Section 132 — Youth Criminal Justice Act: Exclusion from hearing

Subject to subsection (2), a court or justice before whom proceedings are carried out under this Act may exclude any person from all or part of the proceedings if the court or justice considers that the person’s presence is unnecessary to the conduct of the proceedings and the court or justice is of the opinion that any evidence or information presented to the court or justice would be seriously injurious or seriously prejudicial to the young person who is being dealt with in the proceedings, a child or young person who is a witness in the proceedings, or a child or young person who is aggrieved by or the victim of the offence charged in the proceedings; or it would be in the interest of public morals, the maintenance of order or the proper administration of justice to exclude any or all members of the public from the court room. Subject to section 650 (accused to be present) of the Criminal Code and except if it is necessary for the purposes of subsection 34(9) (nondisclosure of medical or psychological report) of this Act, a court or justice may not, under subsection (1), exclude from proceedings under this Act the prosecutor; the young person who is being dealt with in the proceedings, the counsel or a parent of the young person or any adult assisting the young person under subsection 25(7); the provincial director or his or her agent; or the youth worker to whom the young person’s case has been assigned. A youth justice court, after it has found a young person guilty of an offence, or a youth justice court or a review board, during a review, may, in its discretion, exclude from the court or from a hearing of the review board any person other than the following, when it is being presented with information the knowledge of which might, in its opinion, be seriously injurious or seriously prejudicial to the young person: the young person or his or her counsel; the provincial director or his or her agent; the youth worker to whom the young person’s case has been assigned; and the Attorney General. The exception set out in paragraph (3)(a) is subject to subsection 34(9) (nondisclosure of medical or psychological report) of this Act and section 650 (accused to be present) of the Criminal Code .