How To Cite the Criminal Code of Canada

Dec 26, 2020


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Citation is one of the most important things while writing any research paper or using any important lines or issues from others' creations. It ensures your solid acknowledgment to the actual writer of your used writings or concepts.


Criminal code citation needs while using criminal codes for your own purpose with proper validation. This article discusses how to cite the criminal code of Canada properly.



Criminal Law of Canada


Every state or country comprises specific laws and regulations. Canada is not an exception, and several laws are here for different purposes.


Canada's Criminal Law is one of the sections where all the important laws regarding criminal activities are established. Canada's two specific cities get considered the offices for criminal laws- one in Manitoba and Winnipeg.



How To Cite the Criminal Code of Canada


Citing the criminal codes of Canada often seems very difficult for many people. Here you will get a clear idea of how to cite Canada's criminal code accurately.



Legislation Citation


In order to cite legislation from Canadian Law, you must include the following things:




  • Full Name of the legislation act you are citing (italic form)

  • Relevant jurisdiction and volume in its form of abbreviation

  • Chapter number

  • Year

  • Revised statutes(if any)

  • Subsections(optional or to be more specific)


An example of legislation citation and its explanation can make your understanding more clear.


Example: Criminal Code, RSC 1985, c C-46, s 163(1)(b).




  • Here, "Criminal Code" symbolizes the Name of the legislation act of Canadian Law.

  • RS represents the statutes of the volume in which R is revised statutes of the act. That means, if a law or legislation act gets changed or re-edited, it cites as revised statutes. But if the case happens when the act is no longer changed, it would be cited as just S(statutes).

  • Then comes C, which describes the jurisdiction of the legislation. It has previously been mentioned that the volume and jurisdiction of any act or Law must be used in their abbreviated forms while citing. So, here, the jurisdiction in Canada, which gets represented by C. Similarly, if the jurisdiction is different from Canada and if it is British Columbia, the citation would be BC.

  • 1985 refers to the year when the act is published or dated, or established. It is a very important part of legislation citation as well as any kind of citation style.

  • Finally, we get c C-46, where the small c represents the chapter itself, and the capital C indicates that the act or the legislation starts with the letter C and at last 46 is the page number where the act is written.

  • Further, there is a part that is often optional, and you can use this for being very specific in a citation. The part is using subsections of the act representing by the smalls.


Court Cases Citation


Corresponding to the legislation citation, the court case citation also possesses some obvious parts, such as:




  • Name of the parties(in short form according to the need) in italic form.

  • Neutral citation including the year, the court name in abbreviation, and the number of the act.


Example: CCH Canadian Ltd v Law Society of Upper Canada, 2004, SCC, 13.




  • Here in the mentioned citation, CCH Canadian Ltd v Law Society of Upper Canada represents the Name of the two parties of a criminal case. The parties are CCH Canadian Limited and Law Society of Upper Canada.

  • The rest parts of the citation get considered as the neutral citation, where 2004 is the year when the decision or the act has been made. SCC indicates The Supreme Court of Canada under which the act is issued. Finally, 13 is the number of the act or the case.


The citation process for criminal cases with and without neutral citation is slightly different from each other. Here goes an example of criminal case citation without neutral citation:


R v Landry, [1986] 1 SCR 145.




  • R represents rex(the king) or the Regina(the queen), which is a criminal case. Landry is the last section of the Name of the convicted person. Notably, no punctuation is needed between these two names.

  • The official reports or the reporter is described by SCR, which is Supreme Court Reports.

  • 1986 is the publication year of the criminal case.

  • 1 is the indicator that the case starts with this first printed version in the volume during the mentioned year.

  • 145 is the page number from where the case starts to be written.


Conclusion


So, finally, you have learned how to cite the criminal code of Canada. Following the mentioned processes, you can write or cite any legislation and criminal codes of Canada accurately. Each and every part of the citation plays a very significant and equally important role.


So be careful while citing a case that all the parts are written properly with the punctuation marks where necessary.