I stewed some more on the facts we have to date, and the information on the Manitoba courts database, and I think I have a more complete explanation for the data and what is going on with Dean, legally.
First a proviso - Canada's electronic court records databases are not uniform, and most are horribly old, some dating literally into the 1980's. A consequence of that is the records in them are in many instances not even intended to be 'publicly readable' - and I know when I have periodically pulled these kinds of records I have asked court clerks to explain certain items and they have been forced to say "well ... really can't tell - let's pull the file and look." The fact any of this data is available online is something of a miracle. Long and short, take my interpretation of the entries with a grain of salt.
First factoid - the Manitoba online records only include Queen's Bench and Court of Appeal proceedings - and
not the Provincial Court. This has badly confused many of the Clifford clan because it doesn't mean that there are no Provincial Court proceedings that involve Clifford - it just means we can't obtain information on those online. Nothing conspiratorial or sneaky, it's just a question of
any access to that system.
In answer to your question Jeffrey: criminal proceedings are usually grouped by the source incident, rather than the charges in question. Federal and provincial prosecutions of criminal charges are always conducted together if they flow from a single offence scenario. I've never sat down with a Federal / Provincial Crown prosecutor to ask how these 'hybrid' trials work out from a behind-the-scenes context (add that to my 'to do' list!) but I suspect they're both happy to simply have help to divide up the very considerable work.
So in this case we have two (or more) offence scenarios:
- 1) Dean's 'doing donuts in the parking lot' and officer resistance/driving offence scenario that occurred in Gimli Manitoba, dating back in Feb. 2013.
2) Dean's grow op and weapons charge offence scenario, dating to Nov. 2013.
These are two totally unrelated sets of offences, so each should normally lead to its own criminal prosecution and trial. Each took place at a separate time, a different location. Simply put, the two scenarios are not relevant to each other, so each would usually be a free-standing matter.
[Aside #1 - sometimes what looks like separate offence scenarios are grouped together because they do have some kind of evidentiary link or out of convenience, like a collection of 'spree offences', or more commonly where there are serial offences, but the details of the repeated offence types help understand one another. For example, murders that took place on different times and at different locations would usually lead to separate criminal proceedings, unless there were features of different murders that helped understand/prove other murders by what is called similar fact evidence - basically similarities in two or more apparently separate offences that are likely
not coincidences.]
A second factor is that the Nov. 2013 offences are not going to be tried in Manitoba Provincial Court. Dean's grow op charge(s) must be tried in Manitoba Queen's Bench because that kind of offence is a more serious one, an indictable offence. What is currently happening is the preliminary hearing stage of the Nov. 2013 offence scenario proceeding, which does occur in Provincial Court. There will be a hearing where the Crown presents its evidence to the a Provincial Court judge, and that judge will decide whether or not the Crown has provided enough evidence to establish a basis for a case against Clifford to proceed to trial. Clifford does not need to do anything at that stage - though he can cross-examine and so on. It's entirely a Crown-driven proceeding.
We know that the Nov. 2013 offence scenario has not yet completed that stage because if it had, then the matter would move on to Queen's Bench for the trial proper. We don't see that entry on the Queen's Bench online records, so the preliminary hearing is still either underway or impending. My guess the latter - I don't see any reason to dispute Clifford's statements that he is going through a series of 'case management' hearings moving towards the preliminary hearing.
Ok, now to the Feb. 2013 offence scenario. My estimate is that proceeding was held in Provincial Court - it must start there, following the usual scheme, but because the charges appear to have been less serious I anticipate the trial would have occurred in that court. We know that Clifford was released on Feb. 28, 2013 (or around there). Clifford says his charges were stayed.
This all makes perfect sense. Clifford had spent about 3.5 weeks in judicial interim release pre-trial detention. The Crown very likely calculated its 'best result' at trial if Clifford was found guilty of everything and noted there was little chance they would get a sentence longer than that. There was little reason to proceed with the action because Dean had already been punished as much as he would ever be. So, the Crown decided to stay, but not drop the charges. Stayed charges could later be re-activated if there was a reason to do so.
[Aside #2 - this pattern occurs all the time in Freeman-on-the-Land criminal prosecutions. They do something dumb but mild, get arrested, refuse to accept the authority of the court so they end up detained in remand, a month or so later the Crown stays the charges. Brian Alexander, in particular, bitterly complains about how this keeps happening to him, 'where's the justice!? where's my trial?! they're afraid to take to trial!' No - the Crown is just being efficient with its resources.]
