David Asper Centre for
Constitutional Rights
presents
The Decriminalization of Prostitution in Ontario: Perspectives on Bedford v. Canada
Monday, October 25, 2010
Room FLC, Flavelle House, Faculty of Law
In the recent landmark case Bedford v. Canada, Justice Himmel of the Ontario Superior Court held that three provisions of the Criminal Code that criminalize facets of prostitution—living on the avails of prostitution, keeping a common bawdy house and communicating in a public place for the purpose of engaging in prostitution—infringe the core values protected by section 7 of the Charter, and that this infringement is not saved by section 1 as a reasonable limit demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society. The Federal Government has indicated that it will appeal the decision, which has been stayed for 4 months pending an expedited appeal process. A distinguished panel will discuss the Superior Court decision and what it means for the future of prostitution laws in Canada.
Panel Discussion with:
Professor Alan Young is counsel for the applicants in the case. He is professor of law at Osgoode Hall Law School. He is Co-Founder and Director of Osgoode’s Innocence Project, which involves students in the investigation of suspected cases of wrongful conviction and imprisonment. He also maintains a small practice specializing in criminal law and procedure that is primarily devoted to challenging state authority to criminalize consensual activity. He has brought constitutional challenges to our gambling, obscenity, bawdy-house and drug laws and for more than a decade has provided free legal services for people whose alternative lifestyles have brought them into conflict with the law. He is the author of Justice Defiled: Perverts, Potheads, Serial Killers and Lawyers (Toronto: Key Porter, 2003).
Professor Brenda Cossman joined the U of T Faculty of Law in 1999, and became a full professor in 2000. She holds degrees in law from Harvard and the U of T. In 2002 and 2003, she was a Visiting Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. Prior to joining the U of T, she was Associate Professor at Osgoode Hall Law School. Her teaching and scholarly interests include family law, law and sexuality, and freedom of expression. Her most recent book on Sexual Citizens: The Legal and Cultural Regulation of Sex and Belonging was published by Stanford University Press in 2007. Her publications include the co-authored Bad Attitudes on Trial: Pornography, Feminism and the Butler Decision (University of Toronto Press) and Censorship and the Arts (published by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries).
Professor Hamish Stewart is an Associate Professor of Law at the U of T, where he has taught criminal law, evidence, and several other subjects since 1993. Before attending law school, he studied economics, receiving his B.A. from the University of Toronto in 1983 and his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1989, and he taught for a year in the economics department at Williams College in Massachusetts. He received his LL.B. degree from the University of Toronto in 1992, clerked at the Ontario Court of Appeal in 1992-93, and was called to the Ontario Bar in 1998. From 1998 to 2007, he was an Associate Editor of the Canadian Criminal Cases and the Dominion Law Reports. Professor Stewart is the principal author of Sexual Offences in Canadian Law (Canada Law Book, 2004), the General Editor of Evidence: A Canadian Casebook, 2d ed. (Emond Montgomery, 2006), and the author of more than 40 scholarly papers in criminal law, evidence, legal theory, and economics.
The panel will be moderated by Cheryl Milne, Executive
Director of the Asper Centre.
Please RSVP by registering on the Asper Centre Website: www.aspercentre.ca
