''Scales of Justice'' was a Canadian series of

docudrama Docudrama (or documentary drama) is a genre of television and film, which features dramatized re-enactments of actual events. It is described as a hybrid of documentary and drama and "a fact-based representation of real event". Docudramas typic ...

television films, which aired on

CBC Television CBC Television (also known as CBC TV) is a Canadian English-language broadcast television network owned by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, the national public broadcaster. The network began operations on September 6, 1952. Its French-l ...

between 1991 and 1995. Based on an earlier CBC Radio series of the same name, the films dramatized notable Canadian court cases, with actors reenacting the real-life events of the trial. The series was produced by

George Jonas George Jonas, CM (June 15, 1935 – January 10, 2016) was a Hungarian-born Canadian writer, poet, and journalist. A self-described classical liberal, he authored 16 books, including the bestseller '' Vengeance'' (1984), the story of an Israeli ...

, with lawyer

Edward Greenspan Edward Leonard Greenspan, (February 28, 1944December 24, 2014) was one of Canada's most famous defence lawyers, and a prolific author of legal volumes. His fame was owed to numerous high-profile clients and to his national exposure on the Canad ...

involved in the production as narrator and legal consultant, while episodes were co-written by Jonas with a variety of collaborators and directed by a variety of Canadian filmmakers. Episodes of the series were either one hour or two hours, depending on the complexity of the case being depicted. The series was cancelled in 1995.

Controversy

Robert Stewart, whose trial had been depicted in a 1991 episode, sued Greenspan and the CBC in 1996 for purportedly violating his obligations of loyalty and confidentiality, as Greenspan had been directly involved in Stewart's appeal of his original conviction. During the case, Stewart claimed that the episode had damaged his reputation in the community where he now lived, as he felt that the episode depicted him as a callous murderer rather than a man who was simply caught up in an accident, while the producers testified that the episode had been Jonas's idea and Greenspan had actually opposed it on the grounds that it would create an appearance of

conflict of interest A conflict of interest (COI) is a situation in which a person or organization is involved in multiple interests, financial or otherwise, and serving one interest could involve working against another. Typically, this relates to situations i ...

for him, and that he had actually intervened to make the original script ''more'' fair to Stewart's perspective once it became clear that Jonas was still going to proceed. Justice John Macdonald dismissed the suit against the CBC in April 1996 on the grounds that Stewart had failed to show culpability on the network's part. He later found Greenspan liable for breach of trust, but ordered Greenspan to pay just $5,750 in restitution rather than the $77,000 demanded by Stewart in his original suit; however, after Stewart demanded additional damages of over $200,000, Macdonald subsequently also ruled that Stewart's claim of deliberate malfeasance on Greenspan's part was unmeritorious, calling it a reasonable error in judgement, and ordered Stewart to pay court costs to Greenspan as well. Greenspan subsequently waived the claim to costs, on condition that Stewart release a statement renouncing his prior claims that Greenspan had acted improperly.

Cyril Belshaw Cyril Shirley Belshaw (3 December 1921 – 20 November 2018) was a New Zealand-born Canadian Anthropologist and was professor of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia (UBC) from 1953 until his retirement in 1987. Belshaw attended New ...

, whose murder trial was depicted in a 1994 film, also criticized his episode for purportedly not being unequivocal enough about his innocence.John Colebourn, "CBC show upsets Belshaw". '' The Province'', November 1, 1994.

Episodes

Awards

References

External links

*{{imdb title, 0695381 1990s Canadian anthology television series 1990s Canadian drama television series 1991 Canadian television series debuts 1995 Canadian television series endings CBC Television original programming Canadian film series Canadian legal television series