BETWEEN: |
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HENCO INDUSTRIES LIMITED |
Applicant |
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HAUDENOSAUNEE SIX NATIONS CONFEDERACY COUNCIL, JANIE JAMIESON, DAWN SMITH, OR ANY AGENT OR PERSON acting under their instructions, JOHN DOE, JANE DOE and any other Persons unknown, and THE CORPORATION OF HALDIMAND COUNTY |
Respondents |
BETWEEN: |
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RAILINK CANADA LTD. carrying on business as THE SOUTHERN ONTARIO RAILWAY |
Plaintiff |
- and - |
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HAUDENOSAUNEE CONFEDEACY OF MOHAWK, SENECA, CAYUGA, ONONDAGA, ONEIDA, TUSCARORA NATIONS; SIX NATIONS OF THE GRAND RIVER BAND OF INDIANS, CLYDE POWLESS; JAQUELINE HOUSE; HAZEL HILL; DAWN SMITH; SEAN MT. PLEASANT; WES HILL; JANE DOE; JOHN DOE; and PERSONS UNKNOWN |
Respondents |
Dennis W. Brown
Q.C., Malliha Wilson,
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Mark J. Sandler and
Denise Dwyer, for the
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Kenneth Peel, for RaiLink Canada Ltd. |
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Michael Bruder, for Henco Industries Limited |
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W. B. McKaig, for
The Corporation of
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James O’Reilly, amicus curiae for the perspectives of Aboriginal Peoples |
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David Byers and Manizeh Fancy, amicus curiae for the perspectives of the residents of Caledonia and Haldimand County |
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Darrell Doxtdator, agent for The Six Nations Council and Chief David General |
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Heard: September 25 and 26, 2006 |
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[1] This appeal raises two narrow
issues arising from proceedings in the Superior Court of Justice concerning
what has become known as the standoff at
[2] In February of this year, a
large group of Six Nations Aboriginal protestors occupied property in
[3] The motions judge, Marshall J., found those who did not leave the property – both named and unnamed persons – in criminal contempt for breach of the injunction. The Ontario Provincial Police arrested twenty-one persons, who, by virtue of their arrest, were convicted of contempt and sentenced.
[4] Still the impasse continued. It was accompanied by violence in the community: barricades were erected; a bridge was destroyed; the local rail line could not operate; vandalism, thefts and assaults occurred. Protestors continued to occupy the property
[5] In an attempt to relieve the
impasse, the
[6] In paragraph 1, the motions judge ordered that the Attorney General of Ontario take carriage of the “matter of contempt”, that a case management meeting would be scheduled so that the Crown could apprise the public of its progress, and that he would remain seized of the matter until it was resolved. In paragraph 2, he ordered that the injunction granted in favour of Henco would bind the Crown and that it would not be dissolved “until the criminal contempt has been disposed of.” These two paragraphs alone are in issue on this appeal.
[7] The Attorney General of Ontario
and the OPP submit that both paragraphs of the motions judge’s order are flawed
and should be set aside. The amicus
curiae for the perspectives of Aboriginal Peoples, whom the Associate Chief
Justice of
[8] I would maintain paragraph 1 of the motions judge’s order but on three conditions: (i) no person may be found in criminal contempt for breach of the injunction unless new contempt proceedings are brought and the person is given a fair opportunity to be heard; (ii) new contempt proceedings may be brought only for alleged breaches of the injunction during the period between April 21 and July 4, 2006; and (iii) the Attorney General and the police, in the exercise their discretion, shall decide whether to bring further contempt proceedings.
[9] I would maintain this paragraph because the referral to the Attorney General and the case management of that referral is a lawful exercise of the motions judge’s discretion. I have included the first condition because the conduct of the contempt proceedings to date has been seriously flawed. The motions judge’s finding of contempt permitted the OPP, instead of the court, to determine who was guilty of criminal contempt, operated prospectively instead of retrospectively and was made without affording basic procedural fairness to any of the twenty-one persons convicted.
[10] I have included the second condition
because, on the record before us, all possible contempts for breaches of the
injunction that occurred before April 20 have already been dealt with; and,
after July 4, when the
[11] I have included the third condition to ensure that the court does not seek to review the way the police exercises its operational discretion in enforcing the law and the Attorney General exercises his prosecutorial discretion.
