Glossary

Accused: a person who has been charged with a crime by police and/or prosecutors, but has not yet been found guilty.

Administration of justice offence: a breach of a condition of an undertaking, release order, probation order, or other offence of a court, which has not caused any damage to property or any harm to another person.

Africentrism: a conceptual framework that is rooted in the epistemology, cosmology, and axiology of the indigenous African worldview (Africentrism—Standing on Its Own Cultural Ground - Tolliver - 2015 - New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education - Wiley Online Library).

Anti-Black racism: “Anti-Black racism is prejudice, attitudes, beliefs, stereotyping and discrimination that is directed at people of African descent and is rooted in their unique history and experience of enslavement and its legacy. Anti-Black racism is deeply entrenched in Canadian institutions, policies and practices, to the extent that anti-Black racism is either functionally normalized or rendered invisible to the larger White society. Anti-Black racism is manifest in the current social, economic, and political marginalization of African Canadians, which includes unequal opportunities, lower socio-economic status, higher unemployment, significant poverty rates and overrepresentation in the criminal justice system” (Government of Ontario, 2021).

Anti-racism approach: “Anti-racism is a process, a systematic method of analysis, and a proactive course of action rooted in the recognition of the existence of racism, including systemic racism. Anti-racism actively seeks to identify, remove, prevent, and mitigate racially inequitable outcomes and power imbalances between groups and change the structures that sustain inequities” (Government of Ontario, 2021).

Bail or judicial interim release: judicial interim release is the formal legal term for what most people refer to as “bail.” When an individual is arrested and charged with a crime, they are presumed innocent, but if the police and/or the Crown believe that it would be too dangerous to release the person into the community, they are taken into custody and must appear before a magistrate or a judge to ask that they be released on conditions until they come back to court to deal with their charges.

Conditional sentence order: the formal legal term for what many people refer to as “house arrest”. “The conditional sentence is a meaningful alternative to incarceration for less serious and nondangerous offenders. The offenders who meet the criteria... will serve a sentence under strict surveillance in the community instead of going to prison. These offenders’ liberty will be constrained by conditions to be attached to the sentence... In case of breach of conditions, the offender will be brought back before a judge... If an offender cannot provide a reasonable excuse for breaching the conditions of his or her sentence, the judge may order him or her to serve the remainder of the sentence in jail” (R. v. Proulx, 2000 SCC 5 (CanLII), [2000] 1 SCR 61 at 21-22.).

Challenge for cause: section 638 of the Criminal Code allows either defence counsel or a prosecutor to ask a judge not to place a potential juror on the jury for a number of reasons, including that they believe that the juror is not impartial, in other words, that they do not have an open mind or are biased for or against one side.

Colonialism: the process whereby one country controls another by conquering its population, settling it with their own people, and exploiting it economically.

Constitution/constitutional: the Constitution of Canada is the supreme law of Canada. It describes the type of government we have and the powers each branch of government holds. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms is a part of the Constitution that provides the rights and freedoms every person in Canada has. All laws passed in Canada must agree with the principles stated in the Constitution to be, and if individuals or groups think that a law does not, they can challenge it in court.

Convicted: being found guilty of a criminal offence, either by pleading guilty or being found guilty after a trial.

Cultural competence: the ability to understand people from other cultures and interact fairly and effectively with them.

Custody: being in jail or prison.

De-escalation: reducing the level of intensity of a situation.

Denunciation: publicly stating that something is wrong; public condemnation.

De-skilling: being placed in a situation with lower skill requirements than the person has through their education and experience.

Detention: keeping someone in jail.

Deterrence: giving someone a consequence to discourage them from doing the same thing again (specific deterrence) or to discourage others from doing it (general deterrence).

Disaggregated data: separating information into smaller groups or units so as to better analyze it for trends. In the context of the recommendations in this document, the need for disaggregated data refers to the desire to break down data gathered about “visible minorities” into specific categories, including one for those who identify as Black or African.

Discretion: the power given to public officials such as judges, magistrates, prosecutors, police, immigration officials and others to use their own judgment and conscience, within the law, to make a decision.

Discrimination: “Treating someone unfairly by either imposing a burden on them, or denying them a privilege, benefit or opportunity enjoyed by others, because of their race, citizenship, family status, disability, sex or other personal characteristics.” (Canadian Heritage, 2019a).

