BCBusiness

May 2024 – Women of the Year

With a mission to inform, empower, celebrate and advocate for British Columbia's current and aspiring business leaders, BCBusiness go behind the headlines and bring readers face to face with the key issues and people driving business in B.C.

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THE NBOX i Tuesday—five trials were post poned in the same courthouse. Witnesses may have flown in, sometimes translators have been hired and lawyers' bill able hours are always ticking away. With a delay, all those costs go down a sinkhole. "When you start tallying up," Syer says, "even at a very conservative estimate, you're talking about a minimum $100,000 worth of preparation that got wasted last Monday, just in one courthouse. Multi ply that by all the weeks it hap pens and we are talking about waste in the millions. We've reached a crisis point." The pandemic didn't help. "When COVID hit they adjourned every trial for three months," James says. "We've never really caught up." Meanwhile, the Judicial Advisory Committee, the body that evaluates judicial applicants, went dark for about five months last year after all the members' terms expired. "That's definitely a factor," says Scott Morishita, president of the Canadian Bar Association of BC. Criminal cases, at least, are being heard fairly promptly. "There was a recent Supreme Court of Canada case called R v. Jordan," James says. "The court said if you don't try someone within 18 months, charges are automatically stayed. That means no crimi nal trials get bumped. And that means they take judges away from civil trials." On a sunny Tuesday in Gastown, the happiest creature in Ashley Syer's legal office is Sadie. A threeyearold golden retriever, Sadie is pleased that Syer is around to offer cuddles and to distribute droolcovered toys. Syer herself is not so thrilled. She's supposed to be in court. In a disturbingly com mon situation for Vancouver area lawyers, her trial has been bumped. No judge is available. These days, trial dates in B.C. are more precious than a downtown Vancouver parking space. Vacancies on the B.C. Supreme Court (in early March there were 12) mean many lawyers and their frustrated civil clients cannot have their scheduled day. "On average, 25 percent of all civil trials in Vancouver are bumped," says Amanda James of Burnaby based Apna Law LLP. "And they don't go to the top of the list, because the next 12 to 18 months are already booked with other trials. There's nowhere to put them back in. There's no guarantee for next time—I have had a case bumped three times." Syer wasn't the only one who got bumped on that HOLDING COURT B.C. is facing a serious judge shortage, causing some civil trials to be delayed for years by Steve Burgess L A W " Court is a lot like triage right now. It's like going to the surgery ward and saying 'Whose leg looks worse? Who's going to bleed out first?' It shouldn't be how we administer justice in this province." DOG DAYS When B.C. Supreme Court vacancies cause delays, mediator Ashley Syer gets to hang out with Sadie instead 9 B C B U S I N E S S . C A M AY 2 0 24 To p : Ky r a n i K a n a v a r o s ; illu s t r a t i o n : J a n ik S ö ll n e r/ N o u n P r oj e c t

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