OHTA.ca

Hi,

Just came back from court, and a bit confused so hoping people here can help me out.

I got a ticket for going 72km/hr in a 50 zone on Mar 31, 2015. I filed my notice for trial on Apr 13. I received my notice for trial in Aug for Jan 13, 2016.

I filed all my disclosure requests in November, then followed up with more faxes in Nov and December. I never received anything. I filed a section 7 prior to trial. I also filed a 11b as it was already 9 months. When I got to court on Jan 13, the prosecutor said that disclosure was ready for me to pick up and they mailed a letter, but I never received this letter. Their letter was dated Nov 26, and I have 2 faxes following that date following-up on my original request. I got an adjournment to Feb 12 to review the disclosure.

I went to court today ready to argue my 11b and ready to go to trial, but then when they call me up, they say that today was not the trial and it is to schedule a trial date. I was completely thrown for a loop. I didn't really know that existed, and had not seen it happen in my 2 times going to court for this ticket (basically all I see is people going up to plead guilty to amended charge). I tried to argue for a stay, but the JP was having none of it as it was not a trial and I was there for scheduling a trial.

Now I have a trial date for june 30, 2016. Is this "showing up to get a trial date" a real thing? Or did I get tricked by the prosecutor (I don't think the cop that gave me the ticket was there, but I couldn't be sure, there were a lot of cops and I thought one may have been, but I couldn't be sure [a lot of people look similar to me])

My thinking is that this extra 4.5 month gets added to the delay caused by the prosecutor? That would strengthen my 11b argument. Is there anyway they can argue this delay is caused by me?

Comments and advice are greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

I am not sure what it is called, but yes it is a real thing to have a court date where you show up and it is solely to set a trial date.

Now in order to win the speedy trial argument, you are going to have to request official transcripts from both of your previous court appearances on January 13th and February 12th. You need to get on this right away so you will have them by June. The JP can not make a determination on whether the trial took too long unless they have the transcript to review and they can see that you had made good efforts to get disclosure and then that you had come prepared for the trial on Feb 12th.

Once you get the transcripts, you can verify that the on January 13th transcript whether they had set Feb 12th as a new TRIAL date or not. With the Feb 12th transcript you should have good evidence that you were ready to proceed and therfore it should be counted against the prosecution.

And in fact, in order to help your case (once you get the transcripts), you could even make some requests to get an earlier court date than June 30th.