What is the effect of the common law requirement for corroboration on a witness?
Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada
The following excerpt is from R. v. Lokhmachev, 2001 NFCA 68 (CanLII):
In Vetrovec v. the Queen (1982), 1982 CanLII 20 (SCC), 67 C.C.C. (2d) 1 S.C.C., Dickson J. (as he then was), for the entire court, undertook a review of the common law requirement for corroboration and decided that it was time to simplify it. After a lengthy review of the law as it then existed in Canada and England, he wrote, at p. 17: I would hold that there is no special category for “accomplices”. An accomplice is to be treated like any other witness testifying at a criminal trial and the judge’s conduct, if he chooses to give his opinion, is governed by the general rules.
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