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| Patrick J Ducharme |
A plea is taken to each charge individually. The usual pleas to the charges are ‘guilty’ or ‘not guilty’. The accused is also able to enter any of the special pleas authorized in Part XX of the Criminal Code.
In special circumstances the accused may be allowed to enter one of the special pleas of autrefois convict or acquit, or, pardon. Subsection 606(4) also allows an accused to plead not guilty to the offence charged, but guilty to an included offence or any other offence arising out of the same transaction, however to do so the consent of the prosecutor is necessary.
Canada does not have conditional pleas. Canada also does not have the special plea of nolo contendere, a legal term that comes from the Latin for, “I do not wish to contend.” Nolo contendere is used quite frequently in the United States as a plea of “I do not contest.” By this plea the accused neither admits the essential elements of the offence nor disputes the charge.
This special plea nolo contendere in the United States serves as an alternative to either pleading guilty or not guilty. Each state in the United States of America, at its discretion, either permits its use or does not. The Federal court only permits a plea of nolo contendere with leave of the court, and, only after the court has considered the interests of the “effective administration of justice.” There is therefore always discretion in the Federal court to reject such a plea on the basis that it is not in the interests of the effective administration of justice.
Continued in part 2…
The above is the an excerpt of Patrick J Ducharme's book, Canadian Criminal Procedure, available at Amazon or in bulk through MedicaLegal Publishing along with Criminal Trial Strategies.
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