Charron

The appellant was convicted of aggravated assault and uttering threats after beating the victim with a baseball bat.

He appealed, arguing the trial judge misapprehended the evidence, specifically regarding whether the victim's life was endangered.

The Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the appeal, affirming the stringent standard from R. v. Morrissey.

The Court held that to set aside a conviction, a misapprehension of evidence must go to the substance rather than detail, and must play an essential part in the reasoning process resulting in the conviction.

The respondent Attorney General of Quebec brought a motion to strike portions of the appellant's record and factum.

The Attorney General argued that certain material filed by the appellant during the leave to appeal application constituted fresh evidence that was not before the lower courts, and that a new constitutional argument under s. 121 of the Constitution Act, 1867 was improperly raised.

The Supreme Court of Canada granted the motion in part.

The Court struck the material from the record, finding it did not meet the test for fresh evidence as there was no due diligence and the evidence was not determinative.

However, the Court declined to strike the s. 121 argument, holding that it was relevant to the stated constitutional questions and should be determined by the Court.

In a federal reference concerning proposed civil marriage legislation, the Court held that Parliament had jurisdiction to define civil marriage as the lawful union of two persons, but not to legislate protections for religious officials in relation to solemnization, which falls within provincial authority.

The Court further held that extending civil marriage to same-sex couples was consistent with the Charter and that freedom of religion broadly protects religious officials from state compulsion to perform marriages contrary to their beliefs.

Exercising its residual discretion under the Supreme Court Act reference jurisdiction, the Court declined to answer whether the pre-existing opposite-sex requirement for civil marriage was Charter-compliant, given the government's legislative position, the reliance interests created by lower-court rulings, and the risk of legal confusion.

The appellant appealed his conviction for sexual assault.

The Supreme Court of Canada found that the trial judge misapprehended the DNA evidence by assuming the complainant's DNA was found on the inside of the appellant's trousers, a finding unsupported by the record.

As this misapprehension was central to the trial judge's finding of guilt, the appeal was allowed, the conviction vacated, and a new trial ordered.

The appellant appealed his convictions for dangerous driving causing bodily harm, driving while disqualified, and failing to stop at the scene of an accident.

The Supreme Court of Canada allowed the appeal and entered acquittals, holding that the frailties of the eyewitness identification evidence rendered the convictions unsafe.

Appeal from a declaration that a strip of land remained a public highway because a municipality had not complied with statutory requirements when confirming a road closing and later selling the land.

The court held the earlier by-law had effectively stopped up the highway and the later by-law merely corrected the description and confirmed that result, so s. 470(1) did not invalidate the road closing.

Although the municipality failed to comply with s. 487 when selling the stopped-up highway to the predecessor in title, the court had discretion to refuse declaratory relief and should have done so because of extensive delay.

The court further held that subsequent purchasers could rely on defences under the Limitations Act and the Land Titles Act.

The appeal was allowed and the underlying application dismissed.

An Indigenous band appealed from a summary judgment disposition concerning reserve lands sold in the 19th century without a lawful formal surrender.

The Court of Appeal held that there had been no surrender and that the claim was not barred by statutory limitation periods, but concluded that declaratory and possessory relief should nevertheless be refused.

The court applied public law discretion and equitable doctrines, emphasizing the band's historical acquiescence, the extraordinary delay in asserting the land claim, and the reliance of innocent third-party landowners who had held and developed the properties for generations.

The band was left to pursue its damages claims against the Crown.

In a child protection matter, the appellant father sought to appeal an order concerning interim care and custody after the Superior Court had dismissed his earlier appeal.

The Court of Appeal held that both the original order and the intervening appeal were interlocutory because they dealt only temporarily with custody of the child.

As a result, the proper appeal route was, with leave, to the Divisional Court rather than directly to the Court of Appeal.

The motion to quash was granted and no costs were awarded.

A foreign judgment creditor appealed the dismissal of a petition for a receiving order under the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act based on an unpaid Ohio civil judgment arising from a fatal boating collision.

The Court of Appeal held that the bankruptcy judge erred in treating the foreign plaintiffs as a single creditor and in requiring the petitioning creditor to exhaust other civil enforcement routes before invoking the bankruptcy regime.

The court found there were at least three creditors, substantial unpaid liabilities under a final foreign judgment, and evidence of suspicious asset transfers that made bankruptcy remedies appropriate.

The appeal was allowed, the debtor was adjudged bankrupt, and a trustee was appointed.

The appeal concerned whether weekly no-fault benefits paid under s. 13 of the pre-1994 Statutory Accident Benefits Schedule were deductible from an award of general damages in a motor vehicle personal injury action.

Applying the no-double-recovery approach from prior appellate authority, the court held that deductibility depends on whether the statutory benefit is akin to the same head of loss as the damages award.

The court concluded that s. 13 benefits are more akin to damages for loss of income than to general damages because they are weekly, age-linked, coordinated with income loss benefits, and directed at those prevented from seeking employment or education.

The appeal was allowed, the Divisional Court order was quashed, and the motions judge's order was restored.

Appeal from an order granting a combined suspended and conditional discharge from bankruptcy.

The court held that the rehabilitative purpose of the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act must be balanced against creditor interests and the integrity of the bankruptcy system.

A bankrupt who is dishonest, evasive, untruthful, fails to make full disclosure, or refuses to co-operate with the trustee is not entitled to a discharge on any terms.