[12] I would set aside paragraph 2
of the motions judge’s order and in its place I would order that the injunction
is dissolved effective July 5, 2006. In
my view, the motions judge erred in law and in the exercise of his discretion
in maintaining the injunction against the wishes of both the previous owner of
the property, Henco, and the current owner, the
[13] I emphasize that the legal
issues on this appeal are narrow. The
two broader questions that surround the standoff – the validity of the Six
Nations land claim, which gave rise to the protest, and the wisdom of
permitting the protestors to remain on the property while the land claim
negotiations continue – are not before this court. The first question will, preferably, be
resolved at the negotiating table. The
decision on the second question rests with the
[14] The mass protest in
[15] Some
of the thirty land claims will be addressed through the federal
government’s special claims system. The others are being
litigated. In 1994, Six Nations began an action against
[16] Within the Haldimand Tract lies
Douglas Creek Estates. It is a
residential subdivision in the Town of
[17] In late 2005, Henco registered
a plan of subdivision for Douglas Creek Estates and entered into an agreement
with
[18] On February 11, 2006, apparently out of frustration with the pace of the land claims, Haudenosaunee Six Nations Confederacy Council, a distinct entity from the band council, notified Henco in writing that people from the Six Nations intended to assemble on Douglas Creek Estates.
[19] On February 28, 2006 a group of
protestors belonging to or associated with Six Nations occupied Douglas Creek
Estates and blocked the roadway entrance to the property by parking cars on the
streets. They did so to try to stop, or
at least disrupt, further development of the subdivision. Protesters also erected barricades on the
streets surrounding Douglas Creek Estates –
i) Matheson J. Issues a Without Notice Injunction Order on March 3, 2006
[20] Because the Six Nations protest impeded its development, Henco brought a motion without notice for injunctive relief. It sought relief against the Confederacy Council; against three individual respondents, Janie Jamieson, Dawn Smith and Tom Deer; and against “John Doe” and “Jane Doe”, representing unidentified protestors.[1] On March 3, 2006, Matheson J. granted Henco’s motion and made the following interim and interlocutory orders:
ii) Matheson J. Provides for Substituted Service of his Order
[21] Matheson J. also provided for
service of the injunction. He ordered
that service could be effected by posting Henco’s notice of motion and the
injunction order at
[22] The Sheriff tried to deliver Matheson J.’s order to the protestors late Sunday evening, March 5. They would not accept delivery. One of the protestors, the respondent Dawn Smith, burned the order. The burning was broadcast on local television. The next day the protestors burned the order again.
iii) Marshall J. Issues a Permanent Injunction on March 9, 2006
[23] The protestors refused to
comply with Matheson J.’s order. Instead, on March 7, a group calling itself the Trustees of the Mohawk
Nation Grand River served the Attorney General of Ontario[2] with a notice of constitutional question, styled as a claim that the Haldimand
is the supreme law of the land and that
[24] The
motion to continue Matheson J.’s injunction had been scheduled for
March 9. As the protestors had refused to comply with the
injunction, Henco also brought a motion returnable March 9 asking the
court to find the respondents in contempt for breach of the March 3
order. Counsel for Henco, the Attorney General and
[25] Marshall J. made three orders on March 9. At Henco’s request, he made the March 3 order, the interim and interlocutory injunction, permanent;[3] he adjourned Henco’s contempt motion to March 16; and he ordered that the service of the contempt motion on the respondents could be effected by the same methods Matheson J. had provided for service of the injunction order.
i) The Motions Judge Finds the Respondents in Contempt on March 17, 2006
[26] The
motions judge heard Henco’s contempt motion over two days, March 16 and
17, 2006. Henco filed an affidavit attesting to the protestors’
continuing breach of the injunction through their occupation of Douglas
Creek Estates. The respondents filed no evidence. However,
Ms. Smith did appear at the hearing. She asked the motions judge
to recuse himself because he owned land in the Haldimand Tract.
He declined to do so. Ms. Smith read two letters, one addressed
to the Queen and the other to the general public, contending that her
people had never relinquished title to
[27] The motions judge issued his order on March 17. He held the respondents, the Confederacy Council, Ms. Jamieson, Ms. Smith and “unknown persons identified as John Doe and Jane Doe” in both civil and criminal contempt for breach of the injunction.[4] He found that the order of Matheson J. was “clear and unambiguous”, that proper notice had been given, that he was satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt these respondents had breached the order, and that they intended to do so. He concluded that “here the [r]espondents, I find, defied the clear Order of the court, and in a very public way, which was their intent. They could not have but known that such defiance would harm the court’s enforcement of its orders generally.”
[28] The motions judge heard submissions from counsel and from Dawn Smith on the appropriate penalty and the enforcement of his order in the light of the number of protestors on the property. He began his reasons on penalty by stating that he did not want to sentence anyone to jail and that he hoped, having made this point, the respondents would abandon their protest at Douglas Creek Estates.
