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Articles on Gerald Butts

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Former SNC-Lavalin CEO Pierre Duhaime leaves a courtroom in Montreal in February 2019. Duhaime pleaded guilty in a bribe scandal around the construction of a $1.3-billion Montreal hospital. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Paul Chiasson

SNC-Lavalin: Deferred prosecution deals aren’t get-out-of-jail free cards

The SNC-Lavalin controversy has resulted in some misunderstandings and misinterpretations of the legal mechanism at its heart: Deferred prosecution agreements.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau holds a news conference in Ottawa to respond to allegations his office pressured former attorney general Jody Wilson-Raybould in the SNC-Lavalin affair. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Fred Chartrand

SNC-Lavalin & the need for fresh thinking around independence and interference

The prospect of political interference is at the heart of the SNC-Lavalin controversy. But it raises more issues related to identifying and preventing inappropriate interference.
Is the SNC-Lavalin controversy truly a political scandal? If so, it’s unlike any we’ve seen before in Canada. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is seen here in January 2019 with Jody Wilson-Raybould after she was shuffled out of her job as attorney general. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick

Is the SNC-Lavalin controversy truly a scandal?

A standard political scandal involves a person who did something wrong out of negligence or motivations of money, personal ambition, sex, etc. But the SNC-Lavalin affair so far lacks those elements.
Gerald Butts, principal secretary to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, is seen on April 20, 2018. Butts resigned amid allegations that the Prime Minister’s Office interfered to prevent a criminal prosecution of SNC-Lavalin. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darren Calabrese

The SNC-Lavalin affair and the politics of prosecution

The SNC-Lavalin affair raises fundamental questions about how decisions to prosecute are made, and what role elected politicians should have in that process – if any at all.

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