Quote:
Originally Posted by iggy_oi
The case likely would have went to a human rights tribunal who would have made a decision on settlement. The government could have challenged that decision in the Supreme Court. Given that the Supreme Court had already ruled in his favour on the charge that his rights were violated it is doubtful they would not have upheld the human rights commission's decision on settlement.
There is no chance the government wasn't going to have to pay Khadr a settlement.
|
The legal saga of Omar Khadr is a very complex one. He (and his legal team) has initiated dozens of applications, motions, and actions over the past decade +. It is difficult to keep track of.
So, its not surprising that I think that a number of posters have confused the process in the last few pages. The SCC's 2010 decision was considering Khadr's application for judicial review. At the time, Khadr was still in US custody. Khadr had requested that the Canadian government make efforts to repatriate him. The government decided not to make any such efforts. Khadr's application challenged that decision and asked the court to order the federal government to make those efforts. The SCC held that the government had breached Khadr's international human rights and Charter rights. However, it declined to order the government to repatriate Khadr because it did not think that it had jurisdiction to order the government to repatriate Khadr. Therefore, it left it to the discretion/prerogative of the federal government to remedy the Charter breaches going forward. However, this had nothing to do with compensation for past and continuing Charter breaches.
Later, Khadr commenced an action (sued) for damages (ie, money) for Charter breaches, misfeasance in public office, etc. For obvious reasons, it was not up to the government to determine what those damages should be. Had the action proceeded to trial, it would have been up to the court to determine how to compensate Khadr. However, based (presumably) on the legal advice that it received, the federal government chose to settle the action and avoid trial.