R. v.
McLaughlin
citation(s): (1979) 19 A.R. 368 (Alta. C.A.); [1980] 2 S.C.R. 331
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R. v.
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by Donald M Cameron, Aird & Berlis
In 1980, the Supreme Court of Canada held that the unauthorized use of a computer facility did not constitute 'theft" of telecommunications facilities.
In early 1977, Michael McLaughlin made use of a computer owned and operated by the University of Alberta. The university's computer had about three hundred terminals located in and around the campus, connected to the central processing unit by coaxial cable and telephone lines. Mr. McLaughlin used one such terminal to use the computer's central processing unit without authorization.
Michael McLaughlin was charged with theft contrary to s.287(1)(b) of the Criminal Code for "fraudulently and without colour of right" using a "telecommunication facility".
Mr. McLaughlin was convicted of theft at trial. The trial judge considered that the central processing unit computer, the memory, the printers and the terminals constituted a telecommunications facility.
The Alberta Court of Appeal held that the accent of the computer facility was on computing and calculation and that the relay or communication aspect was only incidental and allowed the appeal.
The Supreme Court of Canada agreed with the finding of the Alberta Court of Appeal that the university computer facility was not a "telecommunications facility" and that Mr. McLaughlin was not guilty of theft under s.387(1)(b).
Mr. Justice Estey, one of the panel of judges at the Supreme Court of Canada, invited Parliament to amend the Criminal Code at page 341 of the reported decision:
"Had Parliament intended to associate penal consequences with the unauthorized use of a computer, it no doubt would have done so in a section of the Criminal Code or other penal statute in which the term which is now so permanently embedded in our language is employed."
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