Diverse/diversity: inclusion of people from a wide variety of backgrounds.

Diversion: diverting, or moving, cases away from the criminal justice system by offering an individual charged with a criminal offence the opportunity to complete counselling or programming in the community. Once this is successfully completed, the Crown will agree to withdraw or stay the charges (see definition below). Some jurisdictions have specialized diversion courts, such as mental health courts, drug treatment courts, or Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder courts, which have more structured programs that offer diversion if individuals agree to receive programming and supports specific to the focus of that particular court.

Empirical evidence: information obtained by observing and documenting human behaviour.

Ex-officio: a person acting as a result of the office they hold.

Gang disaffiliation: the process of leaving a gang.

Guilty plea: a person’s choice to take responsibility for committing a criminal offence and admit that they did something wrong.

Hybrid offence: a criminal offence that can be prosecuted either as a summary conviction or indictable offence, as determined by the prosecutor.

Incarceration/incarcerated: being in jail or prison.

Indictable offence: the most serious crimes with the longest sentences.

Intermittent sentence: a jail sentence that allows the person serving it to live in the community for part of the time and report to jail for part of the time until the sentence is finished.

Intersectionality: “Acknowledges the ways in which people's lives are shaped by their multiple and overlapping identities and social locations, which, together, can produce a unique and distinct experience for that individual or group, for example, creating additional barriers or opportunities” (Government of Canada, Canadian Heritage, 2019b). This term was first used by African American legal scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw to describe how race and gender discrimination both impact the lives of Black women.

Impact of Race and Culture Assessment (IRCA): “An Impact of Race and Culture Assessment (IRCA) is an attempt to articulate the issues of anti-Black racism and systemic racism in Canadian society to the court at the sentencing stage of adjudicating African Canadians. A founding premise of IRCA is that a person’s race and cultural heritage should be considered as a significant factor in considering their sentence in a criminal matter.” R. v. Jackson, 2018 ONSC 2527 (CanLII) at p. 28. An IRCA is a report prepared by a social worker or other professional that contains information provided by a Black accused person and their family, friends and supports that helps to explain how anti-Black racism contributed to their criminal offending.

Legislative reform: making changes to laws so that they work better and are fair.

Mandatory minimums: sentences for criminal offences that require a judge to impose a sentence of at least the length of time provided in sentencing laws such as the Criminal Code, Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, or Youth Criminal Justice Act. The judge cannot impose a lower sentence unless the accused person is able to show that the mandatory minimum is cruel and unusual punishment, pursuant to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Marginalization: “Marginalization is a long-term, structural process of systemic discrimination that creates a class of disadvantaged minorities. Marginalized groups become permanently confined to the fringes of society. Their status is perpetuated through various dimensions of exclusion, particularly in the labour market, from full and meaningful participation in society” (Government of Ontario, 2021).

Over-policing: an excessive response from law enforcement characterized by a heavy police presence and over-surveillance, an aggressive response to minor offences, frequent interactions with people who are not breaking any laws especially among low-income individuals and racial minorities.

Microaggressions: commonplace daily, subtle messages, slights and insults against marginalized people that are verbal, unconscious, and take a psychological and physiological toll on the target person or group (City of Toronto, 2023).

Moral culpability: a court’s finding as to the level of blame that should be placed upon an offender, considering all their circumstances and the circumstance of the offence. R. v. Stone, 1999 CanLII 688 (SCC), [1999] 2 SCR 290 at 233-234.

Overrepresented: where more individuals from a particular group are found in a specific place or situation than their proportion of the overall population.

Peremptory challenge: the ability of defence counsel or the prosecutor to remove a potential juror from serving on a jury without giving a reason.

Policy: statements of principles or values that lead to consistent decision making.

Pre-trial detention/remand custody: if an individual is not granted bail, or does not apply for it, they are held in pre-trial detention or remand custody, where they are housed in a jail and treated in a similar manner to sentenced inmates, although they are still presumed innocent and have not been convicted of a crime.

Proportionality: the principle found in s.718.1 of the Criminal Code which states that the sentence an individual receives must not be any greater than their level of moral culpability.

