David John Beaton

The Crown brought a motion to summarily dismiss the accused's Charter application, which alleged violations of sections 8, 9, and 10(a) and (b) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Applying the "manifestly frivolous" standard established in R. v. Haevischer, the court found that none of the accused's Charter arguments were manifestly frivolous.

The motion to dismiss was denied, and the Charter application was allowed to proceed to a voir dire at trial.

The judge also provided observations on the efficiency and procedural considerations of such summary dismissal motions.

The accused was convicted of sexually assaulting a sleeping 16-year-old complainant while the accused was 19 years old.

The assault occurred when the accused, after consuming alcohol, entered a bedroom where the complainant was sleeping and engaged in non-consensual sexual intercourse with her.

The complainant awoke in pain and, frozen with fear, eventually escaped to another room.

The accused was identified through DNA evidence (saliva on the complainant's breast).

At sentencing, the Crown sought incarceration while the defence sought a conditional sentence.

The court imposed an 18-month conditional sentence with strict house arrest for the first six months, followed by graduated curfews, and a 12-month probation order with ancillary orders including a 10-year weapons prohibition, DNA order, and 10-year sex offender registration.

The accused, Delores Harper, was charged with theft of a house trailer, mischief to the trailer, and possession of property obtained by crime.

The Crown alleged she pretended to buy the trailer, then removed it, cut its tow tongue, and placed it on her property.

The accused claimed she honestly purchased the trailer from a Crown witness who misrepresented himself as the owner.

The court rejected the accused's testimony, finding her evidence incredible and inconsistent, partly due to a criminal record for dishonesty.

The court found the accused guilty of theft (value not exceeding $5000), mischief (value not exceeding $5000), and possession of property obtained by crime (value not exceeding $5000).

The possession charge was conditionally stayed under the Kienapple principle.

The accused was charged with sexually assaulting a complainant on April 3, 2015, contrary to section 271 of the Criminal Code.

The complainant was unable to identify her assailant as the assault occurred in darkness and she kept her eyes closed.

The defence raised issues of identity and continuity of forensic evidence.

DNA evidence from a sexual assault kit, collected from the complainant's body, was matched to the accused with a probability of 1 in 110 quadrillion.

Circumstantial evidence placed the accused in the bedroom where the assault occurred.

The court admitted the forensic evidence despite the defence challenge to its continuity and convicted the accused based on the overwhelming evidence.

During a jury trial for attempted murder, the trial judge ruled on two issues regarding jury instructions.

First, the judge held that the Crown's cross-examination of the accused regarding his failure to mention self-defence to police violated his right to silence.

The judge instructed the jury to disregard that portion of the cross-examination.

Second, the judge ruled that because the indictment for attempted murder was drafted simpliciter, there were no lesser and included offences to leave with the jury.

The Crown brought a Khan application to admit an audio/visual statement from a witness, Hailey Saikkonen, as substantive evidence after she testified that her memory of the incident was based on prior statements.

The defence conceded necessity due to the witness's lack of memory, leaving threshold reliability as the sole issue.

The court found both procedural and substantive reliability were established, noting the statement was given to police shortly after the incident without prompting, and the witness would be available for cross-examination.

The application was granted, allowing the statement to be used as substantive evidence by the jury.

The accused, Kaitlyn Trudeau, facing charges including aggravated assault, brought an application to introduce bad character evidence against two complainants, Vern Otosquaiob and Robert Travis Wemigwans, to support a self-defence claim.

The application sought to admit evidence of their propensity for violence.

The court granted the application in part, allowing evidence of Otosquaiob's known propensity for violence and Wemigwans' unknown propensity based on his extensive criminal record, but excluded reference to Wemigwans' pending murder charge due to its prejudicial effect outweighing its probative value.