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Jeffry A. House (born December 29, 1946) is a retired lawyer who practiced in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He is best known for his efforts on behalf and representation of fugitive American soldiers and Indigenous protesters.
House represented American soldiers applying for refugee status in Canada after they deserted the American military during the Iraq War, including Jeremy Hinzman, Josh Key, Kyle Snyder, and Brandon Hughey. The cases of Jeremy Hinzman and Brandon Hughey were heard and rejected by the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, the Federal Court of Canada, and the Federal Court of Appeal, while the Supreme Court of Canada refused to hear the appeal. [1]
The presence of US Army deserters in Canada was widely reported in the international news media, as well as in Canada and in the United States. During the Vietnam War, upwards of 60,000 U.S. draft evaders and military deserters found refuge in Canada. [2]
House has represented Indigenous protesters involved in the Ipperwash Crisis in Ipperwash Provincial Park, Ontario in 1995, especially Nick Cottrelle and Warren George, with the matter ending in an acquittal of the accused.
Jeffry House grew up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. After a year as an exchange student in Norway, he graduated from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1969. House was drafted into the US Armed Forces during the Vietnam War. In January 1970, House evaded the military draft and moved to Canada.[ citation needed ]
House received a master's degree in Political Theory from York University and a Law Degree from the Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He practiced law for four decades. For six years, House served on the quasi-judicial tribunal enforcing the Ontario Human Rights Code. His decisions involve an early gay rights case in which spousal benefits were awarded to same sex partners (Clinton & Mercaz), and the Northwestern General Hospital case, where Crown disclosure obligation was held to apply in Human Rights cases.[ citation needed ]
In 1991, House was counsel on the Osborne decision in the Supreme Court of Canada which struck down the law which prevented public employees from participating in after-work political activities.
The Nuremberg principles are a set of guidelines for determining what constitutes a war crime. The document was created by the International Law Commission of the United Nations to codify the legal principles underlying the Nuremberg Trials of Nazi party members following World War II.
Conscription evasion or draft evasion is any successful attempt to elude a government-imposed obligation to serve in the military forces of one's nation. Sometimes draft evasion involves refusing to comply with the military draft laws of one's nation. Illegal draft evasion is said to have characterized every military conflict of the 20th and 21st centuries, in which at least one party of such conflict has enforced conscription. Such evasion is generally considered to be a criminal offense, and laws against it go back thousands of years.
Desertion is the abandonment of a military duty or post without permission and is done with the intention of not returning. This contrasts with unauthorized absence (UA) or absence without leave, which are temporary forms of absence.
Canada did not officially participate in the Vietnam War. However, it contributed to peacekeeping forces in 1973 to help enforce the Paris Peace Accords.
Jeremy Dean Hinzman is an Iraq War resister who was the first American deserter to seek refugee status in Canada.
The War Resisters Support Campaign (WRSC) is a Canadian non-profit community organization, founded in April 2004 in Toronto, Ontario to mobilize support among Canadians and worldwide to convince the Canadian government to offer sanctuary to all U.S. military personnel who wish to come to Canada because of their opposition to the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
Canadian immigration and refugee law concerns the area of law related to the admission of foreign nationals into Canada, their rights and responsibilities once admitted, and the conditions of their removal. The primary law on these matters is in the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, whose goals include economic growth, family reunification, and compliance with humanitarian treaties.
Kyle Snyder is a Private First Class and combat engineer with the 94th Engineers based at Fort Leonard Wood, who deserted his Army unit while on mid-tour leave from Iraq and fled to Canada. His application for refugee status in Canada was denied.
Joshua "Josh" Key is a United States Army deserter, who fled while on leave from the Iraq War, and is a current resident of Canada. He is the author, with Lawrence Hill, of The Deserter's Tale, a book chronicling his service in Iraq and his subsequent departure from military life.
Superior orders, also known as just following orders or the Nuremberg defense, is a plea in a court of law that a person, whether civilian, military or police, can be considered guilty of committing crimes ordered by a superior officer or official. It is regarded as a complement to command responsibility.
Robin Long is one of several U.S. Army deserters who sought asylum in Canada because of his opposition to the Iraq War and became the first of those to be deported to the United States after being rejected for refugee status. He was deported from Canada on July 15, 2008.
André Shepherd is a U.S. Army Specialist and deserter who applied for asylum in Germany on November 26, 2008. He is the first Iraq War veteran to pursue refugee status in Europe and only the second U.S. soldier to ever apply for refugee status in Germany.
Anne L. Mactavish is a Canadian jurist who is a judge of the Federal Court of Appeal.
Brian Paul Goodman was the Chairperson of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada (IRB).
During the Iraq War, which began with the 2003 invasion of Iraq, there were United States military personnel who refused to participate, or continue to participate, in that specific war. Their refusal meant that they faced the possibility of punishment in the United States according to Article 85 of the US Uniform Code of Military Justice. For that reason some of them chose to go to Canada as a place of refuge. The choice of these US Iraq War resisters to go to Canada has led to considerable debate in Canada's society, press, legal arenas, and political arenas. Much of the debate on this issue has been due to the controversial nature of the Iraq War itself. Among the many elements of that debate are Canada's relationship to the Iraq War, and Canada's relationship to the US, its largest trading partner.
A war resister is a person who resists war. The term can mean several things: resisting participation in all war, or a specific war, either before or after enlisting in, being inducted into, or being conscripted into a military force.
Kimberly Rivera is an Iraq War resister and former U.S. Army Private First Class who went AWOL in February 2007 after a year of service. She was the first female U.S. military deserter to flee to Canada. She was deported from Canada on September 20, 2012, and pleaded guilty to desertion, receiving a sentence of ten months' imprisonment and a bad-conduct discharge. Amnesty International objected to her detention and designated her a prisoner of conscience.
Vietnam War resisters in Canada were American draft evaders and military deserters who avoided serving in the Vietnam War by seeking political asylum in Canada between 1965 and 1975. Draft avoiders were typically college-educated and middle class Americans who could no longer avoid conscription. Deserters were usually lower-income and working class who had been inducted into the United States Armed Forces right after high school or had later volunteered.
Vietnam War resisters in Sweden were Americans who fled to Sweden to avoid service in the Vietnam War between 1967 and 1973. Among the roughly 1,000 American exiles were around 800 military deserters and draft dodgers. Unlike other nations like Canada that discreetly harbored Vietnam War resisters, the Swedish government granted war resisters asylum status and the public openly welcomed them. This unique acceptance and Swedish politicians' open protests against American involvement in the Vietnam War caused a rift in relations between the United States and Sweden.