Trial courts take direction from previous appellate level decisions. However, as can be seen below, trial courts have generated the most police powers out of all three levels we categorized in this section. Trial court judges are essential to the fact finding process within the criminal justice system. Once the facts have been agreed upon in a trial, they are accepted by appellate courts if there is an appeal by the losing side at the trial level. This suggests that trial courts have an impact on appellate level decisions and the facts and arguments heard at the trial level are often relied upon during the appeal process.
Trial courts take direction from previous appellate level decisions. However, as can be seen below, trial courts have generated the most police powers out of all three levels we categorized in this section. Trial court judges are essential to the fact finding process within the criminal justice system. Once the facts have been agreed upon in a trial, they are accepted by appellate courts if there is an appeal by the losing side at the trial level. This suggests that trial courts have an impact on appellate level decisions and the facts and arguments heard at the trial level are often relied upon during the appeal process.
Common Law Police Powers Deployed from 2020-2021:
Common Law Police Powers Deployed from 2020-2021:
In the past 35 years, the Supreme Court of Canada has generated several key police powers that have changed the criminal law landscape. Alongside warrantless roadside detentions (R v Dedman), the Supreme Court has provided police with the ability to detain individuals during a police investigation and search incident to the investigatory detention for police safety (R v Mann). The Supreme Court has also provided police with the power to use sniffer-dogs without a warrant (R v Kang-Brown, R v AM), and warrantless cell phone searches incident to arrest (R v Fearon).
Nova Scotia:
Since 1985, 7 ancillary common law police powers have been generated by trial and appeal courts in Nova Scotia. Pre-existing common law police powers have been deployed by Nova Scotian Courts 44 times.
Meanwhile, these courts have declined to generate common law police powers on 10 occasions and declined to deploy pre-existing powers on 35.