What is the case law in which the US Supreme Court has ruled that a delay in bringing criminal charges against the accused is a violation of fundamental conceptions of justice?

Alberta, Canada


The following excerpt is from R. v. Cameron, 1985 CanLII 1236 (AB QB):

Dubin J.A. stated as follows at pp. 544-45: Mr. Justice Marshall, however, went on to stress the caution which must be exercised before it can be said that delay in the institution of the proceedings violates fundamental conceptions of justice. He advanced many reasons for doing so, of which I set forth below only a few from his judgment, which I think are apt. He commenced this analysis as follows at pp. 790-2: “It requires no extended argument to establish that prosecutors do not deviate from “fundamental conceptions of justice” when they defer seeking indictments until they have probable cause to believe an accused is guilty; indeed it is unprofessional conduct for a prosecutor to recommend an indictment on less than probable cause. It should be equally obvious that prosecutors are under no duty to file charges as soon as probable cause exists but before they are satisfied they will be able to establish the suspect’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. To impose such a duty ‘would have a deleterious effect both upon the rights of the accused and upon the ability of society to protect itself.’ United States v. Ewell, supra, at 120. From the perspective of potential defendants, requiring prosecutions to commence when probable cause is established is undesirable because it would increase the likelihood of unwarranted charges being filed, and would add to the time during which defendants stand accused but untried. These costs are by no means insubstantial since, as we recognized in Marion, a formal accusation may ‘interfere with the defendant’s liberty … disrupt his employment, drain his financial resources, curtail his associations, subject him to public obloquy, and create anxiety in him, his family and his friends,’ 404 U.S., at 320. From the perspective of law enforcement officials, a requirement of immediate prosecution upon probable cause is equally unacceptable because it could make obtaining proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt impossible by causing potentially fruitful sources of information to evaporate before they are fully exploited. And from the standpoint of the courts, such a requirement is unwise because it would cause scarce resources to be consumed on cases that prove to be insubstantial, or that involve only some of the responsible parties or some of the criminal acts. Thus, no one’s interests would be well served by compelling prosecutors to initiate prosecutions as soon as they are legally entitled to do so.” [The italics are Dubin J.A.’s.]

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