Research Tools: The Canadian Registry of Wrongful Convictions

From The University of Toronto Law School:

Initiated in 2018, the [The Canadian Registry of Wrongful Convictions] has been developed with the dedicated support of multiple U of T Law student researchers and several William Southam Journalism Fellows from U of T’s Massey College.

The Registry includes 83 publicly documented cases where a criminal conviction was overturned based on new matters of significance related to guilt not considered when the accused was convicted or pled guilty. The researchers do not have access to confidential information, do not make determinations of guilt or innocence, nor do they act on behalf of the wrongfully convicted.

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The Registry includes a timeline of miscarriages of justice, dating back to 1755, when 8,000 Acadians were expelled from Nova Scotia over doubts of loyalty to the British Crown.

“The first step to unpacking Canada’s colonial legacy is educating people. Our timeline and the cases that are included in the Registry are just the beginning of the story that the Canadian criminal justice system has, and continues to, get it wrong,” says [Amanda] Carling [JD 2012].

[Jessie] Stirling [JD 2020] adds that the Registry team expects to learn of new cases of wrongful conviction that meet their definition, following today’s launch. The Registry team can be contacted about cases they may have missed, or about incorrect or missing case information through the contact us form on the Registry’s website.

Learn More, Read the Complete Launch Announcement

Direct to The Canadian Registry of Wrongful Convictions

See Also: National Registry of Exonerations (USA)

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