Backgrounder: National Prosecution Awards 2021

The Commitment to Justice Award

Annick Murphy recently retired after more than 40 years serving the public through the Directeur des poursuites criminelles et pénales (DPCP) in Quebec. Starting in 1983, she was assigned to youth matters, where she demonstrated great sensitivity and commitment to the goal of rehabilitation of youth involved in the criminal justice system. In 2003, she became the Deputy Chief Prosecutor of the Youth Bureau in Montreal, Quebec, then became the Chief Prosecutor of the same bureau in 2007. In this role, she was instrumental in modernizing the computer infrastructure of the DPCP to meet the obligations set forth in the Youth Criminal Justice Act, 2003.

In 2012, she became Chief Prosecutor of the Bureau de la jeunesse for all of Quebec. She was the architect behind the creation of a youth bureau under unified governance within the DPCP, ensuring the presence of specialized and dedicated prosecutors everywhere in Quebec focused on improved handling of cases consistent with the Quebec intervention model. The result of her efforts was the official creation of the Bureau de la jeunesse on February 1, 2012, now called Bureau des affaires de la jeunesse.

She was named Deputy Director of the DPCP in 2012, interim Director in 2014 and was confirmed in the role in 2015—the first woman to hold the position. She stayed in this position until her retirement in February 2021. One of her most important accomplishments in this role was the changes she brought to public communications. She introduced a policy of publicly explaining the reasons for decisions not to lay charges in order to foster a public understanding of certain prosecutorial decisions and confidence in the institution of the DPCP. She led a review of all the directives of the DPCP in order to reduce judicial delays, to promote the autonomy of prosecutor decision-making and to improve the support offered to victims of crime. She also promoted the idea to prosecutors that the DPCP could contribute to social development by addressing underlying causes of crime such as substance use, homelessness, mental health and poverty through alternative measures, while promoting the rehabilitation of offenders from a long-term public safety perspective.

The Humanitarian Award

Trevor Shaw started as a prosecutor for the Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General in 1995 in Toronto. In 2006, he left Ontario to join the British Columbia Prosecution Service, eventually becoming, in 2013, Director of the Criminal Appeals and Special Prosecutions for the province, based in Vancouver.

Since 2009, he has worked on a regular basis as a consultant to judges and prosecutors in Central America through the Justice Education Society (JES), primarily with Oral Trials training. In 2015, he developed training modules for the JES for major case management, domestic violence, femicide and gender-based violence investigations and prosecutions in El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala. In 2019 and 2020, he was instrumental in organizing Canadian experts to provide assessments and training in Panama and Guyana to improve Indigenous access to justice and gender-based crime investigations, interviewing techniques, criminal procedure and advocacy.

In 2011, he worked at Interpol headquarters as a consultant for the Office of Legal Affairs where he coordinated the launch of a pilot project for the electronic transmission of extradition documents. He has also been a member of the Faculty of the National Criminal Law Program of the Federation of Law Societies of Canada since 2015.

Outstanding Achievement in a Prosecution Award

The Nova Scotia Public Prosecution Service (PPS) team of Christine Driscoll, Rick Woodburn, and Sean McCarroll showed enormous dedication and commitment by prosecuting James Melvin through multiple trials and a lengthy dangerous offender designation application. Arrested in 2015 for the murder of Terry Marriott Jr., Melvin was also charged with conspiracy to commit murder and attempted murder. Acquitted of murder in June 2017, he was convicted of conspiracy to commit and attempted murder later that year. The team then began the request for designation as a dangerous offender, which had to be postponed from mid-2020 to January 2021 due to COVID. He is currently appealing his conviction for conspiracy to commit murder and attempted murder.

Christine Driscoll is Senior Crown Counsel with the Nova Scotia PPS, where she has worked for over 20 years.

Rick Woodburn is Senior Crown Counsel with the Nova Scotia PPS, where he has worked for 20 years.

Sean McCarroll is Senior Crown Attorney for the Nova Scotia PPS where he has worked for nearly 10 years.

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INFORMATION:

Robert P. Doyle
Secretary, FPT Heads of Prosecutions Committee
613-952-0267

(Version française disponible)

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