[29] To give effect to his intent, the motions judge sentenced the respondents – named and unknown – to thirty days in jail, but suspended sentence for six months once they had been taken into custody, photographed and fingerprinted.[5] For respondents who complied with the injunction for six months “that [would] be the end of the matter.” Respondents who did not comply would serve a thirty day sentence.
[30] The motions judge also ordered the Sheriff to go to Douglas Creek Estates, read aloud the March 17 contempt order and the March 3 injunction order of Matheson J., and distribute copies to anyone present. Finally, the motions judge ordered that warrants of committal for contempt be issued. However, he delayed their execution for five days to permit the respondents to “quit the blockade and leave Douglas Creek Estates.”
[31] During the hearing of the motion on March 16 and 17, both counsel for the Sheriff and Ms. Smith suggested the need for a show cause hearing before a person could be found in contempt. The motions judge rejected their suggestion. In his view, his order, under which the OPP would give protestors an opportunity to leave the property before arresting them, was an adequate substitute for a show cause hearing.
ii) The Motions Judge Issues a Second Contempt Order on March 28, 2006
[32] Before any warrants of committal had been executed, the Attorney General brought a motion to amend the motions judge’s March 17 order to better promote its intent. The Attorney General, supported by the OPP, proposed a new form of an order and warrant of arrest in which the motions judge would:
[33] The motions judge accepted the
Attorney General’s proposed amendments. On March 28 he issued a new order of contempt and a warrant of arrest
that incorporated these amendments. The
warrant of arrest was directed to all police officers in
iii) The OPP Execute the Warrant of Arrest on April 20, 2006
[34] On April 20, more than three weeks after the motions judge’s second contempt order, the OPP went to Douglas Creek Estates and arrested twenty-one persons under the warrant of arrest.
[35] Immediately after the arrests
were made, the conflict between the protestors and the government
intensified. Many more protestors
occupied Douglas Creek Estates; the occupation expanded to include the
surrounding roads; an OPP officer was hit by a bag of rocks; the
[36] Despite these consequences of enforcing the contempt order, the OPP continued to investigate criminal activity arising from the protest. To the date of the appeal, the OPP has laid fifty-three charges for breaches of the injunction and other breaches of the peace against twenty-eight individuals. We were told that these charges will proceed normally through the criminal justice system.
[37] RaiLink, which carries on
business as the Southern Ontario Railway, provides freight rail services to a
number of communities in southwestern
[38] Service ceased, however, after the OPP executed the warrant of arrest. The obstructions and blockades that followed the arrests made rail service impossible. Indeed, the OPP directed RaiLink to stop operating around Douglas Creek Estates.
[39] Unable to carry on its business, RaiLink asked the motions judge for injunctive relief. On May 4, 2006 he granted an injunction to permit RaiLink to resume its services around Douglas Creek Estates. After negotiations between the federal and provincial governments and Six Nations, rail service resumed on June 14, 2006. Although the RaiLink injunction remains in effect, it is not at issue in this appeal.
6. The Perspectives of the Residents
[40] The Six Nations protest in and
around Douglas Creek Estates undoubtedly has profoundly affected many of the
residents in Caledonia and
[41] Although, in the absence of sworn testimony, I will refrain from making any express findings of fact on the residents’ perspectives, I think it fair to record the views that they expressed to the amicus. By doing so I hope to provide a better context for the issues this court must resolve.
[42] The amicus grouped the residents’
perspectives under “five common themes,” which, he submitted, illustrate how
the protest in
[43] Partway through the conflict, representatives of the governments of Canada and Ontario and Six Nations began to meet regularly and to work to ease tensions, restore calm, preserve order and, ultimately to resolve the dispute. They did so in what has become known as the “Main Table Negotiations”. The first meeting took place on May 9, 2006.
[44] Although the situation in
[45] Thus, at the time the appeal
was argued essentially all that remained of the civil disruption was a group of
protestors at Douglas Creek Estates. The
[46] In the three months after the OPP acted on the warrant of arrest, the motions judge, on his own motion, ordered the parties to appear before him to make submissions on the status of the enforcement of his contempt order. He did so on four occasions: June 1, June 16, July 5 and July 24.
[47] At each of these status hearings the motions judge sought an explanation from the Attorney General and the OPP why, as he saw it, “the rule of law has been suspended to some extent in our county,” the injunction had not been adhered to and his contempt order had not been enforced.
[48] The Attorney General did not dispute the desirability of these status hearings. Instead, counsel for the Attorney General apologized for not having kept the motions judge informed about the enforcement of his order and suggested establishing a schedule for reporting to the court. The OPP was agreeable to updating the court periodically and participating in case management conferences as long as no orders were made that interfered with its operational discretion. The OPP also stressed that the motions judge’s warrant of arrest had already been enforced.
