Angelo Veneziano

The court sentenced Ronald Joseph, a Toronto police officer, for his role as the architect of a multi-participant insurance fraud scheme involving staged vehicle thefts and accidents.

Joseph pleaded guilty to three counts of attempted fraud over $5,000 and one count of public mischief.

The court imposed a conditional sentence of two years less a day, to be served in the community, with house arrest, curfew, and GPS monitoring, reflecting the gravity of the offences, breach of public trust, and Joseph’s status as a police officer.

The decision reviews aggravating and mitigating factors, the principle of parity, and relevant case law.

Brendan Bananish pleaded guilty to aggravated assault, failure to comply with recognizance, and failure to comply with probation.

The Crown sought a Long-Term Offender (LTO) designation and an eight-year penitentiary sentence.

The defence opposed the LTO designation and sought a shorter sentence.

The court designated Bananish an LTO, imposed a global penitentiary sentence of seven years and three months (with 63 months credit for pre-sentence custody), and ordered an eight-year Long-Term Supervision Order, a lifetime weapons prohibition, and a DNA order.

The court considered Bananish's extensive criminal record, history of intimate partner violence, psychiatric diagnoses (antisocial personality disorder, schizophrenia, severe substance use disorder), and repeated breaches of court orders, while also acknowledging his Indigenous background and related systemic factors.

This criminal trial in the Ontario Court of Justice addresses two assault allegations against the accused, James Alfred Doan, stemming from an incident in an apartment building elevator during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The first allegation involved an intentional push of the complainant, Roxanne Wright, in the elevator, while the second concerned an alleged strike to her face.

The court applied the principles from R. v. W.(D.) to assess credibility, particularly where video evidence was available for one allegation but not the other.

The defence argued the de minimis non curat lex principle, which the court rejected, distinguishing the intentional push from incidental contact.

The court found the accused guilty of the intentional push in the elevator, relying on clear video evidence and the complainant's corroborated testimony.

However, due to numerous inconsistencies and reliability concerns in the complainant's testimony regarding the alleged face strike, for which no video evidence existed, the court found the accused not guilty of that charge, concluding that the Crown had not proven it beyond a reasonable doubt.