2 - no court * Day 87: Thursday, December 5 * Day 86: Tuesday, December 3 * Day 88: Friday, December 6 * Wednesday, November 27 - no court