Supreme Court of Canada Strikes Down Emergency Warrantless Wiretapping Provision

The Supreme Court of Canada has struck down a provision of the Criminal Code that allows emergency warrantless wiretapping, ruling that it violates the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. In R. v. Tse, the Court held that section 184.4 of the Criminal Code violates the individual’s rights to be free from unreasonable search and seizure under Section 8 of the Charter and cannot be saved under Section 1 of the Charter because 1) it does not require accountability for law enforcement who do the wiretapping and 2) it does not require that those individuals who have been wiretapped be informed of the wiretapping “after the fact.” Read the decision here.