[49] In mid-June 2006, in the midst
of the negotiations with Six Nations, the
[50] The sale closed on July 4, 2006. The next day, July 5, during the third of the court-ordered status hearings, Henco brought a motion to dissolve the injunctions. No one opposed the motion. Nevertheless, the motions judge reserved his decision.
[51] As I have said, on July 24,
2006, the motions judge convened a fourth status hearing. He did so to receive “submissions as to what
the court should do with the extant orders of contempt.” Counsel for the Attorneys General of Ontario
and
[52] Counsel for the OPP took the position that the court’s jurisdiction to supervise the enforcement of the injunction should be divided into two time periods: pre-April 20 and post-April 20. In the OPP’s view, its execution of the March 28 order on April 20 finally disposed of all contempts that occurred before that date. After April 20, however, new contempts of the injunction took place because of the protestors’ re-occupation of the Douglas Creek Estates. The OPP submitted that the court could exercise its inherent jurisdiction to address these contempts, but would have to do so in new proceedings. In its view, the March 28 order was spent after its execution and a new order would be required to address post-April 20 contempt matters.
[53] Although the record is unclear, at one point the motions judge appeared to agree with the OPP’s position that the March 28 order had no continuing legal effect after its execution on April 20. He did not, however, view the court’s involvement in enforcing the injunction as ending with the execution of the March 28 order. Much of the hearing, therefore, was devoted to submissions on the court’s jurisdiction to continue enforcing the injunction through new orders. While emphasizing that the motions judge should allow the Crown to decide whether future contempt proceedings would be appropriate, the other parties conceded that the court was entitled to exercise its inherent jurisdiction to refer the matter to the Attorney General. The Haldimand Law Association asked the motions judge to make a new contempt order, that, while allowing the OPP discretion over its execution, would “sen[d] a definite signal that it’s time the [site] was cleared.” The motions judge declined to do so.
[54] Importantly, the Attorneys
General, RaiLink, the Elected Council and
[55] At the conclusion of these submissions, the motions judge adjourned the proceedings to August 8, at which time he delivered the reasons that are under appeal.
[56] The motions judge handed down
his decision to the parties on August 8. Throughout his reasons he expressed the view that the rule of law was
not functioning in
[57] His order contained only two operative paragraphs:
THIS COURT ORDERS that the matter of contempt is to be referred to the Attorney General of Ontario for carriage, and at that time to be fixed in the course of a case management meeting, a time will be set so that the [c]ourt and the public may be apprised of the Crown’s progression or lack thereof in regard to the criminal contempt. The [c]ourt will remain seized of this matter until it is resolved.
THIS COURT ORDERS that the injunction issued in
favour of Henco Industries Limited binds the (new) property owner, Her Majesty
the Queen in [R]ight of
These two paragraphs alone are the subject of this appeal.
[58] The Attorney General appealed the motions judge’s August 8 order and asked for a stay of the order pending appeal. This panel heard the motion on August 22. At the end of the oral hearing, we addressed the question of ongoing negotiations. We recognized that although the motions judge’s formal order did not preclude negotiations, the parties felt constrained from negotiating because of the statements in the motions judge’s reasons. Thus, we said that “the parties should be free to continue to negotiate if they choose to do so without fear of being in breach of contempt of a court order.” We reserved the balance of the motion and gave our reasons on August 25.
[59] We granted, in part, the relief the Attorney General had requested. We stayed paragraph 2 of the motions judge’s order, finding it of dubious validity. The stay suspended, until the hearing of the appeal, the order that the Henco injunction binds the provincial Crown. It meant that the mere occupation of Douglas Creek Estates would not be a breach of the Henco injunction.
[60] We declined to stay paragraph 1
of the motions judge’s order. Having
stayed paragraph 2, however, we said that only contempts occurring before July
5, the date of the sale of Douglas Creek Estates to the
[61] I turn now to the legal issues on the appeal. As we did in our reasons on the stay, I will begin with paragraph 2 of the motions judge’s order.
[62] On March 9, 2006, the motions judge granted Henco a permanent injunction. The injunction restrained both named and unnamed protestors from obstructing the roads in and around Douglas Creek Estates and from interfering with Henco’s construction work. It also required the protestors to remove cars and take down the barricades they had erected on the public highways to prevent access to Douglas Creek Estates.