So - with those preliminary steps we can now look at the Queen's Bench court database records and make a little more sense of things:
Documents:
- 20-Feb-2013 Winnipeg-QB NOTICE OF MOTION (JUDGE) WRIT OF HABEAS CORPUS
20-Feb-2013 Winnipeg-QB AFFIDAVIT MARTIN NEIL SUTTON SWORN 20FEB2013
20-Feb-2013 Winnipeg-QB ACCEPTANCE OF SERVICE OF NOTICE OF MOTION ON CROWN; 20FEB2013
20-Feb-2013 Winnipeg-QB ACCEPTANCE OF SERVICE OF AFFADAVIT OF SUTTON ON CROWN; 20FEB2013
20-Feb-2013 Winnipeg-QB ORDER TO CONVEY A PRISONER
21-Feb-2013 Winnipeg-QB AFFIDAVIT OF MARTIN NEIL SUTTON, 21FEB2013
21-Feb-2013 Winnipeg-QB ACCEPTANCE OF SERVICE OF AFFIDAVIT OF NEIL SUTTON, ON ATTORNEY GENERAL, 21FEB2013
27-Feb-2013 Winnipeg-QB CORRESPONDENCE - FROM DEAN CLIFFORD, 16FEB2013
28-Feb-2013 Winnipeg-QB DISPOSITION SHEET CHARTIER, J 28FEB2013 MATTER STRUCK
27-Dec-2013 Winnipeg-QB CORRESPONDENCE - TO DEAN CLIFFORD, DATED 27-DEC-2013 RETURNING FAXED DOCUMENTS
06-Feb-2014 Winnipeg-QB NOTICE OF MOTION (JUDGE) OF APPLICANT -ADJOURNED SINE DIE
06-Feb-2014 Winnipeg-QB ORDER TO CONVEY A PRISONER
13-Feb-2014 Winnipeg-QB DISPOSITION SHEET BRYK J, 13FEB2014, ADJ SINE DIE
Hearings:
- 28-Feb-2013 10:00 STRUCKOFF CRIMINAL UNCONTESTED MOTIONS(THURS-10:00) WRIT OF HABEAS CORPUS
13-Feb-2014 10:00 ADJOURNED CRIMINAL UNCONTESTED MOTIONS(THURS-10:00) OF APPLICANT -ADJOURNED SINE DIE
What we are seeing is two applications by Clifford - both originating from Clifford - filed in Queen's Bench in an attempt by Clifford to pop himself out of detention.
On Feb. 20, 2013 Clifford filed a
habeas corpus application - a legally appropriate application and potentially one on which the Queen's Bench could make a decision. It was supported by affidavits and served on the Crown. A hearing was scheduled for Feb. 28, 2013.
Clifford is then released, and now the
habeas corpus application is irrelevant - and is struck from the Feb. 28, 2013 hearing list.
The Clifford camp has placed great emphasis on that result, claiming that means the charges against Dean were struck out. Not the case. Those charges were still in Provincial Court and never made it to the higher Queen's Bench court. What we see here is a record of Dean attempting to use his right to challenge detention and detention conditions (which exists) in the correct court which has the inherent jurisdiction to hear that application, the Manitoba Court of Queen's Bench. On Feb. 28, 2013 that item was struck from the list because it was irrelevant - Clifford was out.
Ok, now to the more recent set of entries.
- Dec. 27, 2013 - Dean tries to file documents by fax, they are returned. Presumably the documents are defective in some manner.
Feb. 6, 2104 - Dean files more magic paperwork, this time a hearing is scheduled for Feb. 13, 2014
Feb. 13, 2014 - the hearing occurs and is adjourned to an unspecified future data.
The fact these entries are under the same file number as the Feb. 2013 entries strongly suggests to me the Feb. 2013 charges have be 'unstayed', and are now proceeding once again. Dean once more attempts to pop himself out of detention. I'll assume that the Winnipeg Alternative Media report on the Feb. 13, 2014 hearing is vaguely accurate, and presume that Dean has filed largely useless material, but since the Crown has just seen this stuff it wants time to properly respond. The hearing has been adjourned until a date can be suggested for full disposal of Dean's Feb. 6, 2014 magic paperwork.
And there we sit.
So, in conclusion, Dean is probably facing at least two sets of charges that relate to two offence scenarios, one from Feb. 2013, the second from Nov. 2014. Both are presently in Manitoba Provincial Court. Dean's activities to date at the Manitoba Court of Queen's Bench are strictly attempts to challenge his detention, and thus far unsuccessful.
These records show no attempt by Dean to have his denial of bail reviewed at Queen's Bench, and as I have previously posted, a
habeas corpus-like application in Queen's Bench will inevitably fail because bail review is Dean's appropriate remedy.
SMS Möwe
really looking forward to release some amazing clips from the seminars soon.