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No its not biased. He is allowed to testify as a witness as well.

From the Ontario Evidence Act https://www.ontario.ca/laws/statute/90e23

Presumption of competency
18. (1) A person of any age is presumed to be competent to give evidence. 1995, c. 6, s. 6 (1).

Challenge, examination
(2) When a persons competence is challenged, the judge, justice or other presiding officer shall examine the person. 1995, c. 6, s ...

Once the trial starts, yes the prosecutor can still amend... the amendment can happen anytime DURING the trial if there is evidence to support the amendment.

Remember that DEMERIT points are meaningless to insurance companies. For example a 0 demerit speeding ticket and a 3 demerit speeding ticket are both considered a MINOR offence by insurance companies and will both cause the same increase.

If you are found guilty though, it will go on your record and it is up to your insurance company to decide if ...

What is the exact section number you were charged with on the ticket? What is the Set Fine amount on the ticket? Is ticket signed?

Posting disclosure notes would be helpful, but whenaxis brings up a good point.

So if you go to trial, remember there are two different phases you need to be aware of...

The first is when the officer is on the ...

Yes you only plead guilty when you get in front of JP and they read the charge and ask you how you plead.

But again you have nothing to lose by saying NOT GUILTY and continuing with the trial. The worst that can happen is that you are found guilty at the end of it, but best case is that you actually get the charge dropped.

If you just plead ...

a) If officer does not show, then prosecutor should withdraw the charge, but may also try to set new trial which you should object to.
c) If witnesses do not show, then prosecutor should withdraw the charge, but may also try to set new trial which you should object to.

b) If officer shows AND at least one of the witnesses shows, then you may have ...

If no plea deal is offered then you must either just plead guilty to original charge or take it to trial and try to beat it.

If no plea deal is offered then you really have nothing to lose by taking it to trial. Maybe the JP will believe you, as there might be contradictory testimony given by the other witnesses.

Some prosecutors will not tell ...

What you can do is go to the Provincial Offences Office on a day before your trial and ask then for:
- a copy of the origincal Certificate of Offence, and
- a copy of both sides of the Notice of Offence that you filed.

If the change is on BOTH then there is no issue for you to be concerned about.

If the change is ONLY on the Notice of Offence ...

I would object if the officer tries to say/read something that was not in the notes you were provided. Actually at the beginning of the trial when the officer first takes the stand, the prosecutor will ask him a few questions about his notes and then ask permission from the JP to be able to use them. The JP should ask you if you have any questions ...

Your wife does not need to be there so that is irrelevent unless you want her to take the stand and testify. Since I believe you do want her to testify, you can ask for an adjournment because she is about to have baby, but then that delay will count against you and will not count towards an 11b application.

If you can get an adjournment because ...

They could probably proceed without any witnesses except the other driver, although that would not be a strong case for them as the other driver will say you went thru a red light and you will say it was green so it comes down to who the JP believes more.

If they have the other driver and at least one additional witness that will say you went thru ...

There are three levels of proof required:
- mens rea
- strict liability
- absolute liability

Tickets for things like speeding and failing to stop are considered absolute liability, meaning either yes you did or no did not do it. Whether you meant to do it or not is irrelevent. As soon as you admit you did it, you are guilty and there are no ...

Yes.

If officer does not show, then you can request the charge be dropped. That is probably best course of action.

Getting on stand and saying you stopped 99% will just mean you admitted you did not stop and by your own words you will be found guilty. You probably do NOT want to testify.

If the officer is not there, but they are still going to proceed ...

I personally see early resolution as a waste of time. If you just set a trial date then you can meet before trial with prosecutor to discuss plea deals. You also do not get to review disclosure before an early resolution meeting.

I recommend you plead NOT GUILTY and request a trial with the officer present. Once you get the Notice of Trial, you ...

You can file both a section 7 lack of disclosure challenge and an 11b speedy trial challenge.

You would ask to review the 11b first and if it does not succeed, then you bring up the 7 for lack of disclosure.

The courts have decided that it it is YOUR responsibility to check if disclosure is ready and it is NOT the prosecutions responsibility to inform you that it is ready. Sometime they do send it and sometimes they do contact you to let you know its ready, but they do not have to. If it is ready but you did not call to check, then the delay will be ...

The courts have ruled that it is up to YOU to contact the prosecutor to see if disclosure is ready (and they are not obligated to send it to you either, so you might have to go pick it up).

Some of us think your video does show careless and others of us don't. Given the seriousness of a careless charge, a plea might be the better option to at least consider.

You would need to file for an 7 instead of 11b if you dont get dislcosure.

I would say yes you are better filiing the section 7 lack of disclosure one. However remember for either of these to succeed you need to give notice to both the Attorney General of Ontario and the Attorney General of Canada at least 15 days before the trial date. The ...

And what was the date you asked for a trial? If you did early resolution the time up to that point does not count either.

Being able to stop but choosing to change lanes instead does not equal careless. If a vehicle was cut off, then where was that vehicle? Even passing the other vehicle that pulled out, it was still not going very fast.

Also the charge is not speeding though, it is careless. Speeding does not equal careless.

Can a charge of speeding be issued even ...

Good for you for wanting to go all the way!

If you haven't already read these threads, they might be helpful:
http://www.ontariohighwaytrafficact.com/topic7039.html
http://www.ontariohighwaytrafficact.com/topic7041.html

Those two decision are both Ontario Court of Justice level and are both by Justice of the Peace which means they are NOT binding on any court or any other Justice of the Peace.

I would still make the 11b arguments at 10 months, even though a JP may agree with prosecutor that it should be 18 months it will make a good appeal argument for a Judge to ...

It will probably take somebody having to take the presumptive ceiling thing to Ontario Court of Appeals to get a real decision as to whether it applies to POA or not.

My opinion is that it does NOT apply to POA. Prosecutors will of course argue that it does.

Read this thread for further comments:
http://www.ontariohighwaytrafficact.com/topic7680 ...

It's hard to tell whether you were speeding or not, but you can see you slow down a little when the van pulls out in front of you.

So my opinion is that how were driving was NOT careless. The van pulled out and you had to change lanes to avoid a collission.

As long as you checked the lane was clear to your left, then you do not need to signal ...

For provincial offences, they have up to 6 months from the date of the offence to issue a ticket. So if they realize it was the wrong charge, before the 6 months is up, they could withdraw/drop the existing charge and re-issue a new ticket with the correct charge on it. Once you pass the 6 month mark, then it is okay to tell them about the problem ...

Just remember that when you show them they made a mistake, this gives them an opportunity to correct it. In my opinion, you should cancel early resolution meeting and say you plan to plead not guilty and want a trial date. Do NOT tell them about the mistake. On the trial date you and your friend can show up, and when the officer is on the stand ...

Here is a previous discussion on the R v Jordan case:
http://www.ontariohighwaytrafficact.com/topic7680.html
My opinion is that the 18 months does NOT apply to POA offences and that it still remains at the 8 to 10 month limit.

As far as cross-examination goes, here is a thread to give you some tips on that:
http://www.ontariohighwaytrafficact.com ...