[63] On July 4, 2006, Henco conveyed
Douglas Creek Estates to the
THIS
COURT ORDERS that the injunction issued in favour of Henco Industries Limited
binds the (new) property owner, Her Majesty the Queen in [R]ight of
[64] As I have said, on August 25, 2006, we stayed paragraph 2. We concluded that there was a serious question about its validity. We expressed our concern in para. 19 of our reasons:
The
Province owns Douglas Creek Estates. It does not claim that the
protesters are on its property unlawfully. It does not seek a
court order removing them. It is content to let them
remain. We see no reason why it should not be permitted to do
so. If the protesters cause a nuisance or other disturbance
affecting neighbouring lands or residents of
[65] The Attorney General reiterates the position he took on the stay. He submits that the motions judge erred in law and improperly exercised whatever discretion he had by refusing to dissolve the injunction unconditionally as of July 5. Only the amicus for the residents supports the motions judge’s order. All other parties support the Attorney General’s position. I agree with the Attorney General’s submissions.
[66] The motions judge gave two reasons for refusing to dissolve the injunction as of July 5: as a matter of law, an injunction binds a subsequent purchaser until the court dissolves it; and as a matter of discretion, the court is entitled to continue the injunction until its breach is dealt with by contempt proceedings.
[67] On this record, neither reason is supportable. As a matter of law, maintaining the injunction unjustifiably interfered with the government’s property rights. As a matter of discretion, maintaining the injunction was not needed to deal with any breaches of it that had already occurred but had not been dealt with by contempt proceedings.
(ii) The
injunction does not bind the
[68] The motions judge held that
despite the conveyance of Douglas Creek Estates to the
[69] In my view, the motions judge’s
reasoning confuses two categories of cases. In the first category, a person succeeds to the title of one who had
obtained an injunction for its benefit; in the second category, a person
succeeds to the title of one who is subject to an injunction. The
[70] Thus, if a defendant property owner is enjoined from doing things on its property, a person who purchases the defendant’s property with notice of the injunction may be bound by it. The court will not allow the beneficiary of an injunction to be thwarted by a change in ownership.
[71] An example of a case in the second category is this court’s decision in Ruthig v. Stuart Brothers Limited (1923), 53 O.L.R. 558 (S.C. (A.D.)). There, the plaintiff used a shallow ford to cross a river running through his property. He had obtained an injunction to restrain the defendant, a milling company, from drowning the ford by damming the waters of the river. The defendant, however, sold its mill and dam to another company. Although the purchasing company bought the property with notice of the injunction, it caused the ford to flood. The plaintiff moved to enforce the injunction against the purchaser. The purchaser contended that it was not bound by the injunction because it was not a party to the original lawsuit. The court rejected this contention. Either the purchaser was bound by the injunction, or if not technically bound, was nonetheless bound to obey it or be guilty of contempt for obstructing the course of justice. Middleton J. stated the applicable principle at 560-561:
Where there is an action brought concerning land, the defendant is not permitted to defeat the plaintiff by conveying the property which is the subject of the suit.
…
I am not at all troubled by the question as to whether the remedy against the offending grantee should be technically for a breach of the injunction or whether it should be for contempt of court – the distinction between these two remedies is well pointed out in the case of Seaward v. Paterson, [1897] 1 Ch. 545 – because the result is the same in either case. The contempt, whether it is technically – a breach of the injunction, or whether it is contempt arising from the doing of the thing which it is known the Court has enjoined, has the same outcome – a writ of sequestration, as in this case.
See also MacMillan Bloedel Ltd. v. Simpson, [1996] 2 S.C.R. 1048, where the Supreme Court of Canada applied this principle.
[72] The motions judge’s order
misapplies this principle. Henco is not
a defendant; it is a plaintiff. It is not
subject to the injunction; it obtained the injunction for its benefit. The
[73]
[74] The
(iii) Outstanding breaches of the injunction can be addressed in contempt proceedings without maintaining the injunction.
[75] The motions judge sought to support paragraph 2 of his order on a second basis: the exercise of his discretion. He held that despite the wishes of Henco and the government to dissolve the injunction, he nevertheless had the discretion to maintain it until the outstanding contempt proceedings had been resolved. He put it this way at para. 43:
The law is clear. Just because Henco Ltd., and in this case, the Attorney General of
Ontario and the Ontario Provincial Police are no longer interested in the
enforcement of the injunction, this [c]ourt is entitled to continue the
prosecution of the case for the reason that defiance of court orders transfers
the conduct in question from a mere civil contempt to the realm of public
depreciation of the authority of the court and tends to bring the
administration of justice into scorn. It
has become a penal matter for the court to deal with, not unlike any other
breach of a criminal statute in
[76] The motions judge was right to be concerned about the defiance of the injunction. The court has a legitimate interest in seeing that breaches of its orders are addressed in contempt proceedings. But whether the court may also have a discretion to refuse to dissolve an injunction or to dissolve it on terms, despite the wishes of the party for whom the injunction was originally granted, is dubious. I do not think, however, that I need decide this question, because even if this discretion exists, it must be exercised for a proper purpose. Here, there was no proper purpose.
