Does Canadian court recognise live link to U.K. in criminal proceedings for a witness in U.K. criminal case. Can they

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To make sure I understand; there is someone in Canada that you would like to have compelled as a witness in the UK, and you are wondering if Canadian court processes can assist with that, including live streaming the witness' testimony. Is that correct?

I am allowed to answer hypotheticals, no problem there. Let me do a little bit of research here. This is not a question I know the answer of off the top of my head. Bear with me for a little bit!

Canada will absolutely help with enforcing foreign jurisdictions orders; for example, if the UK courts made an order compelling a witness in Canada to appear, they would assist with that. An application would have to be made to the court to recognize the original order or document from the UK, and then they would assist with enforcing.

As to whether it would be enforcing via a live video stream? While I cannot find legislation indicating that they would for certain, nor case-law indicating if it's been done in the past, I would be astonished if that's something the Canadian courts would not assist with. Ultimately whatever the foreign jurisdiction (in this case, the UK) deems to be reasonable and acceptable for testimony would be how the Canadian courts would assist. We definitely have the technilogical abilities to do so.

So my short answer is yes, I believe that the Canadian courts would assist in both procuring the witness, and in having them appear via live stream.

S. 34.13 at this link for the UK; https://www.justice.gov.uk/courts/procedure-rules/civil/rules/part34#34.13

Which province do you hypothetically believe this person is located in? That would change the legislation. We don't have a single over-arching piece of legislation dealing with the whole country on that issue unfortunately.

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