Charter Of Rights And Freedoms In Canad Case Study

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Recommended: Canadian Charter of Rights

Police should be responsible for upholding the Charter of Rights and Freedoms in Canada. The more police abide by the Charter, the more criminal cases will be prosecuted in the court system. As police officers are usually the first point of contact within the criminal justice system for the public, it is very important that they respect individual’s rights and freedoms, as well as perform searches and collect evidence legally and by the book. The more they do this, the more they will see their collected evidence used in trials and used to convict the individuals they arrested.An example that examines this is the case against Mohamed Hamed in Ottawa. In 2015, the officer in this case, pulled Hamed over for swerving his vehicle while driving. …show more content…

Hamed was asked to step outside of the vehicle and upon the investigation the police officer found a few flakes of marijuana inside the car. During the arrest, Hamed began the tense up and resist being put into the police cruiser. The officer then struck him twice in the side of the head as hard as he could to get Hamed to cooperate. The officer did not read Hamed his rights and did not let him know why he was arresting him. The officer would also not let Hamed contact his lawyer while being detained. After the arrest the officer continued to search the vehicle without a warrant and found more marijuana in a backpack along with counterfeit money.As this case went to trial, Hamed was found not guilty of the charges laid against him during the unlawful arrest. Judge Bourgeois found several charter violations that lead to this case being dismissed from the criminal justice system. Bourgeois could not accept the evidence from the officer that proved Hamed veered or swerved before being pulled over. She also stated

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