David Paul Finley

The appellant appealed his convictions for careless storage of a firearm and his sentence of 12 months' imprisonment and a five-year weapons prohibition.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the conviction appeal, finding the trial judge properly instructed the jury on the marked departure standard of care.

The sentence appeal was allowed, as the trial judge erred in treating rehabilitative prospects as a neutral factor and failed to explain why consecutive sentences were justified.

The sentence was varied to time served and the prohibition order was reduced to two years.

The appellant appealed his conviction and sentence for homicide, arguing the trial judge erred in admitting evidence of a witness's guilty plea to manslaughter, refusing to put self-defence to the jury, and admitting a prior statement as a threat.

The Court of Appeal found no error in the trial judge's evidentiary rulings or jury instructions, noting there was no air of reality to the self-defence claim.

The court also upheld the 12-year parole ineligibility period, finding it was not manifestly unreasonable.

The appellant appealed convictions for sexual assault and sexual interference involving historic intrafamilial abuse, arguing that the trial judge's reasons were inadequate and that the credibility analysis failed to address contradictions and frailties in the complainant's evidence.

The court held that the trial judge was alive to the complainant's psychiatric history, substance abuse, delayed disclosure, and conflicts with other witnesses, and properly differentiated between allegations that lacked confirmation and those that had some independent support.

The court further held that a partial admission to the complainant's mother was capable of providing confirmatory support, while other corroborative details were given only slight weight.

The appeal was dismissed.

The appellant abandoned his conviction appeal and sought leave to appeal his sentence of one year for fraud and forgery plus three years probation.

He requested a variation to an intermittent sentence of 90 days to allow him to earn money for restitution.

The Court of Appeal found the sentence imposed by the trial judge was within the range and not unfit, and dismissed the appeal.

The appellants were convicted of second degree murder following a fatal beating.

On appeal, they argued that the trial judge made errors in his charge to the jury.

The Court of Appeal found that the trial judge misapprehended evidence regarding a statement allegedly made by one appellant, which was crucial to determining his intent.

For the other appellant, the trial judge failed to properly instruct the jury on how to apply the concept of reasonable doubt to his exculpatory statements and to eyewitness identification evidence that excluded him as the primary attacker.

The appeals were allowed, the convictions quashed, and a new trial ordered.

The appellant was convicted of careless storage of a firearm and ammunition after police, assisting sheriff's officers with an eviction, opened gun cases found in the apartment without a warrant.

The summary conviction appeal court upheld the convictions.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal found that the appellant retained a reasonable expectation of privacy in his home and belongings despite the eviction order.

The court held that the police breached s. 8 of the Charter by opening the gun cases without a warrant or exigent circumstances.

Applying the Grant framework, the court excluded the evidence under s. 24(2) of the Charter, allowed the appeal, and entered acquittals.

The appellants were convicted of first degree murder after the Crown alleged the wife hired her co-accused to kill her husband.

On appeal, the wife argued the trial judge erred by permitting the Crown to cross-examine its own witness at large after declaring her adverse under s. 9(1) of the Canada Evidence Act, without instructing the jury that the witness's lack of credibility could not be used to infer the accused were not credible or guilty.

The co-accused argued the trial judge erred in refusing to sever his trial, exposing him to highly prejudicial hearsay evidence admissible only against the wife.

The Court of Appeal allowed both appeals, finding the lack of a limiting instruction regarding the adverse witness amounted to misdirection, and the refusal to sever the trial resulted in an injustice.

Separate new trials were ordered.

The appellant was convicted of manslaughter following a second trial for a 1985 shooting outside an after-hours club.

He appealed his conviction, arguing the trial judge erred by failing to correct Crown counsel's closing submissions regarding his failure to retreat and his alleged lack of fear.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding that the trial judge's instructions on self-defence were adequate and that the jury was not misled by the Crown's submissions.

The appellant was convicted of refusing to comply with a roadside demand for a breath sample.

At trial, she testified that a panic attack prevented her from providing a sample.

The trial judge rejected her evidence, relying on her failure to mention the panic attack to the officer at the roadside and on inconsistent statements she made before being advised of her right to counsel.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal and ordered a new trial, holding that the trial judge erred by using pre-counsel roadside statements to impeach the appellant's credibility and by using her pre-trial silence to draw adverse inferences against her.

The appellant was convicted of first degree murder for the killing of a police officer.

On appeal, he argued that the trial judge misdirected the jury regarding expert psychiatric evidence and that the Crown engaged in illegal jury vetting by seeking police officers' opinions on potential jurors.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding that the jury instructions correctly explained how to weigh expert opinions based on hearsay without shifting the burden of proof.