Prosecuted/prosecution: the process of trying to find an accused person guilty of an offence.

Race: “Race is a term used to classify people into groups based principally on physical traits (phenotypes) such as skin colour. Racial categories are not based on science or biology but on differences that society has created (in other words, “socially constructed”), with significant consequences for people’s lives. Racial categories may vary over time and place and can overlap with ethnic, cultural or religious groupings” (Government of Ontario, 2021).

Racial profiling: “Racial profiling is any action undertaken for reasons of safety, security or public protection, that relies on stereotypes about race, colour, ethnicity, ancestry, religion, or place of origin, or on a combination of those traits, rather than on a reasonable suspicion, to single out an individual for greater scrutiny or different treatment” (Government of Ontario, 2021).

Recidivism: refers to a person who has been convicted of a crime, served a sentence of incarceration and been released into the community, and then commits a new crime.

Record suspension or pardon: record suspensions are granted by the Parole Board of Canada and former offenders can apply for them either 5 or 10 years after finishing their sentences, depending on the type of offence they committed. There is a fee. If granted, a record suspension requires police not to disclose an individual’s criminal record when someone does a criminal record check on that individual. Certain offences are not eligible.

Re-entry or reintegration: the process by which a person housed in a correctional institution transitions back to living in the community. For federal prisoners, the process is overseen by the Parole Board of Canada. For provincial offenders who have received probation as part of their sentence, their parole officer supervises their return to the community.

Rehabilitation: punishment that allows an offender to receive help to become a law-abiding member of society.

Restorative justice: a process that brings together an offender and a victim, and any other persons affected by the crime, who agree to participate. The parties discuss the effects of the crime and ways to hold the perpetrator accountable to remedy the harm (https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/rp-pr/cj-jp/victim/rest.html).

Retroactive: a law that goes into effect at a date earlier than it first comes into effect.

Social determinants of justice: socio-economic factors from outside the justice system that affect outcomes inside the justice system.

Socio-economic: the interaction of social factors such as race, gender, etc. and economic factors such as income.

Stay of proceedings or withdrawal of charges: occurs when a prosecutor agrees not to continue a prosecution; commonly known as “having your charges dropped.” The person who receives a stay of proceedings is not convicted of the offence and no longer needs to attend court. Though people often use the terms stay of proceedings and withdrawal of charges interchangeably, the two are different. A withdrawal of charges means that the prosecution can never bring those charges back, but with a stay of proceedings, charges can be revived within a year.

Stereotype: the unfair or untrue assumption that all individuals from a group share certain characteristics

Stop and frisk/carding/street checks: when police stop and question individuals without a good reason or any evidence that they have committed a crime; often an example of racial profiling.

Summary conviction offence: a less serious criminal offence with a less serious sentence.

Surety: an individual who agrees to supervise a person on bail and pledges an amount of money to be paid if the person on bail does not follow their conditions.

Surveillance: being closely watched and monitored.

Systemic and institutional racism: “Consists of patterns of behaviour, policies or practices that are part of the social or administrative structures of an organization, and which create or perpetuate a position of relative disadvantage for racialized persons. These appear neutral on the surface but, nevertheless, have an exclusionary impact on racialized persons” (Canadian Heritage, 2019a).

Temporary absence: the first type of release that an individual in the penitentiary may get; it allows them to leave the penitentiary for a few hours, either escorted by a correctional officer or unescorted. Offenders apply to either the Correctional Service of Canada or the Parole Board for temporary absences to attend work or school, family events such as funerals, etc.

Tertiary ground: found in s.515(10) of the Criminal Code, it is the ability of a judge to deny someone bail where to grant them bail would reduce the confidence of the public in the administration of justice. R. v. St-Cloud 2015 SCC 27 (CanLII), [2015] 2 SCR 328 at 63-80.

Trauma-informed: an approach to providing services that assumes it is likely that an individual has experienced trauma, and which is aware of the symptoms and effects of trauma and how to address them.

Unconscious bias: negative stereotypes and assumptions about groups of people that affects the way a person deals with others, but they are not aware of doing this.

White supremacy: the belief that white people are naturally superior to other races, which leads to white people creating political, economic and social systems that control other races and keep white people in a privileged position.