The defendant was charged with multiple criminal and provincial offences including impaired driving, driving while under suspension, and taking a motor vehicle without consent.
Prior to trial, the court was asked to determine whether the alleged common-law spouse of the defendant was a competent and compellable witness for the Crown.
The court found that the parties were in a common-law relationship and extended the spousal non-compellability rule to common-law couples, finding that the existing common-law rule was discriminatory and inconsistent with modern Charter values.
The court granted a common-law remedy extending the non-compellability aspect of the spousal immunity rule to common-law couples without requiring a formal constitutional challenge.
