Thunder Bay – If you’ve ever sat through a morning docket at the Thunder Bay courthouse, you’ll have heard the litany: Remanded. Remanded. Remanded. It’s a chorus that plays daily across courtrooms in the city—a painful and public reminder that justice here is grinding slowly, often pointlessly, and with little faith that it serves the community, the victims, or even the accused.

Our local justice system is faltering—not just under the weight of caseloads, but under the gravity of its own inertia. Cases are being remanded dozens of times.

People are held for months, even years, in the crumbling Thunder Bay District Jail—often waiting for proceedings that lead to little more than procedural resolutions or plea deals.

For many, the process itself has become the punishment.

A System That Doesn’t Know When to Say No

There are also increasing questions around why some cases are in court at all.Minor breaches, technical infractions, or charges involving deeply complex mental health or addictions issues are being …