B.C. Supreme Court amends procedures for pretrial conferences, insolvency proceedings

Law360 Canada (May 5, 2020, 12:21 PM EDT) -- Effective as of May 4 and during the remainder of the suspension of the court’s normal operations, pretrial conferences at the Supreme Court of British Columbia will be held by telephone for criminal cases where the trial was unable to proceed because of the suspension or is at risk of being adjourned because of indirect effects of the suspension.

According to the court’s press release, these COVID-19 pretrial conferences, or CV PTCs, have the specific purpose of advancing or resolving adjourned and at-risk cases as much as possible and appropriate. CV PTCs are mandatory for all criminal cases except for those cases that have been determined to be subject to Criminal Practice Direction 3: Complex Criminal Cases (CPD-3) and are in addition to regularly scheduled pretrial conferences. The judge conducting the CV PTC may be different than the assigned trial or case management judge.

The court said it has also modified its Request for Urgent Hearing – Insolvency process to remove the requirement to submit draft materials. Click here for the revised notice.