[77] The motions judge considered that maintaining the injunction was necessary to uphold the integrity of the court’s orders. He apparently thought that if the injunction were dissolved, the outstanding breaches of it could not be addressed in contempt proceedings. I do not agree. The dissolution of the injunction would not have prevented past breaches of it from being addressed in contempt proceedings. In other words, the resolution of any outstanding contempts did not depend on maintaining the injunction. The court had a continuing interest in the contempt proceedings. It did not have a similar interest in the injunction, once the party for whose benefit it was originally granted sought its dissolution. Keeping the injunction alive did nothing to uphold the integrity of the court’s processes.
[78] Moreover, keeping the injunction alive meant that the protestors who remained on Douglas Creek Estates after July 5 risked being found in contempt even though they were on the property with the new owner’s consent.
[79] Still, the amicus for
the residents submits that the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision in Poje v.
[80] In Poje, union picketers blocked the entrance to a dock to prevent cargo from being loaded onto a ship. The company that owned the ship obtained an injunction to restrain the picketing. When the picketers refused to obey the injunction, the company brought a motion to commit them for contempt. The day before the return of the motion, the company and the union settled their dispute, and asked the court to dissolve the injunction and discontinue the contempt proceedings. Farris C.J.B.C. refused the parties’ request. Instead, he adjourned the motion to determine whether the picketing amounted to a criminal contempt of court. He concluded that it did, fined all the picketers and sent one of them to prison. Both the British Columbia Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court of Canada approved of the procedure that he had adopted. Their decisions, however, focused not on the injunction, but instead on whether the trial judge had jurisdiction to continue the contempt proceedings on his own motion. They held, at 527, that he did because the defiance of the injunction against picketing “tend[ed] to bring the administration of justice into scorn.”
[81] In the present case, no one disputes that the motions judge similarly had inherent jurisdiction to invoke contempt proceedings for past breaches of the Henco injunction. Unlike in Poje, however, the issue on this part of the appeal is whether the motions judge erred by refusing to dissolve the injunction. In my view, he did err. He should have dissolved the injunction unconditionally on July 5.
[82] As is evident from the four status hearings that he ordered, the motions judge was of the view that the criminal contempt for breach of the injunction continued and that his jurisdiction to supervise or case manage the enforcement of his contempt order was ongoing. His August 8 decision reflects this view. He referred the criminal contempt proceedings to the Attorney General, ordered a case management meeting where the Attorney General would apprise the court and the public of his progress in dealing with possible contempts of the injunction, and said that he would remain seized of the “matter” until it was resolved. Paragraph 1 of his order states:
THIS COURT ORDERS that the matter of contempt is referred to the Attorney General of Ontario for carriage, and at a time to be fixed in the course of a case management meeting, a time will be set so that the [c]ourt and the public may be apprised of the Crown’s progress or lack thereof in regard to the criminal contempt. The [c]ourt will remain seized of this matter until it is resolved.
[83] Both the Attorney General and the OPP appeal this paragraph of the motions judge’s order and submit that it should be set aside. The amicus for Aboriginal perspectives and the Six Nations Council support the appeal. The appellants accept that the motions judge had jurisdiction to refer the conduct of potential contempt matters to the Attorney General. They question, however, whether he had jurisdiction to case manage future contempt proceedings. They contend that he erred in requiring the Attorney General to report back to him and in remaining seized of the “matter” until it is resolved. And, they contend that even if he does have this jurisdiction, he should not be allowed to exercise it for either of two reasons: first, on the record no outstanding contempts remain to be case managed; and second, the process the motions judge has used to date has been so flawed that we should not permit his ongoing supervision of the proceedings.
[84]
[85] To put the parties’ submissions in context, I will briefly outline the nature of criminal contempt. Contempts are of two kinds, civil and criminal. Civil contempt is disobedience of a court order in a private matter causing a private injury or wrong. Criminal contempt is any private or public misconduct that interferes with a court’s process or seriously threatens the proper administration of justice. See Canadian Judicial Council, Some Guidelines on the Use of Contempt Powers (May 2001).
[86] Contempts can take place in the
face of the court or outside the face of the court. In these proceedings, we are dealing with
criminal contempt committed outside the face of the court. The large scale public defiance of a court-ordered
injunction can amount to a criminal contempt that has been committed outside
the face of the court. See United
Nurses of
[87] Some of the debate over the
validity of paragraph 1 of the motions judge’s August 8 order turns on whether
the Crown and the OPP have already dealt with and have reported on all
outstanding criminal contempts. They say
that they have done so.
