The accused was convicted of sexual offences.
Prior to sentencing, the defence brought an application to exclude or redact portions of the victim impact statements sought to be introduced by the Crown, arguing they contained irrelevant and inflammatory information.
The court declined to order the statements redacted or rewritten, finding that doing so would be insensitive and unnecessary.
Instead, relying on s. 722(8) of the Criminal Code, the court admitted the statements in their entirety but explicitly directed that it would disregard any inadmissible or irrelevant portions, such as facts not in evidence, requests for specific sanctions, and criticisms of the offender.
