Paths to the Bench: The Judicial Appointment Process in Manitoba, 1870-1950 (Law and Society)

Using the judiciary of Manitoba as a model, Paths to the Bench examines the political nature of Canada's judicial appointment process, and suggests that ability alone seldom determined who went to the bench. In fact, many of Manitoba's early judges spent little time actually practising law, since professional merit was not a criterion for judicial appointments. Rather, it was relationships with influential mentors and communities that ensured appointments and ultimately propelled careers. Brawn offers an in-depth analysis of how the path to the bench of competent and connected and less competent and connected lawyers differed. This book is one of the few studies to examine why many of the best and brightest members of the bar either did not want to go to the bench, or if they did, why they may not have gotten there.

History

Brawn, Dale

Americas

UBC Press

This study of the Manitoba judiciary is not only the first biographical history to examine an entire provincial bench, it is also one of the first studies to offer an internal view of the political nature of the judicial appointment process. Dale Brawn has penned the biographies of the first thirty-three men appointed to Manitoba's Court of Queen's Bench. The relative youth of Manitoba as a province and the small size of its legal profession makes possible an exceptionally detailed investigation of the background of those appointed to the province's highest trial court.The biographical data that Brawn has collected for this book highlights the extent to which judicial candidates underwent a socialization process designed to produce a legal elite whose members shared remarkably similar views and ways of thinking. In addition, these biographies suggest that until at least 1950, seats on provincial benches were rewards for political services rendered. Many lawyers became judges not because of their legal ability, but because they had made themselves known in the communities in which they practiced. This fascinating study offers an intimate look at personalities ranging from prime ministers to members of the bench and both senior levels of government.

The Court of Queen's Bench of Manitoba, 1870-1950: A Biographical History (Osgoode Society for Canadian Legal History)

Biographies & Memoirs

Historical

University of Toronto Press

Twisted tales of killers who almost got away with perfect murders. 
A man murders the first four infants he fathers with his lover, then tries again with a fifth. Two men have three things in common: each commits what seems like a perfect murder, each marries his victim’s wife far too soon, each has an overdue appointment with the gallows. A man cuts up the body of his victim into little pieces and gets away with the crime until he slaughters another neighbour six years later. Practically Perfect details the crimes of killers who very nearly got away with perfect murders, including the tale of Marie Beaulne, who laced her husband’s food with poison, only to be found out when a priest recalled someone else dying that way in his village. Each tale provides specific details on the planning of each murder, the events leading up to the discovery of the criminal, and the results of the trial, usually resulting in an execution.

Practically Perfect: Killers Who Got Away with Murder ... for a While

True Crime

Dundurn Press

Practically Perfect: Killers Who Got Away with Murder ... for a While [large print edition]

ReadHowYouWant

Every Stone a Story is a collection of stories gleaned from Manitoba';s buried history. Each is illustrated with a photograph of a headstone and each describes the life, death and/or experiences of someone buried in a particular cemetery. The stories are often about the famous or infamous, but equally often they are about people little known outside their communities, but who have done something extraordinary. The stories are grouped according to their topics: politicians, artists, andsportsmen and women, crimes and scandals, accidents and disasters, and pioneers.

Every Stone a Story: Manitoba's Buried History

Brawn, Charles

Great Plains Publications

EVERY STONE A STORY II contains more stories gleaned from Manitoba’s buried history. Illustrated with black and white photographs, each story describes the life, death, and experiences of someone buried in a particular cemetery. The stories are often about the famous or infamous, but equally often they are about people little known outside their communities, but who have done something extraordinary.

Every Stone a Story II: Manitoba's Buried History

Before capital punishment was abolished in 1962, more than 700 men and women were executed by hanging in Canada. Last Moments shines a light into a dark corner of a long and painful part of Canadian history that threatens to re-emerge. Here are dramatic stories of the characters whose finals moments and last words were tragic, unpredictable, poignant, eccentric and often bizarre:* The principal object of curiosity at executions, apart from the person about to die, was the executioner; before Confederation, these individuals were often recruited from among the condemned, and they were given two options -- kill or be killed* A Yukon execution was delayed because freezing spectators, tired of waiting in the cold, used the wooden trapdoor of the gallows to build a fire* When Cordelia Viau and her lover, Sam Parslow, were hanged back to back for the murder of Viau's husband, they were separated by a screen to prevent them from offering comfort to one another* George Dowie from PEI didn t believe in brief farewells; his final discourse was so long that officials brought an armchair onto the scaffold so he could sit while addressing the crowd* In 1938, the hangman at the Oakalla prison farm in BC set a grisly, unofficial speed record when he pinioned, hooded, noosed and sprang the trap that sent a killer to his death -- all in five seconds* British Columbian Corky Vincent brawled with his executioner on the scaffold before onlookers leaped into the fray, overpowered him and held him on the trapdoor until he was dropped to his death* New Brunswick killer John Sullivan, overcome by emotion at the thought of saying his final goodbyes, begged his executioner to hang him earlier than scheduled.And so many more tantalizing and twisted tidbits...

Last Moments: Sentenced to Death in Canada

Politics & Social Sciences

Social Sciences

Quagmire Press

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Books by Brawn, Dale