Today the Slaw blog highlighted R. v. McKay, a very interesting Canadian case in which a 19-year-old defendant claims he was not given a reasonable opportunity to exercise his right to counsel. The defendant’s main argument is that he was not provided with "a full range of resources and access to sources of information which reasonably were or ought have been made available to him" because he was not given access to the Internet.
Following his arrest for operating a motor vehicle while impaired by alcohol, the defendant was asked if he wanted to call a lawyer and he replied, "yes." An officer then showed the accused the "resources" available to contact counsel:
- 411 for information as to phone numbers; and
- the White Pages and the Yellow Pages of the telephone book.
