The appellant was convicted of first degree murder in the death of his former girlfriend.
He appealed on five grounds, all relating to errors in the trial judge's charge to the jury.
The Court of Appeal found that the trial judge erred in: (1) providing contradictory instructions on the relevance of post-offence conduct to planning and deliberation; (2) instructing the jury that post-offence conduct was relevant to the provocation defence when the parties had agreed it was not; (3) failing to include a separate box for the provocation defence in the decision tree, thereby conflating provocation with the mental element required for murder; and (4) failing to correct misstatements in the Crown's closing address.
The cumulative effect of these errors compromised the integrity of the verdict.
The appeal was allowed, the conviction of first degree murder was set aside, and a new trial was ordered on both counts.
