Law & Order: The Intersection of Criminal Justice and Professional Regulation

A practitioner has been charged with a criminal offense. It is high profile and it is public. Tactical and public relations decisions will need to be made by the regulator immediately and on an ongoing basis, each critical to the regulator’s public interest role.

This session will take the audience through a hypothetical scenario in which a practitioner has been charged with a serious criminal offense. Attendees will assume the role of the head of a regulatory body and think about the challenging questions that will face regulators at each step of the process when a practitioner faces criminal charges. As each tactical step is addressed, the panel will discuss the relevant law from across various jurisdictions and how regulators have reacted to similar situations. The differences in approach are both surprising and enlightening.

Learning Objectives:

• Learn the imperative action steps when a member has been charged with a criminal offense
• Identify the relevant considerations for determining whether to proceed with the disciplinary process or wait for the criminal proceedings to be completed and how different jurisdictions around the world have addressed this issue
• Learn how a criminal proceeding may impact the investigation of the allegations by the regulatory body. For example: Can or should the member be interviewed? What protections is the member likely to invoke, and how do these differ across jurisdictions? Should other witnesses be interviewed? Can the police be summonsed? Can you obtain the prosecution brief?
• Learn how the disciplinary proceedings may impact the criminal proceedings and vice versa
• Identify relevant considerations for determining whether to proceed with the disciplinary proceedings when the key evidence was

Presenters:

Bernard C. LeBlanc, Partner, Steinecke Maciura LeBlanc
Robin McKechney, Partner, Steinecke Maciura LeBlanc

Jan Robinson, Registrar and Chief Executive Officer, College of Veterinarians of Ontario