Gary Martin Chayko

The appellants, two First Nation individuals with no prior criminal records, appealed their sentences for obstructing police.

They were found guilty after a multi-day trial for interfering with a search warrant at an unlicensed cannabis store on a reserve.

The sentencing judge imposed a 90-day conditional sentence followed by two years' probation, exceeding the Crown's recommendation of a suspended sentence with 12 months' probation and a fine/community service.

Co-accused with criminal records who pleaded guilty received suspended sentences.

The appeal court found that the sentencing judge erred by failing to provide cogent reasons for exceeding the Crown's position, misapplying the principles of parity, restraint, and the sentencing of Indigenous and first offenders, and over-emphasizing denunciation and deterrence without considering the potential of a suspended sentence to achieve these goals.

The appeal was granted, and a suspended sentence with a one-year period of probation was imposed.

The offender pled guilty to aggravated assault against his intimate partner and assault against her young son and a doctor.

The unprovoked, drug-induced attack left the partner with severe, permanent brain damage, requiring full-time care for the rest of her life.

The court considered the profound impact on the victims, the children who witnessed the attack, and the Akwesasne community.

Finding numerous aggravating factors and acknowledging the extreme gravity of the offence, the court imposed the maximum sentence of 14 years for the aggravated assault, plus a consecutive one-year sentence for the assault on the child.

The accused was convicted of three counts of sexual assault against young female adult voice students.

The assaults occurred under the guise of 'healing sessions' and involved significant intimate physical contact, including digital penetration and oral sex, exploiting a position of trust as a teacher and quasi-therapist.

The Crown sought a global sentence of 5 years, while the defence proposed 2 years plus probation.

The court considered aggravating factors such as abuse of trust, the devastating impact on victims, and the accused's lack of remorse.

Mitigating factors included the accused's age (73 at sentencing) and lack of criminal record, though his age was given limited weight due to his vigor and the severity of the assaults.

The court imposed a global sentence of 4 years imprisonment, along with DNA order, lifetime SOIRA registration, and a 10-year weapons prohibition.

The appellant, a domestic traveler residing on Cornwall Island, appealed his conviction for hindering an officer and evading compliance under the Customs Act after failing to attend a secondary inspection at a mixed-traffic corridor border crossing.

The appellant argued the primary border services officer lacked reasonable grounds to suspect a contravention of the Act when making the referral based solely on an automated license plate 'lookout'.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the appeal, holding that the threshold for a search under s. 99(1)(f) of the Customs Act does not apply to a mere referral to secondary inspection, which is a routine part of the screening process.

The accused was tried on three counts of sexual assault arising from alleged sexual touching of young voice students during purported healing sessions conducted within a music studio setting.

The court found the complainants highly credible and rejected the accused's denial that any breast, genital, anal, or oral sexual touching occurred.

Applying the similar fact and collusion jurisprudence, the court held there was an air of reality to possible unconscious collusion because the complainants discussed their experiences before reporting to police, but the Crown disproved taint on a balance of probabilities.

The complainants' evidence was admitted on a count-to-count similar fact basis and materially strengthened the Crown's case.

The court found beyond a reasonable doubt that the touching occurred for sexual gratification and not as legitimate therapy, and entered convictions on all three counts.

The accused, charged with first-degree murder, applied for judicial interim release.

The Crown opposed bail on the secondary and tertiary grounds under s. 515(10) of the Criminal Code.

The court found that the accused's proposed electronic monitoring plan sufficiently addressed the secondary ground by minimizing the risk to public safety.

However, the court denied bail on the tertiary ground, concluding that detention was necessary to maintain public confidence in the administration of justice due to the strength of the Crown's case, the gravity of the offence, and the accused's extensive criminal record.

The accused brought Charter applications seeking a stay of proceedings or exclusion of evidence arising from police stops and searches following a 911 report of a domestic dispute and suspected drug trafficking.

Police stopped a vehicle containing approximately 32.5 pounds of marijuana and later stopped a second vehicle carrying cash.

The defence alleged breaches of sections 7, 8, and 9 of the Charter, including arbitrary detention, unreasonable search, loss of a 911 recording, degradation of evidence, and improper commingling of seized drugs.

The court held that the initial stop constituted a lawful investigative detention based on a detailed 911 call from an identified caller and that the officer’s observations and smell of marijuana provided reasonable grounds to arrest and search.

The loss of the 911 recording and evidence-handling issues did not prejudice the accused’s right to make full answer and defence.

The Charter applications were dismissed and the seized evidence ruled admissible.

The appellants appealed their convictions for assault causing bodily harm, arguing that the trial judge's verdict was unreasonable, that he erred in his assessment of eyewitness identification evidence, gave insufficient reasons, improperly relied on post-offence conduct, and failed to consider self-defence.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the appeal, finding that the trial judge's conclusions were reasonably supported by the evidence of independent eyewitnesses who observed the group assault.

The court held that the trial judge made no palpable and overriding errors in his credibility findings, properly applied the law regarding parties to an offence, and correctly assessed the post-offence conduct of fleeing the scene.

The applicant sought the release of seized cash under s. 462.34 of the Criminal Code to fund legal expenses in pending criminal proceedings.

Police had seized more than $1 million in cash during a search that also uncovered drugs and other evidence.

The court accepted that the seized funds were available for potential release and that the applicant had established sole entitlement to the money despite arguments about possible competing claims.

However, the applicant failed to demonstrate financial need, as required under s. 462.34, given inconsistencies between his claimed lack of assets and evidence that he possessed substantial unexplained cash and lived in a mortgage-free home.

The application for release of funds for legal fees was therefore denied.

The appellant appealed convictions for historical sexual offences against seven boys, six of whom were former speech therapy patients and one of whom was his step-nephew, as well as a six-year penitentiary sentence.

The court rejected arguments that the trial judge scrutinized the accused's memory more harshly than the complainants' recollections, failed to distinguish credibility from reliability, improperly admitted similar fact evidence, and should have quashed one count for vagueness of timeframe.

The court held that the similar fact evidence properly went to whether the actus reus occurred in the patient counts, that there was no air of reality to collusion or tainting, and that the indictment gave sufficient information to permit a defence.

The sentence was within the normal range for sexual offences by an adult in a position of trust who groomed children over time.