The bankrupt's non-cooperation, misleading evidence concerning a family trust, unexplained office arrangements, inaccurate income disclosure, and post-bankruptcy business activity required refusal of discharge.

The appellant appealed convictions for theft and possession of stolen property, arguing that the trial judge failed to address weaknesses in the identification evidence, improperly relied on witness sincerity instead of reliability, and returned an unreasonable verdict.

The court held that, although brief, the trial reasons disclosed no such errors.

It further held that the verdict was supported not only by eyewitness identification but also by circumstantial evidence placing the appellant at the scene at the relevant time.

The appeal was dismissed.

The Crown appealed a conditional sentence imposed after convictions for four counts of trafficking in a substantial quantity of heroin.

The majority held that the sentencing judge gave excessive weight to the respondent's psychological condition and erred by treating treatment of that condition as central to rehabilitation absent evidence connecting it to the offences.

While the respondent's history of torture and resulting post-traumatic stress disorder justified some reduction from the usual range, a community-based sentence was held unavailable for this level of heroin trafficking.

The court allowed the appeal, set aside the conditional sentence and probation order, and substituted a six-year penitentiary sentence.

The intervenor's motion to introduce fresh evidence on electronic monitoring was dismissed.

The appellant appealed his conviction for abduction, his designation as a dangerous offender, and the indeterminate sentence imposed.

The court rejected arguments that the trial judge applied the wrong mens rea test under s. 281 of the Criminal Code or that the actus reus was incomplete because the child had not yet been taken to a location of control.

The court also upheld the dismissal of an abuse of process stay application in the dangerous offender proceeding and found the predicate offence qualified as a serious personal injury offence under s. 752(a)(ii).

Given the record of actual and attempted sexual incidents with young girls and medical evidence concerning treatment prospects, the dangerous offender designation and indeterminate sentence were affirmed.

Criminal appeal from convictions for impaired driving causing bodily harm and driving over the legal blood-alcohol limit, where identity of the driver was the only live issue.

The court held that the Crown's failure to preserve the vehicle for possible forensic testing breached the appellant's s. 7 disclosure rights and constituted an abuse of process under the lost-evidence framework in La, but did not justify a stay because the prejudice could be mitigated.

The trial judge nevertheless erred by preventing the defence from cross-examining on the consequences of the missing forensic evidence and by treating the absence of testing as irrelevant to reasonable doubt.

The convictions were set aside and a new trial ordered.

The appellant municipality sought to enforce Ontario's building code and development charge regime against a massive redevelopment project at a federally owned international airport operated under long-term leases.

The court held that the entire redevelopment, including terminals, runways, utilities, and air navigation facilities, fell within Parliament's exclusive jurisdiction over aeronautics and also formed part of a federal undertaking, such that provincial laws directly regulating building design, permits, and development charges were constitutionally inapplicable under interjurisdictional immunity.

The court further held that provincial land and property development legislation could not apply to the federal Crown's continuing property interest in leased airport lands.

Ancillary claims based on the ground lease, common law compensation, and refusal of fire services were rejected, with the municipality directed to pursue the statutory grant-in-lieu regime instead.

Appeal concerning whether a purchaser of residential rental premises from a mortgagee exercising a power of sale takes title subject to an existing tenancy agreement.

The court held that ss. 46 and 47 of the Mortgages Act were enacted to protect tenants from disruption caused by mortgage default and apply to a purchaser who obtains title through a power of sale transaction.

As a deemed landlord, the purchaser was bound by the tenant's lease, and those protections prevailed over any conflicting effect of s. 44 of the Land Titles Act.

The appeal was allowed, the Divisional Court order was set aside, and the matter was remitted for determination of the remaining grounds of appeal.

The appellant appealed the dismissal of an application for leave under s. 215 of the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act to commence an action against a trustee administering a court-approved proposal.

The Court of Appeal held that on a s. 215 motion the judge must only determine whether there is a factual basis for the claim and whether it discloses a cause of action, not finally decide the merits.

The motions judge erred by conclusively interpreting the proposal and the trustee's duties, thereby exceeding jurisdiction on the threshold application.

The court also declined to refuse leave on the basis that the appellant should have proceeded under s. 37 instead.

Leave to commence the action was granted.

The union appealed a Divisional Court decision quashing a labour arbitrator's award arising from layoffs following government funding cuts to municipal homes for the aged.

The Court of Appeal held that the applicable standard of review was patent unreasonableness and emphasized that a reviewing court must ask whether there is a rational basis for the arbitrator's interpretation, not search for the correct interpretation.

The arbitrator's reading of the collective agreement, treating the specific layoff clause as limiting the general management rights clause, was one the agreement could reasonably bear.

The court further held that economic hardship caused by funding reductions could not justify rewriting the parties' negotiated allocation of risk.

The appeal was allowed, the Divisional Court order set aside, and the arbitrator's award restored.

The appellant appealed convictions for sexual assault and sexual touching involving a 12-year-old complainant arising from a single alleged incident.

The Court of Appeal held that the trial judge made several errors in evaluating credibility in a case turning centrally on whether the allegation was true or fabricated to explain romantic and sexual fantasy writings discovered by the complainant’s mother.

The court found error in the unsupported inference concerning the appellant’s alleged sterility, concern over the treatment of the medical evidence and defence theory, failure to address a significant prior inconsistent statement, and a misapprehension of comparative evidence about the events when the mother returned home.

The cumulative effect of those errors undermined confidence in the verdict and required a new trial.