Canadian Criminal Sentencing/Introduction

Preface

This text was written as a reference on the law of sentencing for criminal offences. The audience for this text will be mostly criminal law practitioners, police officers, and law students, who need a convenient way to look up principles and case law. Where possible there are links to cited cases on CanLII for ease of reference.

Organization of the Book

The book is organized into six sections. The book begins covering the principles and factors of sentencing that apply to just about every sentencing hearing.

The second section reviews the available sentences to a sentencing judge. There are the obvious tools of jail, probations and fines, as well as the many additional options available from ancillary sentencing orders.

The next section covers the procedural elements of sentencing, much of it focusing on the evidential rules that set out what the judge can consider when crafting an appropriate sentence.

The fourth section covers the principles and case law associated with specific offences. Certain offences include lengthy tables of prior sentences as references.

The following section cover special issues raised post-sentence by parole as well as the manner of dealing with the most dangerous offenders with Long-Term Orders and Dangerous Offender Orders. The final section deals with the particular rules around sentencing of youths.