Anthony J. Does

The accused, Guy Coté, was charged with 57 property-related offences, primarily break and enter and mischief, stemming from a spree of unlawful entries into residential and commercial buildings where utility systems were disrupted.

The Crown withdrew several counts, and the trial proceeded on remaining counts related to 12 premises.

The court relied on circumstantial evidence, including video footage and similar act evidence, to establish identity and guilt.

The accused was found guilty on most counts, but acquitted on others where evidence was insufficient or the Crown conceded.

The defendants, Michael Buckley and Dwayne Young, were charged with first-degree murder in the death of Jonathan Wite.

They pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to manslaughter, which the Crown did not accept.

The trial proceeded to determine guilt for first-degree murder, second-degree murder, or manslaughter.

The court found that the Crown failed to prove first-degree or second-degree murder beyond a reasonable doubt, concluding that the incident was a "robbery gone wrong" rather than a planned murder.

Both defendants were found guilty of manslaughter based on common unlawful purpose and objective foreseeability of harm.

The accused was tried for murder arising from a point-blank shooting in a housing project parking area.

The central issue was identification, with the Crown relying on a purported recognition witness, cell phone location evidence, text messages, and alleged consciousness of guilt.

The court found the eyewitness evidence unreliable given the darkness, extremely brief and stressful observation, generic description, cross-racial identification concerns, and the witness's admitted difficulty distinguishing the accused from his brothers.

Applying the circumstantial evidence standard, the court held the after-the-fact conduct and utterances did not make guilt the only rational inference and also rejected party liability on the evidence.

The accused was acquitted.

The defendant was charged with operating a conveyance while impaired by alcohol and having 80 mg or more of alcohol in 100 ml of blood.

She brought a Charter application to exclude breath test evidence, alleging breaches of her s. 10(b) (right to counsel), s. 8 (search and seizure), and s. 9 (arbitrary detention) rights.

The defendant argued that the approved screening device demand was not made immediately, that she was not advised of her right to counsel during the delay caused by her chewing gum, and that her arrest was arbitrary.

The court found that the demand was made immediately, that the delay was too brief to require the officer to facilitate access to counsel, and that the defendant's Charter rights were not infringed.

The application was dismissed and the breath test evidence was admitted.

The defendant in a sexual assault case brought a motion for directions under s. 278.1 of the Criminal Code to determine the admissibility of Facebook messages exchanged with the complainant.

The court had to decide if the messages contained personal information for which the complainant had a reasonable expectation of privacy, making them presumptively inadmissible.

The court found that two of the three sets of messages met this definition, while one mundane chat did not.

The ruling clarified the factors for assessing privacy expectation, rejecting the relevance of the current adversarial relationship and broad policy implications at the initial definitional stage.

The defendant was convicted of aggravated assault following a road rage incident in which she pushed a 66-year-old victim, causing the victim to fall to the roadway and sustain a fractured pelvis and broken pubic bone.

The victim required hospitalization and convalescence, and suffered significant ongoing physical and emotional injuries.

The defendant was sentenced to six months in custody followed by two years' probation with mandatory counselling, a DNA order, a ten-year weapons prohibition, and a no-contact order with the victim.

During a criminal trial, a Crown witness failed to appear despite being served with a subpoena.

The Crown requested a material witness warrant under s. 705 of the Criminal Code.

The defence opposed, arguing the subpoena was invalidly issued by a court clerk without any inquiry into whether the witness had material evidence to give, as required by s. 698.

The court agreed with the defence, applying the framework from Dykstra v. Greensword, and held that issuing a subpoena without any case-specific inquiry exceeds the issuer's jurisdiction.

The subpoena was quashed and the request for a warrant was denied.

Five appellants were convicted of offences arising from a home invasion robbery.

The Crown's case alleged a planned robbery with violence, while the defence maintained the incident arose from a drug transaction that escalated when the victim produced a firearm.

The appellants appealed on grounds that the trial judge's conduct rendered the trial unfair, that jury selection instructions were inadequate, and that prior consistent statement instructions were deficient.

The Court of Appeal found that the trial judge's questioning of defence witnesses and extemporaneous comments during jury instructions created a cumulative appearance of bias toward the prosecution, seriously compromising the fairness of the trial.

The court allowed the appeal and ordered a new trial.