[88] To address this debate, I think it helpful to divide the timeframe in question into three periods:
[89] No possible contempts remain outstanding for the first period, March 28 to April 20. As directed by the motions judge, the OPP went to Douglas Creek Estates on April 20 and arrested all twenty-one protestors who refused to leave the property. By the terms of the motions judge’s order, on arrest these protestors were convicted and sentenced. The Attorney General and the OPP have so reported to the motions judge on at least four occasions. Although in his reasons the motions judge does not refer to the execution of the warrant of arrest or the reports back to him, I am satisfied that in this first period there are no remaining “contempt matters” to be case managed.
[90] All parties acknowledge that in
the third period, July 5 to August 25, the court has no valid contempt power to
exercise because no person has breached the injunction in this period. That is so factually, as I outline below, not
because we have concluded that the motions judge erred in failing to dissolve
the injunction unconditionally as of July 5. The law is clear that an order of the court, however wrong, must be
obeyed until it is reversed or varied. See
[91] But from July 5 on, no protestor did breach the injunction. The terms of the injunction are important. The injunction did not prohibit protestors from merely occupying Douglas Creek Estates. The injunction prohibited protestors from interfering with Henco’s operations and Henco’s use of the roads in and around Douglas Creek Estates. By July 5, Henco had no operations in Douglas Creek Estates and was not using the surrounding roads. The motions judge may have thought that the continued occupation of Douglas Creek Estates after July 5 breached the terms of the injunction. If so, he was quite wrong.
[92] The injunction also required the protestors to remove cars and barricades that were preventing access to Douglas Creek Estates. On the record before us, by July 5 all cars and barricades preventing access to the property had been removed. Therefore, there are no outstanding potential contempt matters in this third period to be case managed.
[93] That leaves the second time
period, between April 21 and July 4, the period beginning after the OPP
executed the warrant of arrest and ending when Henco sold Douglas Creek Estates
to the
[94] The appellants say that even if this is so, the motions judge’s jurisdiction to case manage these contempt matters is dubious. They submit that the Attorney General (and through him, the OPP) should not be required to report back to the motions judge. They also submit that the motions judge erred in remaining seized of the matter. Most importantly, they argue that even if the motions judge had jurisdiction to require a report and to remain seized, we should nonetheless set aside paragraph 1 of his order in the light of the flawed process he has invoked to date. They say that maintaining paragraph 1 will only perpetuate these flawed proceedings.
[95] I will discuss these submissions in two parts: first, whether paragraph 1 of the motions judge’s order is a lawful exercise of his discretion; and second, even if it is, whether we ought to maintain this order in the light of the process he has used to date and his intent in remaining seized of the proceedings.
[96] In my view, on its face, paragraph 1 of the motions judge’s order is a lawful exercise of his discretion. Contempt of court forms part of the court’s inherent jurisdiction. It is the means the law provides to protect the court’s authority from improper interference. As the motions judge recognized, the rule of law depends on the court’s ability to enforce its own orders by punishing for contempt. Where no other party has done so, the court may in its discretion even initiate contempt proceedings on its own motion to ensure that its process and authority are respected. See Poje, supra and Some Guidelines on the Use of Contempt Power, supra.
[97] Here, the motions judge believed that widespread defiance of the injunction continued after April 20. He was not prepared to let the “matter of contempt” rest. Instead, in the exercise of his discretion, he decided that further contempt proceedings should be considered. I am not persuaded that he exercised his discretion unreasonably.
[98] The motions judge’s order itself consists of three elements: the referral of the contempt proceedings to the Attorney General; the requirement that the Attorney General report on his progress to the court and the public at a case management meeting; and the provision that the motions judge will remain seized of the “matter of contempt” until it is resolved. In principle, none of these elements is objectionable.
[99] The first element of the motions judge’s order – the referral to the “matter of contempt” to the Attorney General – is open to two interpretations. On one interpretation, the motions judge intended that his finding of criminal contempt on March 28 and the warrant of arrest he issued that day would continue to apply to persons who occupied Douglas Creek Estates in breach of the injunction after April 20. The Crown and the OPP would continue to act on his finding and re-execute the March 28 warrant of arrest. On the other interpretation, the motions judge intended that the Attorney General should bring and conduct any new contempt proceedings for breaches of the injunction after April 20, which he would case manage and remain seized of until they were resolved.
[100] The record does not entirely clear up this ambiguity. At the status hearing on July 24, all the parties agreed with the OPP’s position that the March 28 contempt order and the warrant of arrest were spent after their execution on April 20, and that new proceedings would be necessary before anyone else could be found in contempt. Although at one point during the hearing the motions judge appeared to accept the OPP’s position, some of his comments during the day suggest otherwise.
