Summary of Meetings



Mental Health Court
(‘Courtroom 102’)

Meeting: March 17, 2010

(Minutes of the 25th reported quarterly meeting of the Mental Health Court Consortium)


Court Mental Health Workers: Vidya Fraser was in attendance. Vidya had no concerns at present. (Up-date: Rhona Zitney has conveyed to me that the study being done which is attempting to get at 102 Court consumer experiences (‘Exit Survey’) is progressing. Hopefully, we will have an idea of what the data looks like by the next meeting.)

Victim Witness Program: No one was in attendance.

Gladue Court: No one was in attendance.

Defence Bar: Ted Kelly was in attendance. He indicated that there is a project underway which is examining how we can better deal with the problem of mentally ill individuals being charged with P.O.A. offences, being tried on an ex parte basis, and sentenced in absentia. This is particularly problematic when the accused is, for example, on the cusp of being discharged from the jail in respect of criminal matters either on bail or probation only to find that when ‘holds’ are checked it is discovered that the accused must serve a 90 day jail sentence. Apart from the psychological impact of such an event, considerable work in discharge planning has been rendered useless.

Perhaps a plan which would advise the Provincial Prosecutors as to who on their dockets are known ‘102ers’ would be of assistance? The problem is still under consideration.

The next meeting of this group will be on April 27th at 4:30pm. Ted will send out a notice by email and has invited all those who are interested.

Ted also indicated that he’ll be making a presentation to some corrections people on April 27th on the topic of mental health court and would like input from anyone interested.

There will be a meeting in early May regarding the consequences of the criminal process as it relates to immigration issues. Ted will send out notice.

Toronto Police Service: Eaton Hyde was in attendance. At present there are no pressing issues.

College Park: No one was in attendance.

Federal Department of Justice: No one was in attendance.

Duty Counsel: No one was in attendance.

Ministry of Health: Chris Higgins was in attendance. He was there mainly for the purpose of information gathering. He is acutely aware of our principal predicament –lack of hospital beds.

While this is obviously not Chris’s responsibility, we discussed the fact that Dr. Howard Barbaree’s replacement should be in town within the next two months. His name is Dr. Sandy Simpson. I had the pleasure of meeting Dr. Simpson in Auckland a few weeks ago and was most impressed. I think he will be a real asset to the Law and Mental Health program and will pick up nicely where Dr. Barbaree left off. He appeared to be very keen and full of energy.

As well, Dr. Zahn has replaced Dr. Garfinkle as the CEO at CAMH. With these new personalities the landscape has changed considerably and we are all optimistic that the Law and Mental Health Program will be making some of the gains that we have been hoping for over the last decade.

Bail Program: Chrystal Martin and Cameron Brown were in attendance. There were no particular concerns. Cameron did indicate that a program evaluation will be undertaken within the next while.

Court Operations: Marnie Cuz was in attendance. She had no particular concerns at this time.

CAMH: Robin Nicholas and Arnie Ness, the new manager of the ATU, were in attendance. Robin was of the view that as wait times (for hospital beds) went down the ‘system’s’ tolerance for delay went down as well. He mentioned that both CAMH and Whitby’s assessment resources were depleted as a result of beds being used for other purposes (eg. Treatment, ORB, Keep Fit Orders).

There was considerable discussion about the impact that ‘keep fit’ orders had upon the system. It was recognized that they are used very sparingly and only in the most compelling circumstances at OCH. At the same time it should be noted that when appropriately used, in a well-resourced system, keep fit may save the courts considerable time that would be lost if the accused decompensated prior to trial requiring the issue of fitness to be revisited.

Chris Higgins noted that small destabilizing events like a ‘blocked bed’ can have major consequences and may constitute the ‘tipping point’ for trends that are difficult to correct.

Ted Kelly suggested that when a ‘keep fit’ order was made that a Crown be assigned to the case to ensure that it did not languish. It was also suggested that accused on ‘keep fit’ orders be ‘fast tracked’ or have their matters expedited as is done at the Court of Appeal.

We also mentioned that Dr. Darani’s time will be more structured with interviews slotted for fixed time intervals (30 mins?) so that the court has an idea of how many accused should be waiting in the queue. There have been too many incidents where accused had made several appearances to see the Dr. but had not ‘made it’.

We also recognized that this resource was probably being over-relied-upon. Not all accused need to see Dr. Darani. Only a few years ago we were functioning without this resource. It is suggested that her services be reserved for the really problematic / difficult cases. Other candidates should be apparent on the basis of their known histories. Again, we should be erring on the side of ‘inclusion’.

Ontario Review Board: No one was in attendance.

Vanier: Maria Cabral was in attendance. She raised concerns regarding Forms 1. A general discussion followed and it was agreed that Form 1’s should stay attached to the information and not be delivered to the remand centres with the Warrant of Committal. Many problems may flow from this. The jail cannot act upon a Form 1. As well, it is important that the Form 1 remain attached to the information so that it is recognized at the time of an order for judicial interim release.

Maplehurst: No one was in attendance. I did however receive a note that there were accused sitting in the jail who had been ordered to hospital –either by the court or the ORB.

Crown Attorney: Jody Milstein was in attendance. Jody raised the issue of traversals from College Park to OCH where the informations have ‘gone missing’. Today we had an example of an accused who appeared in court and there was no information before the court. The accused was not content that an information existed. The Crown will now have to summons the accused to court.

We are not certain as to what the solution should be but will be looking into options. Part of the problem is that the Crown Brief apparently travels with the accused while the information travels separately by courier. Of course, splitting these documents is an invitation for misadventure.

Schizophrenia Society of Ontario: Laura Rudy was in attendance and had no particular concerns. She did say that the number of families in need of support was going steadily ‘up’. She also made it known that the Society is available for educational events.

Ontario Court of Justice: No particular concerns were raised by myself ….other than the usual. We are in desperate need of hospital beds. However, as noted above, there is cause for optimism.