A Judge’s Case Book: A Retrospective

The drama of the court room awaiting a verdict; a case that changed the law or made sense of a difficult legal concept; the evidence that held a pattern not clear until now. These were some of the moments that rewarded the time Justice Peter Howden devoted to his work, often into the night. The eight cases and two essays on improving the system picks up on some of those moments and many others. A fatal shooting of a young police officer and the unexpected lighter moment that exploded the courtroom tension in laughter; a drug deal gone bad and the ritual parade of six men in two cars north from Brampton to watch one murdered; an epic struggle between two brothers over control of the family island; a stolen visa card and a double murder driven by an all-consuming love and the impending point of law on staging a crime with a tilt toward profiling. This book will take you on a ride that is suspenseful, informative, at times difficult, but always deeply human. The well-kown criminal lawyer John Rosen found sees it as a personal meditation on justice.