INTRODUCTION

Law or rules can be defined and assessed in a variety of ways, but is more commonly known to us, the judiciary, “as the rules that society is bound to obey.”[1] These so-called “rules” or laws include government-made rules called “legislation” and judge-made rules called “Common Law” that are respected and enforced by our governments and our courts. Whether we speak in terms of Civil or Common Law traditions, certain characteristics can generally be said to apply to each in a common manner. These characteristics describe laws as being general and impersonal, obligatory, coercive and non retroactive.[2] We may attempt to summarize this notion by stating that law, no matter its origin, applies equally to each and every individual or citizen in a given society at a given time. Seemingly easy to understand, we must not fool ourselves to think that law is simple by nature. It is filled with nuances, definitions, interpretations, jurisdictions that often warrant separate applications to different people, thus challenging the very foundation of the above mentioned guiding principles. One legal principle that seems to fall within this general predicament is that of retribution and compensation. The idea is that when an individual or entity causes harm or damage to another, the former is obliged to restitute and compensate the latter for the damages that were caused. For example, in civil law, article 1457 of the Quebec Civil Code[3] states clearly that “where he is endowed with reason and fails in this duty, he is responsible for any injury he causes to another person by such fault and is liable to reparation for the injury…” More precisely stated in Common Law, “damages for any tort are or ought to be fixed at a sum which will compensate the plaintiff so far as money can do it, for all the injury he has suffered.”[4] The design here is simple and