UPCOMING SEMINARS

All our seminars are accredited for CPD credit with every Canadian Law Society (except Quebec).

The Last Line of Defence: The Role of Criminal Trial Lawyers in a Rapidly Evolving Justice System

11am MST, Friday, February 6th, 2026

This seminar explores the changing landscape of criminal justice through the insights of the Honourable Russell Brown. Get his takes on the evolving “law and order” environment, concerns about how the system is changing, and what defence lawyers can do to fight for their clients. This session will also focus on practical strategies for effective advocacy, navigating new legal challenges, and ensuring that core rights are preserved in a system under strain.

The Honourable Russell Brown FRCGS BA LLB LLM SJD LLD is an arbitrator, mediator and also an associate counsel to Hunter LItigation Chambers in Vancouver. He served on the Canadian judiciary for 10½ years, including eight years as a Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada. Prior to his judicial career, he was Professor and Associate Dean (Graduate Studies) of Law at the University of Alberta, chair of the Health Law Institute, and litigation counsel at the Bars of Alberta and British Columbia.

The State of the Union: Contemporary Issues in Criminal Law, with a special focus on Bill C-16.

11am MST, Friday, March 6th, 2026

In a new seminar that we hope will become an annual staple, CDE presents “State of the Union: Contemporary Issues in Canadian Criminal Law”. This seminar aims to discuss the existing criminal law landscape, focusing on the biggest issues of the moment. This year, the focus will be Bill C-16, and how it will impact defence practice. Peter Sankoff, Kyla Lee, Thomas Hynes and Rebecca McConchie will canvass the bill’s new and expanded offences—coercive control; deepfake/intimate-image distribution and threats; new child sexual abuse material threat and luring links; bestiality-depiction distribution; and youth-recruitment criminalization—then drill into procedural changes that will make life for defence lawyers more onerous, including higher production/admissibility thresholds for therapeutic records and 60-day notice requirements. They will also analyze C-16’s restorative-justice information entitlements and its delay package, pushing courts toward remedies other than stays and codifying complexity factors under Jordan.

Bright Lines or Blurred Standards? The Judicial Regulation of Police Powers

11am MDT, Friday, April 10th, 2026

Police powers law has increasingly become the domain of the courts rather than Parliament. Given this reality, Professor Penney urges judges to adopt a more rules-based, regulatory approach to defining the scope and limitations of the powers of detention, search, and questioning. The current judicial preference for open-ended standards undermines predictability, efficiency, and fairness. He will present concrete proposals to clarify the law for the benefit of the front line justice system actors who must interpret and apply it on a daily basis: police, lawyers, and the lower courts. He will focus on ways that you can use these proposals–and the theoretical framework underlying them–to benefit your clients and improve the law for everyone.

Sexual Assault Update

11am MDT, Friday, May 8th, 2026

The law governing sexual assault trials evolves more quickly than most people can keep up. In this annual seminar, Peter Sankoff gives an update and discusses the latest trends and developments.

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