Court of King's Bench of Manitoba Education Seminar – Fall 2022
This seminar was a thematic examination of violence in the family and criminal law context combined with Supreme Court of Canada caselaw updates. All judges attended plenary sessions that examined intimate partner violence ("IPV"), its intersection with criminal and family law, and the specific impact of IPV in Indigenous communities. These were followed by concurrent sessions offered separately to members of the Court’s Family Division and members of the Court’s General Division.
Number of Participants: 40
Overview
This seminar was a thematic examination of violence in the family and criminal law context combined with Supreme Court of Canada caselaw updates. All judges attended plenary sessions that examined intimate partner violence ("IPV"), its intersection with criminal and family law, and the specific impact of IPV in Indigenous communities. These were followed by concurrent sessions offered separately to members of the Court’s Family Division and members of the Court’s General Division.
Objective
The objectives of this seminar were to enhance participants’ understanding of IPV, the broad range of behaviours, including coercive control, that encompass IPV between adult partners, and its prevalence and specific impact on Indigenous women and children. Concurrent sessions were designed to deliver jurisprudential updates from the Supreme Court of Canada, and to further explore violence in the context of sexual assault law for the members of the General Division and family law and child protection for members of the Family Division.
Summary
This seminar was presented by an experienced faculty of judges, retired judges, legal academics, Indigenous lawyers and an Indigenous community leader. Participants comprehensively explored IPV and its impacts on women and children in both criminal and family law contexts, with particular emphasis on impacts on Indigenous persons. General Division participants focused on the mental elements of an offence in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s 2022 judgment in R v Brown relating to self-induced intoxication and automatism. Interactive scenarios were used to explore the limited admissibility and permissible uses of a complainant's sexual history under section 276 of the Criminal Code and the production and disclosure of third-party records under section 278 of the Criminal Code in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s 2022 judgment in R v JJ. Family Division participants discussed the Divorce Act amendments in the context of family violence, its intersection with provincial laws, the Court’s case flow model where violence is present, and child protection matters including the impact of the enactment of Bill C-92, An Act respecting First Nations, Inuit and Métis children, youth and families. Participants in both Divisions also discussed Supreme Court of Canada caselaw updates impacting on the work of the Court.