[101] If, by his referral to the Attorney General, the motions judge intended that his March 28 finding of contempt and warrant of arrest would permit further convictions for criminal contempt, then paragraph 1 of his order cannot stand. The OPP is likely correct in saying that the warrant of arrest is spent. But even if the warrant is not spent, for reasons I will discuss, the contempt proceedings to date have been so flawed that continuing to use the same process would be untenable.
[102] However, the referral to the Attorney General can stand if it means that any further convictions for criminal contempt must be based on new proceedings, which the Attorney General would bring and conduct. I accept this more benign interpretation of the motions judge’s order. It is consistent with how the parties viewed any further proceedings.
[103] Accepting that the motions judge intended any further conviction for contempt must be based on new proceedings, his referral of the “matter of contempt” to the Attorney General was the prudent course of action. All parties concede this to be so. Although a court has inherent jurisdiction to initiate and conduct contempt proceedings on its own motion, in cases of alleged widespread disobedience of a court order outside the face of the court, a judge lacks both the knowledge and the necessary resources to take carriage of these proceedings. Moreover, allowing the Attorney General to conduct the contempt proceeding avoids the undesirable spectre of the court playing the role of investigator and prosecutor as well as judge.
[104] Indeed, in cases like this one, referral of the carriage of contempt proceedings to the Attorney General is the course of action recommended by the Canadian Judicial Council. In its Some Guidelines on the Use of Contempt Powers, supra, the Council said:
In most cases, it will be the wise course for the judge to leave the initiation of proceedings to the parties or to the Attorney General. Indeed it may be appropriate particularly where there is a large number of defendants, for the court to request that the Attorney General take conduct of the proceedings [footnote omitted].
See also MacMillan Bloedel Ltd. v. Simpson (1994), 111 D.L.R. (4th) 368 (B.C.C.A.), aff’d on other grounds, supra.
[105] Although the appellants accept the referral to the Attorney General, they take issue with the second and third elements of the motions judge’s order. I do not agree with their position.
[106] The second element requires the Attorney General at a case management meeting scheduled by the motions judge to report to the court and the public on his progress in dealing with any potential outstanding criminal contempts. At the status hearings called by the motions judge, both the Attorney General and the OPP agreed that reporting back was appropriate. Indeed, on one occasion, counsel for the Attorney General even apologized to the motions judge for not having done so. Now, however, the appellants argue that a reporting back requirement is wrong in law. I make the following two points in support of the legitimacy of the motions judge’s order to report back.
[107] First, as the Supreme Court of
Canada recognized in Doucet-Boudreau v.
[108] Second, because criminal contempt engages the court’s inherent jurisdiction, the judge concerned with it will necessarily play a more active role than the judge presiding over an ordinary criminal trial. Where the judge asks the Attorney General to take carriage of enforcing the court’s order, the judge can legitimately ask the Attorney General for a report on the steps he has taken to do so. A report back is consistent with the court’s legitimate interest in ensuring that its authority and its orders are respected.
[109] Thus, I agree with the observations of Farley J. in Canada Post Corp. v. Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW), [1991] O.J. No. 2472 (Q.L.) (Gen. Div.) that a court may ask the police and the Crown to report on the exercise of their discretion:
Unless I am convinced otherwise, it would seem to me that in any case that was referred by the court to the Attorney General where he decided not to proceed in his prosecutorial discretion that it would be incumbent upon him to advise in open court why it was felt inappropriate to proceed since in essence the Attorney General is acting to assist the court. I cannot but emphasize that this falls squarely within the role as set out in Boucher [v. the Queen (1954), 114 C.C.C. 263 (S.C.C.)] and which I have quoted above.
[110] The third element of paragraph 1 of the motions judge’s order is the provision that he would remain seized of the “matter of contempt” until it is resolved. In principle, this element of the order is also proper. Again, because of the court’s role in contempt proceedings, the motions judge is entitled to remain seized of the “matter” until the Attorney General reports back on his conduct of the referral.
[111] Accordingly, I am satisfied that paragraph 1 of the motions judge’s order represents a proper exercise of his discretion. Even though it does, I must still consider whether it is appropriate to maintain paragraph 1 and if so, the time period it should cover. Because, as I have said, the only breaches of the injunction not already addressed are those that may have been committed in the period from between April 21 and July 4, paragraph 1 of the motions judge’s order can apply only to this time period. This answers the second question. However, the appellants submit that even if paragraph 1 on its face is not legally flawed and is limited to this time period, the process leading up to it has been so flawed that it should be set aside. They contend that maintaining paragraph 1 will serve only to perpetuate this flawed process.