The Court also held that the jury vetting process did not give the Crown an unfair advantage or create an appearance of bias, as the police opinions were not drawn from databases and the Crown had no obligation to disclose them.

The appellant appealed his convictions and total sentence of 14.5 years for sexually assaulting his two daughters, obstructing justice, and breaching an undertaking.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the conviction appeal, finding no error in the trial judge's jury instructions on credibility.

The sentence appeal was largely dismissed, as the severe sentence was justified by the appellant's persistent, degrading abuse and gross breach of trust.

However, the court varied a 9-year concurrent sentence for assault to one year concurrent, as the original sentence was illegal.

The appellant appealed his nine-year sentence for robbery and attempted robbery using an imitation firearm and disguise.

He argued the sentence overemphasized his dated record and failed to account for the totality and gap principles.

The Court of Appeal agreed, finding the sentencing judge failed to properly account for an effective ten-year gap between the appellant's prior robbery convictions and the present offences.

Leave to appeal was granted, and the total sentence was reduced to seven years.

The appellant appealed his conviction for break, enter, and theft of coins, arguing the trial judge misapprehended evidence regarding coin roll papers found in his motel room.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no evidence in the record to support the alleged misapprehension.

Furthermore, the Court held that even if an error occurred, the overwhelming evidence of guilt, including eyewitness testimony and the appellant's unexplained possession of the stolen coins, rendered the verdict safe.

The appellant appealed his convictions for discharging a firearm with intent to wound and related offences, as well as his global sentence of 7 years.

He argued that the trial judge erred in denying a stay of proceedings under s. 11(b) of the Charter for unreasonable delay, and that the trial judge misapprehended evidence.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the conviction appeal, finding that the 27-month delay was largely attributable to the appellant's changes in counsel and scheduling conflicts, not the Crown.

The court also found no misapprehension of evidence.

The sentence appeal was dismissed, with the court finding no error in the application of the Kienapple principle and concluding the sentence was fit.

The appellant appealed his sentence, arguing that the trial judge improperly applied the totality principle by imposing an additional 2 years consecutive for drug-related offences on top of a minimum 5-year sentence for a weapons charge.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding that the trial judge was alive to the totality principle and that the total sentence of 7 years was not demonstrably unfit.

The appellant was convicted of first-degree murder following a trial where the cause of death and similar fact evidence were central issues.

The Crown alleged the appellant killed his partner during a contraband liquor deal, while the defence argued the death was accidental due to commotio cordis.

The Court of Appeal found the trial judge misdirected the jury by misstating expert evidence regarding carbon monoxide and confusing medical diagnosis with legal causation.

The trial judge also erred in admitting the entirety of a fictitious 'Mr. Big' murder plot as similar fact evidence, as it lacked sufficient distinctiveness and was highly prejudicial.

The appeal was allowed and a new trial ordered.

The appellant appealed his conviction for second degree murder and his sentence of life imprisonment with a 14-year parole ineligibility period.

He argued the trial judge erred in instructing the jury on intoxication, capacity to form intent, after-the-fact conduct, and provocation.

The Court of Appeal found the jury instructions were adequate and that the trial judge properly related the evidence to the issues of intent and foreseeability.

The court also upheld the 14-year parole ineligibility period as not clearly unreasonable.

The appeal was dismissed.

The appellant shot and killed his ex-girlfriend before shooting himself in the head, resulting in a severe brain injury and retrograde amnesia.

At trial, he argued that his inability to remember the events surrounding the homicide rendered him unfit to stand trial and violated his right to make full answer and defence.

The trial judge dismissed these applications, and he was convicted of second degree murder.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, holding that testimonial competence is not a condition precedent to fitness to stand trial, and that amnesia alone does not render an accused unfit or justify a stay of proceedings.

The appellant was convicted of first degree murder.

The Crown's case relied heavily on the testimony of the deceased's wife, with whom the appellant was having an affair, who claimed the appellant confessed to the murder.

The appellant appealed his conviction on several grounds, including the trial judge's instructions on forensic testing, the admission of intercepted phone calls, the admission of video re-enactments and lay opinion evidence, the adequacy of the Vetrovec warning, and instructions on after-the-fact conduct.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no reversible errors in the trial judge's rulings or jury instructions.

The appellant appealed his global sentence of ten years for trafficking in firearms and hard drugs while on bail.

The Crown conceded the trial judge erred in stating the appellant pled guilty to nine firearm trafficking offences, when he only pled to four.

Considering this error, the appellant's age, and fresh evidence of his progress in the institution, the Court of Appeal found the ten-year sentence too long.

The Court reduced the global sentence to eight years, imposing two years concurrent on the drug and gun trafficking charges (accounting for four years pre-trial custody credit), while leaving the consecutive sentences for breach of recognizance unchanged.