Pro bono law firm discovers more than 100 COVID-era tickets were withdrawn

COVID fines People who have COVID fines are now finding out if their tickets have been wiped, but nobody is notifying them. Michelle Malusuke reports.

The Democracy Fund (DF), established during the pandemic to fight for constitutional freedom, recently discovered dozens of tickets in Mississauga were withdrawn.

“A lot of these tickets were stale,” lawyer Mark Joseph said, referencing a common legal argument called R. V. Jordan.

“It says, and for provincial offenses, the ticket must be resolved, within 18 months of the information being laid until the end of the trial.”

Joseph said they weren’t given a reason for why the 109 tickets were withdrawn in Provincial Offences court.

“The court system is fairly glacial in its procedures. It just takes time for something to move through the legal system,” he said. “So, two, three years later, I guess the Crown looked at this and decided that, for whatever reason, they weren't going to take it to trial and they were just going to let these tickets go.”

DF lawyers are also representing clients facing larger fines for cross-border violations during the pandemic.

According to the Public Health Agency of Canada, 19,556 fines for “non-compliance” with the Quarantine Act were laid between April 2020 and September 2022.

“You have people getting issued tickets that were upwards of $6,000 sometimes,” said Joseph. “And these are just regular people. A lot of working class, a lot of racialized, marginalized people receiving these tickets in the thousands of dollars.”

The Democracy Fund has been successful in arguing for Canadians to have their charges either withdrawn or an agreement reached to conclude the matters.

“Prosecutors have to ask themselves one question: ‘Is it in the public interest to proceed?’” said legal expert, Ari Goldkind.

He believes dropping minor provincial offence charges is a good decision in light of how much work there is to do.

“Let it be a murder, home invasion, carjacking, robbery, trial that takes (court) time,” said Goldkind. “Let the courts be used for things that matter to people. Not this.”

You can check the status of your provincial offences ticket here.